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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Janice's Journal
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MO: Students to be charged with distributing child porn
ST. CHARLES COUNTY – St. Peters police say some St. Charles County students are likely to be charged with distributing child pornography. NewsChannel 5 has exclusively learned the case involves nude selfies taken and texted out by students at Fort Zumwalt East High School. Full Article / Video
New School Bus Comes with “Predator Finder”
A brief glance won’t tell you the new buses are equipped with voice-over-IP communication systems, or that they transmit data on speed, location and acceleration in real-time. The “Thumbs-Up!” thumbprint scanner, which keeps track of which kids are on the bus and whether they’re supposed to be there, is also hard to see unless you’re really pressing your face to the glass, as are...
Let’s Rethink Our Love of Prisons
Delaware Judge Jan Jurden just helped to destroy the market in human souls, and for that, I am grateful. She refused to send a self-confessed child rapist to prison, letting him instead walk out the courthouse door, to begin a lengthy period of probation and treatment as a sex offender. Robert H. Richards IV, an heir to the DuPont chemical fortune, pleaded guilty to...
In defense of the judge who sentenced the man who raped his three year old daughter to probation (Op-Ed)
From one of the many, many articles and op/eds written about this case: "A Delaware man convicted of raping his three-year-old daughter only faced probation after a state Superior Court judge ruled he 'will not fare well' in prison." Those words, "will not fare well" in prison may go down as among the most, if not the most, infamous words ever attributed to a...
DA plans rare strategy to try to keep sex offender in Atascadero State Hospital
The San Luis Obispo County District Attorney’s Office plans to present victims from decades-old crimes to a jury in an effort to keep a convicted sex offender with an intriguing past off the streets. But a defense attorney says ___ ___ has served his time and does not pose a threat to the public. Full Article
IL: It’s time to take juveniles off the sex offender lists
A new report by the Illinois Juvenile Justice Commission takes aim at the disturbingly common practice of forcing juvenile sex offenders to comply with sex offender registries, often for life. Its conclusion: “Remove young people from the state’s counter-productive sex offender registry . . . There is no persuasive evidence that subjecting youth to registries improves public safety or reduces risks of future offending....
One size fits all isn’t always wise (Op-Ed)
Few public policies galvanize bipartisan political support like measures that target convicted sexual offenders. Lengthy prison sentences, registration and civil commitment for the most dangerous offenders are among the tools used to mete punishment, protect the public and serve justice. But as The Pilot's Louis Hansen reported Sunday, Virginia's practice of committing violent sex offenders to a lifetime on a public registry, and requiring them...
Recently identified Fresno sex offender murdered
FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- Days after a Fresno man was identified as a sex offender, he turned up dead. Now, two people will stand trial for his murder. ____ ____ was stabbed to death in Sept. 2012, just days after a sex offender sweep. An autopsy showed ____ was stabbed 58 times before his body was dumped near Chandler Airport. When U.S. Marshals and local police...
OpEd: Teens and the Sex Offender Registry – No Good Outcomes for Anyone
Last week, I hailed a taxi in Washington, D C, and asked the driver to take me to the Keck Building for a meeting with a committee of the National Research Council. The cabby recognized the address and asked if I was a scientist. I explained that I am a retired judge and that applying science and research to juvenile court could make us...
Aus: Sex offender squad faces axe
A specialist WA Police squad responsible for monitoring thousands of convicted sex predators could be axed as part of a push to shave millions off the police budget's bottom line. A high-level razor gang has been examining the operations of the sex offender management squad, which tracks the movements of more than 3000 rapists and paedophiles living in the community. Full Article
Sex offender therapy: A battle on multiple fronts
Working with individuals with sex offense convictions is a specialized area of counseling. There are also “specialties within the specialty” when factoring in the different venues for treatment, including programs in prison, in private practice (often with those on postprison supervision or probation) and in mental institutions. The individuals within this population are generally quite different, and the dynamics are made even more complex...
Editorial: This ‘answer’ for sex offenders is not right
They commit heinous sex crimes on children and women. They take online offers from children, hoping for sex. Their computers are libraries of pornography. Some decide to expose or relieve themselves in public. They are convicted of their crimes and sentenced. When they leave prison, they are forever known as sex offenders. Their crimes are despicable. There is no disputing that. But how long...
Let the Burden Fit the Crime: Extending Proportionality Review to Sex Offenders
Under current due process doctrine, punitive damages awards against civil defendants are reviewed for "proportionality" with the underlying misconduct, in accordance with traditional principles of retribution in punishment. This Comment argues that the same proportionality analysis could and should be applied to review statutes imposing harsh civil restrictions on the lives of released sex offenders who have already served their criminal sentences. The argument...
deserving a chance for a pardon
A 25-year-old registered sex offender has been granted a hearing before the Nebraska Board of Pardons. This is excellent news for this young man because if he is pardoned, he will regain his civil rights and he will no longer be on the sex offender registry. According to the Omaha World-Herald article, it is unusual for a sex offender to be granted a hearing because [t]he Pardons Board...
The Prison Industry in the United States: Big Business or a New Form of Slavery?
Human rights organizations, as well as political and social ones, are condemning what they are calling a new form of inhumane exploitation in the United States, where they say a prison population of up to 2 million – mostly Black and Hispanic – are working for various industries for a pittance. For the tycoons who have invested in the prison industry, it has been like...
FL: Gov. Rick Scott signs sexual predator laws
Gov. Rick Scott signed four landmark bills Tuesday designed to better protect children in Florida from sexual predator."Today I am proud to sign this legislation for all the children who have been terribly affected," he said. "I hope these measures and the awareness that we are bringing today will make a difference for generations to come." Full Article
General Comments April 2014
Comments that are not specific to a certain post should go here, for the month of April 2014. Contributions should relate to the cause and goals of this organization and please, keep it courteous and civil.
KY: Viewing child porn not victimless crime; Ky. punishment fair (Op-Ed)
I am a clinical psychologist, lately retired after 12 years of service to the state as an approved provider of sex-offender evaluations to the courts. I wish to address misconceptions in the Guy Hamilton-Smith commentary, in which he complained that he was being unduly punished by being required to register as a sex offender and the subsequent letter of support from Marjorie Valentine of...
VA: Navy increases base security after NSN shooting
The new measure requires drivers presenting a Transportation Worker Identification Credential (TWIC) to be subject to a criminal history check by the National Crime Information Center database. The database will check for previous convictions or outstanding warrants that are grounds for denying the driver access to the base, according to Navy Region Mid-Atlantic access standards — not the TWIC eligibility criteria. That means if...
How to Survive Police Interrogation at Your Door ( Video)
What do you say and do when a police officer knocks on your door at home? You always have the right to remain silent. In this video is a good example of how not to answer questions. This man only uses four little words to great effect: “I don’t answer questions.” Oh, yeah, RECORD EVERYTHING. Video