Estimates of the number of entries with crucial mistakes run into the tens of thousands. One man—and pretty much only one man—is trying to fix them. Full Article
Read MoreCategory: General News
Sex offenders registry may put man back in prison for offence committed as child
Josh Gravens is trying to figure out how he’s going to tell his five children that he might be going to prison for a very long time. Gravens, 28, is a one-time convicted juvenile sex offender facing a possible 25 years to life sentence for a felony related to a crime he committed in his childhood, and for which he has been to prison already. The current charge is not a repeat sex offence; he just failed to correctly update his personal information with his local police department in Texas.…
Read MoreDatabase Infamia: Exit from the Sex Offender Registries
Since originating in the early-mid 1990s, sex offender registration and community notification laws have swept the country, now affecting the lives of hundreds of thousands of individuals. The laws require that individuals provide, update and at least annually verify personal identifying information, which governments make publicly available via the Internet and other means. Typically retrospective in their reach, and sweeping in their breadth, the laws can target individuals for their lifetimes, imposing multiple hardships. This symposium contribution surveys the extent to which states now afford registrants an opportunity to secure…
Read MoreChris Hansen using crowd funding to get back to catching predators
Chris Hansen is going back into the predator-catching business, but this time he’s asking his fans to help him. The veteran network news correspondent, known for the “Dateline NBC” investigative series “To Catch a Predator,” is turning to crowd funding to support a new hidden-camera operation to capture men who use the Internet to find underage sex partners. The results will become the basis for a new series, “Hansen vs. Predator.” Full Article
Read MorePunitive Effect of Retroactive Application of Sex Offender Registration Requirements
Typically, the courts find that the retroactive application of sex offender registration statutes does not violate the Ex Post Facto Clause, because such statutes are found to be nonpunitive. See, e.g., Smith v. Doe, 538 U.S. 84 (2003). Recently, however, the Supreme Judicial Court of Maine held that particular amended provisions of the Maine Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (“SORNA”), as applied to Doe, the registrant in the case before it, Doe v. Anderson, 2015 ME 3, 2015 WL 149030 (not yet released for publication), were punitive and that…
Read MoreAnother (incredibly trivialized) attack on Social Security
The National Journal, an elite newsmagazine that claims to be “regarded as the most influential publication in Washington,” is trumpeting a big scoop about Social Security on its homepage. “Social Security Doles Out More Than $500,000 to Sexual Predators,” the Journal reports. Since the National Journal also claims to be “fiercely honest and scrupulously non-partisan,” this sounds like something worth looking into. Full Article Related http://oig.ssa.gov/sites/default/files/audit/full/pdf/A-06-14-14087.pdf Social Security Doles Out More Than $500,000 to Sexual Predators
Read MoreGenetics can make people more likely to commit sex offenses, study says (UK)
London (CNN) A new study has concluded that genetics as well as environment can influence the likelihood that a person will become a sexual offender. Full Article | Study [html] [pdf]
Read MoreGovernment Officials Damaging a Person’s Reputation Overseas
This is happening more and more; U.S. government officials are attacking registered citizens who live overseas or who are going on vacations overseas. They are doing this by notifying the other countries to the fact that registrants are in or traveling to their country and that our government is implying, that because a person is a registered citizen, that they are coming into or are living in the other country for the expressed purpose of committing additional criminal acts. So the question arises, do they notify other countries every time…
Read MoreGeneral Comments April 2015
Comments that are not specific to a certain post should go here, for the month of April 2015. Contributions should relate to the cause and goals of this organization and please, keep it courteous and civil.
Read MoreSex Offender Brunch!
