Category: National

‘I lost my retirement, my career, my home’: the Americans imprisoned for being HIV-positive

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Source: theguardian.com 12/1/22 Thirty-three states maintain laws tied to exposure or transmission, many developed long before the illness was understood Robert Suttle was 30 when he was arrested and imprisoned for the felony of “intentional exposure to the Aids virus”. He had met the man at a gay club on New Year’s Eve 2007 and they had quickly begun a relationship. Suttle says he disclosed his status as HIV-positive to his partner immediately. However, when the couple separated a few months later, the man pressed charges claiming that Suttle had…

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TX: Shenandoah denies request in sex offender ordinance to allow end-of-life care at relative’s home

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Source: yourconroenews.com 11/25/22 An elderly bed-ridden registered sex offender will not be allowed to move in with relatives in a Montgomery County home for end-of-life care after Shenandoah city leaders declined to amend an ordinance that restricts residency. The daughter of the 79-year-old man sought a waiver to the ordinance adopted in 2018 which restricts registered sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of a child safety zone per state law. That zone includes schools, parks and public swimming pools. City Attorney William Ferebee said neither state law nor the…

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Twitch is, Vaguely, Working to Fix its Child Predator and Groomer Problem

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Source: gizmodo.com 11/23/22 Twitch has been hounded for months after a September report showed just how many sexual predators were stalking the streaming platform’s halls, targeting children that were not supposed to be there in the first place. Now the company says it’s developed systems to combat child sexual abuse material, though it’s not exactly sharing the details. In a Tuesday blog post, Twitch said it is working on a “constantly evolving approach” to limit harm to young people. The user-streaming platform said it’s creating phone verification requirements for “potentially…

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NY: Hundreds of New York Women Are About to Sue Alleged Rapists (and Enablers) Under a Revolutionary New Law

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Source: motherjones.com 11/23/22 For years, former president Donald Trump has been able to push off a lawsuit filed against him by E. Jean Carroll, a writer and advice columnist who says he raped her in a department store dressing room in the mid-1990s. When Carroll decided to come forward—describing the alleged assault in a book excerpt in 2019—Trump had been president for two years, and the statute of limitations to bring criminal charges or a lawsuit against him had long since passed. Carroll sued Trump for defamation instead, arguing that he’d smeared her in…

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National organization works to eliminate sex offender registries

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Source: alaskasnewssource.com 11/22/22 When Congress passed the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, it required states to enact a sex offender registry for those convicted of certain sex crimes. In the 28 years since the law has passed, sex offender registries have become a tool for the public to identify offenders and find out where they live. Now one national organization is working to eliminate those registries altogether. Robin Vander Wall serves as the chair of the National Association for Rational Sexual Offense Laws, or NARSOL. “Our…

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AR: Arkansas lawmakers begin pre-filing bills ahead of coming legislative session

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Source: ktlo.com 11/21/22 Arkansas state lawmakers filed 11 bills during the first four days of the period for lawmakers to file legislation in advance of the regular session that starts Jan. 9, 2023… … Separately, under his House Bill 1004, state Rep. David Ray, R-Maumelle, said the bill would require a complete address on the public sex offender website, and the current statute only requires the street name and block number. “Arkansas is one of only four states (the others being Maine, Washington, and Vermont) that does not give a…

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KOSA Would Let the Government Control What Young People See Online

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Source: eff.org 11/17/22 The latest version of the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) is focused on removing online information that people need to see—people of all ages. Letting governments—state or federal—decide what information anyone needs to see is a dangerous endeavor. On top of that, this bill, supposedly designed to protect our privacy, actually requires tech companies to collect more data on internet users than they already do.    EFF has long supported comprehensive privacy protections, but the details matter. KOSA gets the details consistently wrong, and that’s why we’re…

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UT: Audit: Staff shortage at Division of Adult Probation and Parole contributing to repeat offenses

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Source: ksl.com 11/16/22 A legislative audit blames recent “serious crimes” committed by people on probation or parole on high turnover rates and inexperience on one of Utah’s parole boards. The Utah Department of Correction’s Division of Adult Probation and Parole lacks the staff to adequately supervise and screen sex offenders and offenders with mental illnesses, according to the Legislative Auditor General Office’s new audit. The office presented its findings to the Legislative Audit Subcommittee on Tuesday, along with two other audits addressing the Board of Pardons and Parole, and cooperation…

