[CBS Los Angeles] SIMI VALLEY (CBSLA) — Don’t take candy from strangers. But what about sexual offenders? The Simi Valley City Council decided on Monday night to overturn a law aimed at protecting children from sexual predators. City leaders say the law wouldn’t stand up in a legal appeal so they killed it. There will now be nothing to stop registered sex offenders in Simi Valley from interacting with trick-or-treaters. So when Halloween rolls around in a couple of weeks, parents say they’ll be a lot more vigilant. The ordinance…
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CO: County Sex-Offender Registry Pulled Down Because of Lawsuit Fears
[westword.com] As we’ve reported, Montrose County, on Colorado’s Western Slope, pulled its sex-offender list offline following a recent court ruling in which U.S. District Court Judge Richard Matsch found that such registries constituted cruel and unusual punishment in the case of three plaintiffs. The ruling is specific to the complainants in question, rather than everyone on the roster, and Colorado Attorney General Cynthia Coffman has announced her intention to appeal. So why make the move now? According to a representative from the sheriff’s office in Montrose, a fear of lawsuits.…
Read MoreIN: Sex offender class for prisoners violates Constitution, judge rules
[indystar.com] A federal judge has ruled that Indiana’s mandated sex offender classes for prisoners who oppose them violates the constitutional right to be free from self-incrimination. The Sept. 28 ruling in the class-action lawsuit filed in the Southern District of Indiana will affect all convicted, incarcerated sex offenders who opt out of the Indiana Sex Offender Monitoring and Management, or SOMM, program. Three of the plaintiffs will be eligible for release from prison. The Indiana attorney general’s office has filed an emergency request to temporarily halt the case pending an…
Read MoreSimi Valley Repeals Halloween Ordinance
The Simi Valley City Council unanimously agreed tonight to repeal its Halloween Ordinance which required the city’s registrants to post a sign on the front door of their homes as well as prohibited them from decorating their homes, answering the door to trick-or-treaters and illuminating any exterior lights. The City Council vote was taken without discussion or debate, however, the City Attorney recommended repeal of the ordinance prior to the meeting due to a lawsuit filed on behalf of a registrant and his family who reside in Simi Valley. “The…
Read MoreMI: Young Man Arrested for Underage Sex Was Re-Arrested for Sharing a Pizza with a 17-Year-Old
[Hit & Run blog at Reason.com] ____________, the young man from Elkhart, Indiana, whose harsh punishment for consensual sex with an underage teenager he wrongly believed was 17 made headlines around the country in 2015, has been arrested for violating his probation. What, exactly, did he do? He stopped by for dinner at his parents’ home. His younger brother was present, and incidentally, so was the brother’s friend. The brother thought this friend was 19 years old, but he turned out to be just 17. _______, unfortunately, is not allowed…
Read MoreThe DOJ Has Nearly Doubled Its Prosecutions For Child Sex Crimes Photo of Anders Hagstrom Anders Hagstrom
[The Daily Caller] Federal investigators nearly doubled the number of investigated sex crimes involving children between 2004 and 2013, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) announced Thursday. Child sex crime cases include possession or production of child pornography and child sex trafficking, the BJS reported. Federal investigators took up 1,405 of these cases in 2004, compared to 2,776 cases in 2013. More than 70 percent of the prosecutions each year were for possessing child pornography, followed by those suspected of sex trafficking at 18 percent and those who produced child…
Read MoreAZ: Transient sex offenders not bound by 72-hour notice
[The Seattle Times] PHOENIX (AP) — The state Supreme Court says registered sex offenders without addresses or permanent places of residence aren’t subject to Arizona’s requirement to provide notice of address changes within 72 hours. Instead, the court’s unanimous ruling Friday says those offenders only have to register as transients at least every 90 days. The ruling overturns a lower court’s ruling that upheld a man’s felony conviction for failing to notify law enforcement officials of a new residence or address within 72 hours after he left a halfway house…
Read MoreCA: California Is Right to Curb the Sex Offender Registry
[bloomberg.com] Say what you want about Governor Jerry Brown, but never say he’s not brave. He just signed a law that could eventually purge 90 percent of the names off of California’s lifetime registry for sex offenders. I expect that he, and the legislators who passed it, will be subjected to the withering outrage that accompanies any action or statement, however mild or correct, that seems “soft” on sex offenders. I once wrote a column suggesting that pedophiles who are attracted to children but do not act on their impulses…
Read MoreExtended Sentence
[slate.com] When David Silva returned in 2006 from serving 38 months in New Jersey state prison for offenses related to his substance abuse, he faced more than $35,000 in debt. He didn’t owe this money to private creditors; he was in debt to the government for his prosecutions and stints in prison. Silva’s debts for “use” of the criminal justice system included public defender fees, various surcharges that went to things such as police uniforms and drug-use prevention, and probation supervision fees, as well as restitution and fines. Silva’s debts…
Read MoreEthics and Religion Talk: Should congregations welcome sexual offenders?
