NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) — On Friday, Tennessee became the first state to release an animal abuse registry. It includes the names of people convicted of having intentionally abused animals. Anyone can see the registry, pictures and where offenders live. Full Article
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VA: VSP launches Sex Offender Supplemental Registry
Virginia State Police have launched a Sex Offender Supplemental Registry online for public access, granting information on cases taking place before the sex offender registry’s founding. Full Article More from Virginia
Read MoreWI: Lawmaker seeks to close loophole for naked baby pictures
MADISON, WI (WTAQ) – Lots of families keep naked photos of their babies as keepsakes, but a Wisconsin lawmaker says some of those pictures are made for the wrong reasons. Assembly Republican John Jagler of Watertown is proposing a bill to ban nude baby photos for those intending to use them for sexual gratification. Full Article
Read MoreFL: Lawyer challenges Pasco predator ordinance
the constitutionality of Pasco County’s sexual predator ordinance, which is keeping ____ ____ ____ from returning to the Lutz area to live. _____ was sentenced to community control and sex offender probation after pleading guilty to a molestation charge in Hillsborough County. Full Article
Read MoreTX: Kids or Criminals? series – Locked up at 11, sex offender earns parole at age 32
Khristopher Hood has something he hasn’t had in decades. Hope. Hood was just 11 when he cried alone in his cell, locked up for molesting two younger female relatives. Now 32 and behind bars ever since, he just earned parole. The state will release him next year after he has nine months of intensive therapy. Sentenced to 40 years in 1995, Hood spent his childhood in state juvenile lockup and then, after he turned 17, in adult prison. Full Article
Read MoreWI: Public Defenders Office Questions Sex Offender Housing Bills
An attorney from the Wisconsin State Public Defender’s Office wants changes to a bill that would restrict housing options for released sex predators, saying it could put the state’s civil commitment law in constitutional jeopardy. Full Article
Read MoreTX: Under lawsuit threat, small cities loosen laws restricting sex offenders
The cities of Pottsboro, Gunter and Whitewright all repealed existing laws restricting sex offenders from schools and public parks at recent city council meetings. This decision came on the heels of a legal notice the cities received from the Texas Voices for Reason and Justice. The advocacy group’s attorney sent this notice threatening to file a legal claim against these three unless their sex offender regulations were repealed. Full Article
Read MoreNC: Federal Judge Enjoins Enforcement of Sex Offender Premises Restriction
Federal Judge Enjoins Enforcement of Sex Offender Premises Restriction Posted on Dec. 17, 2015, 12:51 pm by Jamie Markham • 3 comments A federal judge has permanently enjoined all North Carolina district attorneys from enforcing G.S. 14-208.18(a)(3), the law intended to prohibit certain sex offenders from being at places where minors gather for regularly scheduled educational, recreational, or social programs. Full Article
Read MoreMI: Michigan Supreme Court takes sex offender list case
The Michigan Supreme Court has agreed to look at the case of a man who’s on the sex offender list for life, although his conviction was erased nearly 20 years ago. Full Article
Read MoreTX: Why Texas’ civil commitment program was found unconstitutional
Recently the Honorable P.K Reiter made headlines by finding Chapter 841 of the Texas Health and Safety Code unconstitutional. On Monday, December 14, Judge Reiter agreed with Defense Counsel Bill Marshall’s conclusion that the involuntary commitment of Alonzo May under the recently amended law was punitive and a denial of the man’s due process rights under both Texas and U.S. Full Article
Read MoreFL: Treasure Island to list sex offenders on city cable channel
TREASURE ISLAND — City residents will soon see pictures and information about sexual predators and offenders living in their neighborhoods on their local TV channel. Full Article
Read MoreMN: Former sex offenders left out in the cold by city residency restrictions
A City of Milwaukee ordinance passed by the Common Council in July 2014 is making it nearly impossible for former sex offenders to find housing. The ordinance restricts these ex-offenders from living within 2,000 feet of any school, licensed day care center, park, recreation trail or playground. Full Article
Read MoreMN: Order Halts Changes to Minnesota Sex Offender Program
A federal appeals court has granted a full stay of a judge’s order requiring changes to Minnesota’s sex offender program. Full Article
Read MoreSCOTUS declines to hear Ex-Post Facto case
The U.S. Supreme Court has denied a registered citizen the opportunity to further challenge whether a registration law applied to him retroactively violates the Constitution. As a result, the Court will not hear the case and his legal challenge to that law has ended. At issue was whether the retroactive application of a sex offender program violates the Ex Post Facto Clause of the United States Constitution where the program imposes numerous onerous obligations and restrictions upon a registrant for life, with no opportunity to terminate registration even upon a…
Read MoreTX: A first – visiting judge in Texas frees violent sex offender
HOUSTON (AP) — A visiting judge in Conroe has ordered, for the first time, the full release of a violent sex offender from the Texas civil commitment program. Reiter ruled that keeping May in the program would be unconstitutional. The state plans an appeal. Full Article
Read MoreNC: Officials say Brunswick sex offender court, while controversial, works
BRUNSWICK COUNTY — Southeastern North Carolina became the home of what officials there think is the first sex offender accountability and rehabilitation court program in the state after Ola Lewis noticed a trend in her Superior Court courtroom. Lewis, the senior resident Superior Court judge for Brunswick County, considered starting the court after several sex offenders came into her courthouse for violating the terms of their probation — namely not attending court-mandated treatment, which can cost about $40 a week. Full Article
Read MoreCO: DA – No charges in school sexting scandal
CANON CITY — The district attorney will not file charges against 106 students identified as participating in swapping 351 nude or questionable photos of their classmates following a month-long investigation into a sexting case. Full Article
Read MoreOR: Law could make sex offender data more accessible
There are 115 sex offenders registered in Baker County but only one will show up in a search of the Oregon State Police’s website. … The reason for the lack of information about registered sex offenders online is the result of Oregon law that prior to January 2014 limited OSP’s authority to list sex offenders on public websites to only those deemed “predatory” by the Oregon Board of Parole and Post-Prison Supervision. The new system, which will evaluate and place sex offenders at Level 1, Level 2 or Level 3…
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