The Board of Aldermen will not challenge a superior court’s decision that strikes down a city ordinance restricting where convicted sex offenders can live in Rutland. … Hoar’s ruling said Rutland had “not meaningfully articulated” the danger posed by sex offenders and said the city “declares plaintiffs nuisances for no discernible activity but drawing breath.” “What the city has done here is effectively to declare an entire class of persons to be a public nuisance by simple virtue of their physical existence,” Hoar said. “Plaintiffs have been convicted and punished;…
Read MoreCategory: National
The psychology behind making others the villain
[sosen.org] With all of sexual harassment charges floating around possibly it’s time for us to look at the psychological reason why this is such a touchy subject. Okay, I don’t know if anybody else sees this, maybe my experiences are different than other people’s, but from my point of view the feminists have opened themselves up to having the pendulum swing the other direction, this could push our society back towards Victorian values of high neck collars and long dresses in the workplace coupled with modern high-tech body cameras on…
Read MoreWI: Sun Prairie alders eye sex offender residency ordinance changes after lawsuit threats
[hngnews.com] Convicted sex offenders are threatening to file lawsuits over an ordinance that restricts where they can live in the City of Sun Prairie. City officials plan to head off litigation by considering changes to the city ordinance next week. It’s something other Wisconsin municipalities dealt with this year after a federal court ruled that ordinances restricting where convicted sex offenders could live were unconstitutional. Registered sex offenders aren’t allowed to live or loiter within 1,500 feet of a school, daycare center, park, playground, church, and other places where children…
Read MoreVA: It’s Time to Reduce, Reconstruct, Reclassify, Rethink and Reform the Virginia Sex Offender Registry
[restoringintegritytovirginiaregistry.blogspot.com] Virginia Bill HB144- Patroned by Delegate Mark Cole Would Allow RSO’s Convicted of a Misdemeanor to Petition for Removal from the VSP Registry After 7 Years Instead Having to Wait 15 Years A Bill has just posted in LIS (see below) and I am just dumbstruck. It’s a positive Bill that would only help a small percentage of Virginia RSO’s, but it actually helps instead of hurts and that’s why I’m shocked at the moment. I have no idea where this proposal came from as I have not been…
Read MoreFL: Lawsuit over ‘defamatory’ ECSO billboard dismissed
A man who claims he was falsely labeled as a sexual predator on a law enforcement billboard had his defamation lawsuit thrown out Monday. Full Article
Read MoreFight Against Mugshot Sites Brings Little Success
[pewtrusts.org] Mike Anderson was an 18-year-old freshman at Texas State University when he was busted with less than a gram of weed. Police arrested him, took his mugshot, and he spent the night in jail. The legal consequences for being caught with such a small amount of marijuana — just enough for a joint or two — were minimal, but expensive. Prosecutors offered to drop the charges if he attended a drug program and did community service, and he could later get the record of his arrest expunged for about…
Read MoreCT: Sentencing Commission Forwards Two Recommendations, Hit Pause On More Bail Changes
[ctnewsjunkie.com] HARTFORD, CT — A proposal that would allow some on the sex offender registry to petition to shorten their registration period or apply for removal from the registry was unanimously approved Thursday by the Sentencing Commission. The Sentencing Commission also approved recommending reducing misdemeanor sentencing from 365 days to 364 days. That one day would give immigration judges more discretion in deportation hearings. They decided to continue to study the issue of a constitutional amendment on pre-trial release and detention that would deny release to high-risk defendants and deny…
Read MoreVA: Action Item for Virginia 2018 Companion Bills, HB10 and SB112 to Expand the Victims Under a Hate Crime
[http://restoringintegritytovirginiaregistry.blogspot.com] A set of Companion Bills HB10/SB112 have been filed for the upcoming 2018 Virginia General Assembly session to expand the victims under a Hate Crime to also include disability, gender, gender identity, and sexual orientation to the categories of victims. The definition of a Hate Crime: Hate crime (also known as bias-motivated crime) is a usually violent, prejudice motivated crime that occurs when a perpetrator targets a victim because of his or her perceived membership in a certain social group. Examples of such groups include but are not limited…
Read MoreFL: New school program helps first-time sex offenders