[The Rapidian] Fred Stella, the Pracharak (Outreach Minister) for the West Michigan Hindu Temple, responds: “West Michigan Hindu Temple has not had to deal with this issue up to date so I have to speculate on this one. Before anything we must understand that the term ‘sex offender’ has multiple meanings. It stretches from a make out session gone a bit too far between teenagers who have just a couple of years of age difference between them all the way to the most heinous crimes beyond the imaginations of most…
Read MoreHow $40 Can Land You in Prison for Seven Years and on the Sex Offender Registry for Life
[truth-out.org] In December, after more than seven years behind bars, 32-year-old LeeAnn walked out of federal prison. But she’s not a free woman — she will spend the rest of her life on the sex offender registry. Her crime? Letting a girl shower in her mother’s apartment, giving her a clean change of clothes and holding the girl’s $40 while she had sex with a man in another room. These are normal actions in the daily life of sex workers trying to keep themselves and each other safe. But the…
Read MoreShould Animal Abusers Be Registered Like Sex Offenders?
[bigthink.com] One of the objectives of the criminal justice system is to protect the innocent and discourage would-be perpetrators from harming them. Whether it does this in reality or not is another matter. But who among us is more innocent or vulnerable than our pets? They rely on us for so much. Most of us consider our pet a member of the family. The question is, how far should the law go to protect them? This debate has blossomed recently, due to the number of US jurisdictions passing laws creating…
Read MoreMN: After Supreme Court Passes, What’s Next for Sex Offenders?
[U.S. News] When the U.S. Supreme Court last week declined to hear a challenge to the constitutionality of Minnesota‘s sex offender program, it relieved the pressure for major near-term change in a program that confines over 700 people who’ve finished their prison sentences. Only rarely is anyone released. Here’s a look at a program that is often opaque to the public, and at the handful of people who — at least on paper — may have a shot at release sometime soon: Read more
Read MoreJanice’s Journal: The Stage is Set
The stage is set. The Governor has signed the tiered registry bill into law, a law that opens a wide gap in the dam of California’s “Lifetime Registry for All”. A dam that was in place for 70 years. It is now our job to widen that gap. The Tiered Registry will take effect in January 2021, about 3 ½ years from now. While it is truly unfortunate that those who will benefit from the “new” tiered registry will have to wait so long, the lengthy gestation period for the…
Read MoreVA: It’s Time to Reduce, Reconstruct, Reclassify, Rethink and Reform the Virginia Sex Offender Registry
Professor Catherine Carpenter (Southwestern Law School), a nationally renowned criminal law scholar in the area of sex crimes and sex offender registration laws, came to St. Francis College on September 26 to talk about The Unconstitutionality of Sex Offense Laws. Read more and watch video
Read MoreIreland to be first in Europe to cancel passports of paedophiles
[Irish Examiner] Earlier this year Australia became the first country in the world to introduce strict legislation to clamp down on sex offenders leaving or attempting to go abroad. Now Ireland looks set to follow with draft legislation expected to be introduced later this month, which would pave the way for this country becoming the first European nation to make it illegal for convicted paedophiles to travel overseas. The campaign is being spearheaded by Fr Shay Cullen, the Nobel Peace Prize-nominated Irish missionary who runs the PREDA child abuse charity…
Read MoreRI: Bill restricting sex offenders in homeless shelters passes Rhode Island House, Senate
[Brown Daily Herald, Rhode Island] Last month, a bill that would cap the proportion of registered sex offenders in homeless shelter beds at 10 percent for shelters whose capacity exceeds 50 people passed in the Rhode Island State House. A coalition of activists are now asking via petition that Gov. Gina Raimondo veto the bill, arguing that the legislation is “against the public interest.” The bill passed the state Senate in June after the Senate Judiciary Committee recommended it for passage. The bill was passed in concurrence by the Rhode…
Read MoreMI: Sex registry rewrite should focus on risk
[The Detroit News] Michigan’s ill-advised scheme to pile on punishment for convicted sex offenders failed to get even a hearing before the U.S. Supreme Court, leaving the Legislature to craft a new law that will restore both sanity and fairness to the state’s sex offender registry. The High Court said Monday it will not take up Michigan’s appeal of a 6th Circuit Court ruling that struck down its practice of applying new restrictions retroactively to those on the list. Now, the state has no choice but to draft new rules…
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