Twelve towns have passed ordinances to limit where sex offenders can live — barring offenders from living near schools, or child-care centers. But law enforcement oppose such bans. Renny Cushing of Hampton, a Democrat, told House colleagues that police know restrictions make monitoring offenders harder. “The chiefs of police do not want to have a situation where you take away one of the tools they have which is to track where sex offenders are. And that’s also why the coalition against sexual and domestic violence is in support of this legislation.”…
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MN: Judge lets Minnesota sex offender suit proceed
A federal judge allowed a constitutional challenge to Minnesota’s sex-offender program to proceed Thursday and issued a strongly worded challenge to the Legislature to step in and fix “a system that is clearly broken.” U.S. District Judge Donovan Frank didn’t rule on the merits of the constitutional claims brought by participants in the Minnesota Sex Offender Program, but he ordered a panel of court-appointed experts to gather further evidence and indicated that if plaintiffs’ claims hold up, the program is likely in serious constitutional trouble. Full Article
Read MoreWI: Scott Walker’s administration fires new sex offender administrator
Madison — Gov. Scott Walker’s administration Wednesday dropped a controversial new hire charged with evaluating sex offenders for release back into Wisconsin communities, a move that came only hours after Walker said he opposed the psychologist. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel first reported on the hire of Daniel Montaldi as “evaluation director” at the Sand Ridge Secure Treatment Center, a state facility for sex predators. Montaldi, who was to evaluate sex offenders and recommend to court officials which ones should be released, resigned from his post running Florida’s sex predator program six…
Read MoreIL: Reflections on the Campaign to Stop Jail Construction
When we began our campaign to stop jail construction in Champaign County in early 2012, I thought we were doomed. The grand plan to spend $20 million on this project seemed like a done deaI. The Sheriff was driving the initiative; the leading lights in the County Board seemed to think jail construction was the only prudent course. Yet, nearly two years later we have a very different scenario. The 2014 budget for Champaign County doesn’t include a single cent for jail construction. In fact, the county has allocated more than…
Read MoreMO: Sex offender from Ballwin area faces legal limbo
STE. GENEVIEVE COUNTY • There is a special wing here at the county jail that holds nine detainees who were convicted long ago for sex crimes. They already served their time in prison. Still, they wear bright orange jumpsuits as they await another kind of trial. Flagged as possible sexually violent predators, the Missouri attorney general’s office wants them held indefinitely at a secure state mental institution called Sex Offender Rehabilitation and Treatment Services, or SORTS. But first, in most of their cases, juries will be asked to make a rare decision in…
Read MoreOK: Convicted sex offender sues to stay in his home
PRYOR, OK — A convicted sex offender has sued the district attorney and city of Pryor over housing dispute. ____ ____ bought a home near Jefferson Elementary School in Pryor before the sex offender law was passed which would prevent him from living within 2,000 feet of the school. He was convicted of a child sexual offense in 2008. When he was released from prison in 2013, law enforcement told him he could not live in his house because of it’s proximity to a school. ____’s position is he owned the home…
Read MoreWI: Sexting can be considered child porn, so what penalties should kids face?
MILWAUKEE —Research shows one in five teens are sexting — the sending of sexually explicit text or email messages. WISN 12 News investigative reporter Colleen Henry looks into the problem facing parents, police and prosecutors — what to do with kids caught sharing these explicit messages. It’s a digital world, which can change as quick as the click of a camera. “I do think it has desensitized us to what we put out there. We share everything else. Why not share a picture of us?” University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee junior ____ said. Full…
Read MoreIN: Special Report – Stopping Near Sex Offenders
VANDERBURGH CO., IN (WFIE) – Thousands of students in the Tri-State ride the bus to and from school each day. Many of those stops are alarmingly close to registered sex offenders. 14 News followed several bus routes throughout the Tri-State and found children, some as young as five-years-old, waiting for the bus just feet away from registered sex offenders. Some parents are already vigilant, but for some parents, it was a wake up call. There are 471 sex offenders in Vanderburgh County. By law, those offenders cannot live within 1,000 feet of a…
Read MoreFL: Village becomes refuge for sex offenders
Pahokee (United States) (AFP) – Deep in the swamps of southern Florida, Miracle Village lies miles away from the nearest town, surrounded by sugar cane fields. Nearby, the irrigation canals are swarming with alligators. While the name suggests an idyllic rural getaway, the former plantation near Pahokee now is almost exclusively home to men who spent time in prison for sex crimes. Full Article
Read MoreIL: From W.A.R, Action Alert for Illinois Voices