[Ocala.com] Students engaged in consensual sexual activity Each school year, about three dozen Marion County students on average get kicked out of school after being caught groping or engaged in a consensual sex act on a school bus or on campus. To reduce the amount of lost instruction time, the School District will launch a new diversion program in January for first-time offenders in hopes of keeping these students in the classroom. Students caught in the act can forgo attending an alternative school if they attend six nights of after-school…
Read MoreVT: Judge strikes down Rutland’s limits on where sex offenders can live
[vtdigger.org] RUTLAND — A judge has shot down an ordinance in Rutland that limited where convicted sex offenders can live in the community. “The case hinges on the question whether the City of Rutland has the power to declare people nuisances,” Rutland Superior Court Judge Samuel Hoar wrote recently in the strongly worded 13-page ruling. “It does not.” The ordinance, which the city’s Board of Aldermen adopted in 2008, prohibited any offender convicted of a sex crime against a child from living in the city within 1,000 feet of…
Read MoreLA: Jury finds ______ guilty of 2nd degree murder in 2015 killing of his girlfriend’s convicted molester
[The Advocate] _____________, who confessed to fatally stabbing and strangling his girlfriend’s convicted molester inside the man’s Zachary trailer and stuffing his body into a 55-gallon container, was found guilty of second-degree murder Thursday in the brutal July 4, 2015, slaying. _____, 23, of Walker, faces a mandatory term of life in prison when he is sentenced Jan. 18 by state District Judge Tony Marabella. He will remain in custody until then. His girlfriend, _____, 20, also of Walker, pleaded guilty earlier this year to manslaughter, testified for the…
Read MoreKY: A lawmaker accused of molesting a teen killed himself. His widow calls it a ‘high-tech lynching.’
Dan Johnson posted a final message on Facebook to his friends and family Wednesday afternoon. It appeared to be a goodbye. In it, he denied the accusations that had tormented him and his family for the past 48 hours — that he, a Kentucky state representative and the self-proclaimed “Pope” of his Louisville church — had gotten drunk and molested a 17-year-old girl during a sleepover at the church years ago. Full Article
Read MorePA: Legislature moves to keep 17,000 sex offenders on state registry
HARRISBURG — The state House on Tuesday voted unanimously on changes to the state’s sexual offender registry intended to correct problems the state Supreme Court identified as unconstitutional. If left uncorrected, more than three-quarters of the more than 20,000 people now registering on the Megan’s Law list might need to be removed, according to data provided by the Pennsylvania State Police. Full Article
Read MoreTX: State law changed where sex offenders can walk within West Lake Hills
The city of West Lake Hills adopted changes to its sex offender ordinance to be in compliance with state law during the Dec. 13 City Council meeting with hope that the changes will cause Texas Voices for Reason and Justice to drop its lawsuit against the city. Full Article
Read MoreIN: ACLU says sex offender law is tougher on new Hoosiers
Three men have filed a lawsuit against the Indiana Department of Correction, claiming Indiana’s requirement that they register as sex offenders violates their Constitutional rights. Full Article
Read MoreJudge Roy Moore’s Child Sexual Abuse Was an “Open Secret”
[Psychology Today] It’s the people we know and trust, not strangers, who are most likely to engage in harmful sexual behavior. There has been a tidal wave of accusations of sexual abuse committed against women and/or children from powerful men in media and politics including Harvey Weinstein, Kevin Spacey, Louis C.K., and Roy Moore, the former judge running for Senator in Alabama’s special election, and there will probably be many more, spurred on by the #MeToo movement. What makes these cases so maddening is that many people were aware…
Read MoreFL: Oconomowoc tweaks sex offender residency restrictions in wake of federal court decision
[Florida Journal Sentinel] CITY OF OCONOMOWOC – The common council on Tuesday, Dec. 5, voted to repeal and replace the city’s 2011 ordinance outlining residency restrictions for registered sex offenders, joining a handful of other area communities to do so in the wake of lawsuits and a federal court decision earlier this year. Under the new rules, registered sex offenders who did not live in the city at the time of their offense could petition the common council to move into Oconomowoc. Such offenders are currently barred from attempting…
Read MoreFL: Death of sex offender in Georgia State Prison suspicious
[Florida Action Committee] Charles Lee Broady was halfway into a three-year sentence for failure to register as a sex offender when he was found dead, hanging in his cell. Next week, Broady was supposed to appear in Federal Court in a case he brought against the Georgia Department of Corrections after officers allowed gang members to attack him. The previous attacks had been so bad that, after one, his heart stopped and he had to be revived. His family suspects foul play. Read article
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