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OH: Lawmakers consider changing penalties for sex offenders

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Source: journal-news.com 11/16/22 A bill to modify the state’s law on people charged civilly, but not criminally, with child sexual abuse had its first hearing Tuesday in the House Criminal Justice Committee. House Bill 689 would double the statute of limitations, from two years to four, for prosecuting a mandatory reporter who failed to report child abuse, said the bill’s sponsor, state Rep. Bill Seitz, R-Cincinnati. That is the longest period for any misdemeanor offense, he said. For cases in which the statute of limitations for prosecuting sex offenders has…

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60 Junior ROTC Instructors Accused of Sexual Misconduct in Past Five Years, Investigation Finds

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Source: military.com 11/16/22 Sixty instructors in the Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps have been accused of sexual misconduct against high school cadets in the last five years, according to a congressional report released Wednesday. Of those, allegations against 58 instructors were substantiated by local law enforcement or school officials, according to the report from the House Oversight Committee’s majority staff, which was released ahead of a hearing on the JROTC program Wednesday morning. The committee findings come after The New York Times reported earlier this year that at least 33…

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Elizabeth Smart and tech company launch app to locate missing children and adults

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Source: axios.com 11/16/22 Elizabeth Smart, who survived her harrowing abduction in Salt Lake City two decades ago, has partnered with Portland-based tech company Q5id to launch an app that aims to locate missing children and adults. Why it matters: More than 600,000 individuals go missing each year in the U.S., according to The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System. Details: Q5id Guardian, which launched Monday, allows app members to initiate an alert to other users the moment they believe their loved one is missing. Users can create profiles of their…

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NY: Review: Downstate Offers Sympathy for Sex Offenders and Scrutiny for Victims

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Source: theatermania.com 11/15/22 “Victims don’t lie,” a character confidently claims in Downstate, the provocative new drama by Bruce Norris, now making its New York debut at Playwrights Horizons. And in saying this, he is only regurgitating a bit of dogma that has been repeatedly affirmed by the dominant culture — particularly since the #MeToo movement of 2017. If you’re like me, you hear such sentiments and a little voice in your brain whispers, bullshit. In Downstate, that voice belongs to Dee (K. Todd Freeman, giving one of the most exhilarating…

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$20 million given to states and territories to register and track sex offenders

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Source: wtaj.com 11/14/22 The Office of Justice Programs Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking announced it has awarded approximately $20 million to help states, U.S. territories and tribal communities register and track sex offenders and protect Americans from sexual violence. .“Its important for the professionals charged with protecting the public to have information about where people convicted of sex offenses live, work and attend school,” Deputy Assistant Attorney General Maureen A. Henneberg said.  Read the full article  

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At least 269 K-12 educators arrested on child sex crimes in first 9 months of this year

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Source: foxnews.com 10/14/22 Nearly 270 public educators were arrested on child sex-related crimes in the U.S. in the first nine months of this year, ranging from grooming to raping underage students. An analysis conducted by Fox News Digital found that from Jan. 1 to Sept. 30, at least 269 educators were arrested, which works out to roughly one arrest a day. The 269 educators included four principals, two assistant principals, 226 teachers, 20 teacher’s aides and 17 substitute teachers.   At least 199 of the arrests, or 74%, involved alleged…

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ID: Idaho settles lawsuit over antiquated anti-sodomy law

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Source: whec.com 11/10/22 BOISE, Idaho (AP) — People who were convicted of having oral or anal sex under an antiquated Idaho law will be allowed to be removed from the state’s sex offender list, according to a settlement Idaho has reached to resolve a two-year-old lawsuit. The Idaho State Police will also pay the legal fees of the men who sued over the law, according to the settlement filed in Idaho’s U.S. District Court on Thursday. “There’s no reason in 2022 that anybody should be on the sex offender list…

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NC: Accusing opponent of being soft on sex offenders helps candidate to win

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Source: usnews.com 11/9/22 Republican Ted Budd has won the Senate race in North Carolina, edging out Democrat Cheri Beasley and dashing her party’s hopes of flipping the seat left open in the key battleground state by departing Republican Sen. Richard Burr. The victory keeps open Republicans’ pathway to gaining control of the chamber, while increasing the stakes for Democratic incumbents locked in other tight races around the country as the party attempts to hang onto power. … Budd ran a relentlessly negative ad campaign about Beasley, painting her as weak…

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