When ____ ____ was 12, he was locked up for three and a half years for touching his sister’s vagina. Upon his release, ____ was added to the Texas Sex Offender Registry, a publicly searchable database that identifies him as the perpetrator of a sex crime and tracks where he lives. He was ostracized in high school, nearly chased out of college, and as an adult, has found it difficult to find work or lead a normal life. Full Article Related Lox, bagels, juice and sex offenders: Why I invited…
Read MoreHigh court orders review of sex offender GPS monitoring
WASHINGTON — State programs that use GPS systems to monitor sex offenders could eventually be jeopardized based on a preliminary Supreme Court ruling Monday. The justices gave a North Carolina sex offender another chance to prove in state court that being forced to wear a GPS monitoring bracelet for life could be unconstitutional. Full Article Related Los Angeles Times
Read MoreStop the sex-offender registry panic: “A lot of those dots on the map would never hurt your kids”
Lenore Skenazy came to fame for letting her 9-year-old son ride the New York subway home by himself. Or rather, she came to fame by letting him ride the subway home alone and then writing about it for the New York Sun. Recently, Skenazy has taken on a new, albeit related, cause: reform of the sex offender registry. Clearly, this lady is not afraid of controversy. On Sunday, she held a “Sex Offender Brunch” at her house to introduce “her friends in the press to her friends on the Registry.”…
Read MoreLox, bagels, juice and sex offenders: Why I invited two pariahs into my home
Sunday morning at 10 found me slicing the tomatoes and arranging the cheese platter. My husband was setting up the chairs. At 11, the doorbell rang. And so began my very first sex offender brunch. Full Article Lenore Skenazy is the author of the web blog Free-Range Kids. She was a speaker at the 2014 RSOL Conference in Dallas. My Interview in Salon about Sex Offenders & Child Safety on her blog.
Read MoreFrom Sexting to Sex Offender
Florida A&M University – This article explores the cultural phenomenon of sexting; the taking and sending of nude, digital pictures generally through the use of a cellphone; among teenagers and the possible legal consequences. It provides a history of the art of sexting, the origin of the Federal and Florida sex offenders registries and a case study of two Florida teenagers charged with creating and intent to distribute child pornography. Finally, it reviews previous amendments to child pornography laws in regards to teenage sexting and recommends a way forward for…
Read MoreFor the First Time Ever, a Prosecutor Will Go to Jail for Wrongfully Convicting an Innocent Man
Today in Texas, former prosecutor and judge Ken Anderson pled guilty to intentionally failing to disclose evidence in a case that sent an innocent man, Michael Morton, to prison for the murder of his wife. When trying the case as a prosecutor, Anderson possessed evidence that may have cleared Morton, including statements from the crime’s only eyewitness that Morton wasn’t the culprit. Anderson sat on this evidence, and then watched Morton get convicted. While Morton remained in prison for the next 25 years, Anderson’s career flourished, and he eventually became…
Read MoreNH: Sex Offender Policy: Registries, Residency Restrictions, And Beyond (Radio)
New Hampshire Public Radio – Laws limiting where sex-offenders can live have been used in many towns and states aimed at protecting vulnerable populations, especially children. But a growing chorus of critics from police to civil rights attorneys argues these laws are unconstitutional and even counterproductive. We’ll look at the options that communities have in dealing with this sensitive issue. Radio Show
Read MoreThe Unintended Costs of Bi-Partisanship
Over at the Beast, some whiney old coot has a piece up on a church here in Oregon that caters to sex offenders. Or at least, that’s how the assignment began. As I began researching the story, however, I discovered that the system we have in place for dealing with post-incarcerated sex offenders is shockingly cruel to those who no longer pose a credible threat to society and ridiculously ineffective for those who might. Much of the technical blame can be pinned on two famous bodies of legislation: Megan’s Laws and the Adam Walsh Act.…
Read MoreIs a lifetime of involuntary GPS monitoring constitutional?
When the Supreme Court ruled in 2012 that affixing GPS devices to vehicles to track their every move without court warrants was an unconstitutional trespass, the outcome was seen as one of the biggest high court decisions in the digital age. That precedent, which paved the way for the disabling of thousands of GPS devices clandestinely tacked onto vehicles by the authorities, is now being invoked to question the involuntary placement of GPS devices onto human beings. Full Article
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