This week, an Illinois Senate Committee will be considering SB2912, a bill that negatively impacts registered sex offenders (RSOs). We need you to take the following action on this bill: Follow the link below to complete a witness slip OPPOSING this billCall or write the sponsors and committee members and tell them you OPPOSE this billPlease do this RIGHT NOW! Don’t put it off. Your voice is critical in helping to STOP these bills before it goes to the full Senate for a vote! Please see the Illinois Voices website…
Read MoreIN: Sex offenders face hurdles rejoining society
Just mentioning the housing needs of convicted sex offenders is sure to raise the ire of many, with the prevailing attitude being “not in my neighborhood.” It’s an understandable reaction, because those who commit sex crimes often prey on the most helpless and vulnerable victims, our children. To say it’s an especially harmful crime falls short of describing the emotional havoc left in its wake. That’s why many states and locales have enacted laws requiring convicted offenders to register where they live and work; where and how they use the Internet,…
Read MoreNH: Sex Offender Says He Should Be Able To Attend Church
CONCORD, N.H. —A convicted sex offender took his fight to attend church to the state Supreme Court on Wednesday. A lower court told Jonathan Perfetto that he couldn’t go to church because his suspended sentence prohibits him from being around children. Perfetto was convicted in 2002 of possessing 61 images of child pornography. Barbara Keshen of the New Hampshire American Civil Liberties Union told the court that Perfetto, a Jehovah’s Witness, has a fundamental right to go to the church of his choice and should be permitted to be around the…
Read MorePA: Carbondale sued over Megan’s Law ordinance
A former Carbondale man forced from his home because his son is registered under Megan’s Law is suing the city and the mayor, alleging he was targeted for enforcement because he challenged the constitutionality of a city ordinance that limited where sex offenders could live. ____ ____ of Archbald claims his son, ____, was among 15 Megan’s Law offenders living in Carbondale in 2012, but he was the only one singled out by Mayor Justin Taylor for enforcement of the ordinance, which precluded registered sex offenders from living within…
Read MoreOR: Sex offender safety in question after deaths at prison
The safety of sex offenders at two Eastern Oregon prisons has been put in the spotlight this month after a lawsuit and a series of unexpected deaths. Early February marked the third unexpected death of an inmate convicted of sex crimes in as many months at Two Rivers Correctional Institution, Umatilla. At the same time, an inmate at Eastern Oregon Correctional Institution, Pendleton, is awaiting a judge’s decision after suing the prison for separation of sex offenders from the rest of the population to protect them from other inmates. ____ ____, 41,…
Read MoreIN: Frigid temperatures leave ex-offenders out in the cold
There’s controversy in Muncie over where convicted sex offenders should be allowed to live and the issue is becoming more heated because of the bitter cold. Mark called the city’s Jackson Street bridge home after his release from prison, where he served time for a sex offense involving a minor. When temperatures turn dangerously cold, Mark and four to eight other child sex offenders came to Christian Ministry Shelter, until the director got the news they must all leave. Full Article
Read MoreIL: Sex Offenders May Be Banned From Illinois County Fairs
A bill under consideration would ban registered sex offenders from going to county fairs. “There is a loophole in the current sex offender law that says you can’t work at the county fairs or you can’t be a vendor at the county fairs, but you can attend them,” Illinois State Representative Mike Smiddy told News 8′s Angie Sharp on Wednesday, February 12th, 2014. State Rep. Smiddy heard about the loophole following the 2013 Whiteside County Fair. The State’s Attorney for Whiteside County called him and explained an instance where a…
Read MoreTX: Dallas man says he was wrongly included in sex offender database
DALLAS — ____ ____ says the City of Dallas wrongfully made him register as a sex offender for 13 years. Now he wants the city to pay up. “I just feel like I deserve to be recompensed for what’s done happen in all this,” said ____, 43. “I just feel like it’s wrong.” ____ filed a $3 million federal lawsuit early last month, saying police violated his civil rights by refusing to recognize that he did not have a legal obligation to register. He filed the lawsuit after the city ultimately agreed…
Read MoreVA: Judge orders former Stafford teen’s name removed from sex offender registry, vacates sentence
Circuit Judge Jane Marum Roush on Monday ordered former Stafford County teen ____ ____’s name removed from the state’s Sex Offender Registry and vacated the convictions that put him there. The order resulted from Roush’s ruling that court-appointed attorney Denise Rafferty failed to provide effective assistance of counsel to Coker in 2007 as guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. Since January 2009, a team of attorneys with the Innocence Project at the University of Virginia School of Law, the law school’s Child Advocacy Clinic and JustChildren/Legal Aid of Charlottesville has been working…
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