Is the glass half empty or is the glass half full? It’s a question many have asked when they believe not all of their needs or desires have been met. The answer to that question often depends upon whether the person who asked it is an optimist or a pessimist.
I am an optimist and I declare that the glass is half full. That is, the California Sex Offender Management Board (CASOMB) has approved two proposed changes identified by the Alliance for Constitutional Sex Offense Laws (ACSOL) and CASOMB plans to approve a third proposed change after modifications are made.
Did CASOMB approve every change that ACSOL requested nine months ago? No, they did not. But CASOMB is now supporting changes that will benefit thousands of registrants and their families.
A path has been created where CASOMB is listening to and more importantly, acting on, requests made by ACSOL. It’s a path that ACSOL will continue to travel until the Tiered Registry Law allows all registrants to petition for removal. It may also be a path leading toward the ultimate abolition of the registry.
How long will it take to reach those important goals? The answers to those questions are unknown and in fact they are unknowable.
What we do know is that we can continue to help and support each other as we travel this path together. We are a community of registrants, family members and supporters.
Together we can celebrate those who are eligible to petition for removal as well as those whose petitions have been granted. Together we can listen to those who are not yet eligible to petition and encourage them to remain patient even when it is difficult to do so.
I encourage each and every member of our community to start thinking like an optimist. For when we do, we all will know that our glass is half full and that by working together we can fill the rest of that glass.
With all due respect, I disagree.
First, CASOMB is an organization based on an illegality. By “illegality” I mean that their very existence violates the core principles of the Constitution of the United States of America.
By cutting deals with them, they gain a false legitimacy.
Thank you for providing a place for a dissenting opinion.
I get seeing the glass as half full and applaud those who benefit from positive changes to the registration laws. I do truly try to do this.
I do struggle with having a Lifetime of Supervised Release for a first-time Federal Offense from an internet sting operation. I do get my part in all of this, but feel my sentence was bad luck rather than justice.
Anyway, thank you for the article and trying to keep us all thinking in a positive manner. I do appreciate the boost.
Thank you, Janice, and all at ACSOL for your tenacity at trying to fix one of the biggest flaws ever in legislation (in my opinion). People with a single MISDEMEANOR conviction (in their entire life) are being kept on this list FOR LIFE while others with felony convictions are rightfully allowed to petition to be removed. This is unacceptable, and I am grateful for your efforts. Let’s just hope the legislature and the governor will listen to these recommendations!!!
This is great news and very encouraging! I am currently on Parole and sincerely appreciate all you have done and are doing for us. I am a Tier 3 Registrant and was told I cannot petition for removal. I pray 🙏 one day you will be successful in all registrants being able to petition for removal. A true Miracle 🙏 would be seeing the Registration abolished!! I can’t even imagine how my life would change, if that happened! You are our Guardian Angel 😇 and I thank God for you every day! Thank you and your staff for everything and all your efforts on our behalf! God Bless you all!! 🙏❤️
My glass is neither half empty nor half full, because it’s broken…Ehh…I’m not too good with metaphores. I am, however, extremely grateful for the perseverance, and unrelenting compassion of Janice and everyone at ASCOL. While I’ve already accepted life on the registry myself, I will continue to hold out hope for the hundreds of thousands that may be released from it someday soon, and perhaps less restrictive policies for those who may still be on it well into their later years. Thank you everyone, for your rationality, and basic humanity.
My glass is half full. I was removed off the the Register and off the Megan Web site but I fear that it could be put back. If I move to another state I would have to reregistered.i still can’t get housing I was tier 3 .
Tiered registry was and is a positive move for many people who had ZERO recourse prior to its adaptation. Thankfully Janice and ACSOL are making efforts to abolish the registry. I’m one of many in the system who never had a physical relationship, but I am a lifetime registrant. At a minimum, we need a risk-based registry. Since I left the Golden State, I spent several months completely unable to rent an apartment, regardless of my many years incident free and successfully discharging from parole. Fortunately we, my wife and I, were able to qualify for a home loan and now live in our first ever “home of our own.” Oh, I also just passed my 1 year anniversary working for a local city through their 2nd chance program. Yet I couldn’t rent an apartment here. Go figure. Thank you Janice and everyone at or supporting ACSOL. The glass is half full!
I don’t see how any of this will benefit the remaining 49 States of the country. Perhaps if another State has a tiered registry, then maybe this could be a template for similar changes. However I know my State has no tiers. Rather only decades long requirements for registration. My State does distinguish actual Court determined predators on its registry, so maybe this could be an argument towards ending registration requirements for those not deemed predators. But again, without directly petitioning the parameters of each States registration requirements, I don’t see how this will change anything nationally. I feel in the war against the registry this is akin to a flat tire on a jeep. The entire registry mess is continuing for the remaining nearly 1 million PFR’s. I’m sure somewhere a registrant will be harassed, have an act of vigilantism or worse be murdered or harm brought to their family members. That seems to be the only real negative anyone of authority will listen to when making real changes to end the registry. Of course all that is going on anyway and it hasn’t changed anything, so what do I know?
Thank you, Janice! Half full indeed. Hope helps fill that glass, along with the feeling of community working with others to right what is clearly wrong with these senseless laws.
I believe this will benefit those outside of CA. The more noise made on this issue, the better, and many states are trying to make effective change so it certainly cannot hurt to witness ACSOL’s success, even if all state laws are different.
