The Alliance for Constitutional Sex Offense Laws (ACSOL) is dedicated to protecting the Constitution by restoring the civil rights of registrants and their families. In order to achieve that objective, ACSOL will educate and litigate as well as support or oppose legislation. The ACSOL website and recordings are provided as a service to registrants, registrants’ families, and others for general information only. The information on the website and in the recordings are not designed to provide legal or other advice or to create an attorney-client relationship. You should not take, or refrain from taking, action based on their content. Prior results and case studies do not guarantee a similar outcome in future representations. ACSOL accepts no responsibility for any loss or damages that may result from accessing or reliance on content on the ACSOL website and recordings and disclaim, to the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, any and all liability with respect to acts or omissions made by registrants, registrants’ families and others on the basis of content on the ACSOL website.
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Margretta Dwyer understands well the moral, legal and practical implications of dealing with sex offenders. But she hopes that Minnesota legislators working to revamp the civil commitment program also consider something else: Empathy. “I’m not saying sex offending is OK. I’m not saying be easy on them,” Dwyer said this week. “I’m saying there are ways we can help that are better than what...
Fifteen registered sex offenders were arrested this week for allegedly using email accounts on social networking sites like Facebook without first registering those accounts with the state Sex Offender Registry, officials announced Thursday. Under E-Stop legislation passed in 2008, these Oneida County sex offenders were charged with felonies and issued tickets to appear in Whitestown Town Court following a sweep by the Oneida County...
For people who find their faces splashed across mug shot websites, even if they were later found innocent of the crimes, it can haunt them for the rest of their lives. Now, lawmakers and even credit card companies are stepping in to help protect people from further humiliation. Owners of mug shot websites will post the photos released by police departments with the person's name...
___ ___ was a 41-year-old man with a long criminal record and a low IQ when he left Oakland in late 1999 and bedded down at a homeless shelter in San Mateo. Police found him there in March 2000 and discovered he had failed to reregister as a sex offender as required by law — once a year, within five days of his birthday,...
18
Dec
2013
I am old enough to remember the world before it went mad. I read about a child--a baby, really, six--suspended from school for sexual harassment after he kissed a little girl in his class on the hand. Yes, he had apparently given her attention before, and some indications are it was unwanted attention, and correction of behavior may well have been warranted, but SEXUAL HARASSMENT...
... "The last thing a parent should have to worry about when they send their child to school is whether a depraved sex offender is lurking around the corner from the jungle gym or classroom,” Rep. Themis Klarides, R-Derby, said when announcing the proposal last week. Full Article
Ten years ago, when I started my career as an assistant district attorney in the Roxbury neighborhood of Boston, I viewed the American criminal justice system as a vital institution that protected society from dangerous people. I once prosecuted a man for brutally attacking his wife with a flashlight, and another for sexually assaulting a waitress at a nightclub. I believed in the system...
Orange County won't be creating a Megan’s Law-style website for dangerous dogs any time soon. The county Board of Supervisors had been considering creating an online database listing the addresses of homes where dangerous dogs are kept, but on Tuesday a majority of supervisors said they don't support such a site. “I think that whole area needs a lot more study before we go in that...
17
Dec
2013
Florida senators filed a package of bills to crack down on violent sex predators Tuesday, promising to make sex offender reform the centerpiece of the upcoming legislative session. The senators propose longer prison sentences, stricter community monitoring and a wider pool of offenders who can be confined after their criminal sentences end. Lawmakers began working on the legislation after a Sun Sentinel investigation in August...
17
Dec
2013
One evening in February 2012, Vassar College students Xialou "Peter" Yu and Mary Claire Walker, both members of the school's rowing team, had a few drinks at a team gathering and left together as the party wound down. After a make-out session at a campus nightspot, they went to Yu's dorm room, where, by his account, they had sex that was not only consensual...
“My family would lose everything.” That’s the argument made by a King County sex offender terrified his name will be publicized if the State Patrol releases the sex offender registry it maintains. A married father of two convicted of sex crimes in 2009, the man is one of two low-level sex offenders brought forward by the American Civil Liberties Union in a lawsuit aimed at stopping the...
15
Dec
2013
On the same day last month that state Attorney General Kamala D. Harris was announcing an initiative designed to stop criminals from re-offending, prosecutors were in Antelope Valley Superior Court for a pretrial hearing in a case filed against ____ ____ ____, 70, a Valencia resident and three-time convicted sex offender. In the latest case against ____ due to go to court next year,...
Full implementation of a 6-year-old Nevada law may soon cause a dramatic increase in the number of registered sex offenders — raising questions about whether the intended punishment fits the crime. One state lawmaker suggested dumping part of the “terrible, overly harsh law” as it applies to juvenile offenders. Congress approved the Adam Walsh Act in 2006 as a guideline for state laws on...
The City of Sierra Madre has agreed to stop enforcement of its sex offender ordinance, which prohibited all registered sex offenders, from residing in most of the city and from being present in child safety zones that included the city's schools, parks and public library. The Sierra Madre City Council approved this action on December 10 after being sued in federal district court by one...
A Duluth High School senior has been suspended for one year and won't graduate on time for hugging a teacher last month. ____ ____, 17, was suspended last week when a school hearing officer found he violated the Gwinnett County Public Schools' rules on sexual harassment. Full Article
13
Dec
2013
The growing enactment of sex offender restrictions has been one of the most notable developments in criminal law in recent decades. Thus far, courts across the country have been relatively complacent in allowing legislatures to test the limits of various civil liberties. The Ex Post Facto Clause has been among the first constitutional victims of these new laws. Whereas the Clause was once construed...
Judge finds juror committed ‘serious, willful misconduct' for using standard dictionaries to look up a critical word during deliberations. SANTA ANA – A juror was removed for misconduct Wednesday for using dictionaries to look up a word during deliberations in a trial to determine whether a twice-convicted child molester should remain locked up in a mental hospital as a sexually violent predator. The juror...
Scott talks with Derek Logue about the push to get penalties for sex offenders changed. Link
(CNN) - U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander’s chief of staff was arrested on Wednesday on child pornography related charges, federal prosecutors said. ____ ____ ____, 35, was held pending a planned hearing on Thursday in federal court in Washington, according to a Justice Department statement. "I am stunned, surprised and disappointed by what I have learned," Alexander, a Tennessee Republican, said in a statement earlier...
12
Dec
2013
BOSTON (AP) — The state's highest court on Wednesday overturned the classification of a former escort service manager as a low-level sex offender, finding that the state's Sex Offender Registry Board should have considered research showing women are less likely than men to commit new sex offenses. Full Article