Lastly, I’ve been following ACSOL and I believe Janice has what it takes to push this all the way up the chain to the Supreme Court. She is brilliant, passionate, and works tirelessly…that’s a winning combo.
A realist says it is a full glass with two parts of differing substances, but I digress…
The steps they have taken are positive and should yield good results if allowed to do so by those in power, e.g., elected officials. For that, @ACSOL deserves kudos for such efforts.
Cautiously optimistic, those who follow the elected officials should do their part to hound them at the right time to vote in the right direction to pass them into law. At the same time, those who have the power to nominate these changes, e.g., CASOMB, should be made aware of the fallacy of the data they are using to justify such legal constructs, e.g., long tier terms based on static data, and how they appear to be less than honest when it comes to using such data based on false narratives.
My glass is 3/4 full. As a Tier 2 registrant with several years left prior to consideration for removal, I have to thank everyone from friends and family to ACSOL and Janice Bellucci. I learn so much and also know that I have an ombudsman looking to restore and protect my rights. Is it perfect? Heck, no. But it’s way better than otherwise. We must all work constantly to educate our legislators and reform our prosecutorial [PFR] restrictions and laws.
Hopefully someday we can restore sanity after the dog whistle laws brought on by Adam’s and Megan’s laws.
Before California pass SB384 I was a very pessimistic person, before that I was a lifer with no hope of ever getting off the registry.
Fortunately for me and others who were placed on the registry in there early teens the glass isn’t half empty it’s completely FULL.
This a sign of hope to a lot people trapped on the registry because of the type of crimes they committed in their pass, this is hope that one day they will go free and get to at least Die in peace.
First and foremost, I want to thank ACSOL for the efforts and successes this wonderful organization had fought for and achieved on behalf the Registrant community, families and supporters. Thank you.
As a registrant that stands to gain an enormous benefit from this, moving from T3 to T1, I cannot help but be thrilled by this. Instead of spending the rest of my life bound to this ball and chain of injustice, I may be in my last year of official Enemy of the State status. If this recommendation to the State Legislature were adopted today, that would be the result for me. How can I be anything other than thrilled and eternally grateful?
However, reviewing the comments posted here, I also cannot help but agree with many of them. Half measures….and collaboration lending the appearance of legitimacy to a fundamentally corrupt establishment? Both ideas ring true for me.
You cannot have dealings with CASOMB without acknowledging them as an authority, and by doing so you suggest that their authority is in some way legitimate. CASOMB is not a legitimate authority as they are inexorably tied to the fundamentally corrupt institution that is the Registry. This makes them an illegitimate institution, as such any authority they claim is also illegitimate.
A wonderfully just ideal, that will get people killed. Unfortunately, the world is a fundamentally corrupt place, filled with fundamentally corrupt people. Most people are fundamentally corrupt, God knows I am…and I suspect you are too. I, and I suspect you, simply justify our corruptions, and the self serving goals they help us achieve. That is, when we’re not too busy condemning others for doing the same. That, unfortunately, is life…. pursuing our self serving goals by whatever means we can consistently justify to ourselves and others on an as needed basis.
OK…off to the completely, and absolutely legitimate 99 cent store. Perhaps you can get directions to it with your…$5,000….iPhone? You can still get the base model iPhone that cheap….right? One wonders how THAT’S possible?
I’ll ride there on my High Horse, for unlike you…I’m quite comfortable on one. I have prepared a series of lectures on this subject, that I may favor you with at some point.
Thanks to ACSOL for your work to improve conditions for Registrants both in and outside of California. And for keeping us informed of current conditions and experiences of Registrants. For example, one of my elderly relatives who is not aware of my status asked me to drive her to a PX on a military base. I would have volunteered and not have given a thought to being stopped at the gate if I had not attended one of your monthly Zoom meetings and heard about this issue. I was able to get someone else to take her without having the embarrassment of being declined entry.
Do we know which specific code sections are up for recommendation from CASOMB?
Dear Janice,
Please know that you have filled my heart and soul with hope. I congratulate you and the rest of the ACSOL team for the work that you do and that not many would take up and fight for. You are a kind soul.
Thank you so much.
Annonymous
I petitioned to for removal from the registry just after my annual update back in February. Still waiting to hear anything and it’s been almost 8 months. Has anybody else already had their petition granted and how long did it take?
The unrelenting hate that’s associated with this label has been normalized as routine. I understand how behavioral biology and tribalism works so it’s not too difficult for me not to remain cynical and pessimistic. We’re talking about fighting against and reversing decades of indoctrination, brainwashing and fear/hate mongering. the lawmakers and media have created and profited from. The current “outrage culture” further exacerbates the widespread hysteria and resentment associated with this label.
There is no readily accessible “off switch” to any of this madness in sight.
Meanwhile, the proponents of keeping the registry around foolhardily continue to tout it’s merits because of the false sense of empowerment it affords them.
I m not trying to, and excuse me if I do step on some toes but the ASCOL HAS to fight for the rights of the past registrants, who have not commented another offense for 30 years but suffer homelessness joblessness as a result of these regulatory schem that holds power to remove Constitutional rights ( THE AFFECT) from individuals Megan’s law and the tiers registration are only information for the public, yet public shaming is also unconstitutional… some federal courts have already declare tier registration is unconstitutional..