Tag: Minnesota

State officials are pushing back against a series of proposed reforms to Minnesota’s troubled sex offender program ahead of a high-profile court hearing next week. Citing concerns about costs, staff shortages and community opposition, administrators of the program argued in court filings this week against reforms that could accelerate the release of sex offenders from the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP). The program currently holds about 720 sex offenders indefinitely at secure treatment centers in Moose Lake and St. Peter. In June, U.S. District Court Judge Donovan Frank declared the…

The essence of the American criminal justice system is reactive, not predictive: You are punished for the crime you committed. You can’t be punished simply because you might commit one someday. You certainly can’t be held indefinitely to prevent that possibility. And yet that is exactly what is happening to about 5,000 people convicted of sex crimes around the country. This population, which nearly doubled in the last decade, has completed prison sentences but remains held in what is deceptively called civil commitment — the practice of keeping someone locked…

Frustrated by legislative inaction, the federal judge who found Minnesota’s sex offender program unconstitutional has threatened a “more forceful solution” if state leaders fail to implement immediate reforms. In a harshly worded order issued Wednesday, Judge Donovan Frank of the U.S. District Court in St. Paul called on the state to correct systemic problems with the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP), which locks up about 720 sex offenders who have completed their prison terms but are deemed unsafe for public release. Frank gave the state until Sept. 21 to file…

A federal judge has barred the media and other members of the public from attending a legal parley on a case that will determine the future of Minnesota’s sex offender program, a ruling that immediately raised questions about public access and open government. Full Article

Federal Judge Donovan Frank recently handed down an opinion on a lawsuit challenging the legality of Minnesota’s indefinite confinement of sex offenders after they finish their prison sentences. Full Article

A federal judge ruled Wednesday morning that Minnesota’s controversial system of confining convicted sex offenders violates the U.S. Constitution. U.S. District Judge Donovan Frank ruled that the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP) is unconstitutional because it fails to provide adequate protections for civilly committed offenders, including regular assessments of their risk level and access to less-restrictive treatment alternatives in the community. Full Article Ruling

“And justice for all.” Boy, did I believe that as a child, when I placed my hand on my chest and recited the Pledge of Allegiance with fellow grade-school classmates. Although I grew up and smelled the coffee, that ideal is still implanted in my psyche. Dan Gustafson also grew up not only believing in it but walking the talk as a trial lawyer. On Monday, the former high school dropout, twice named a “super lawyer” in Minnesota by a prestigious legal magazine, will go to bat in a federal…

he class-action lawsuit featuring more than 700 civilly committed sex offenders, many from Moose Lake, will go to trial in a St. Paul courtroom beginning Monday after a judge denied the state and its defendants a summary judgment earlier this week. In his ruling filed Monday, U.S. District Judge Donovan Frank scolded the state’s legislative and executive branches for having “let politics, rather than the rule of law and the rights of ‘all’ of their citizens, guide their decisions.” Full Article

Twenty states and the District of Columbia have laws that allow for sexually dangerous people to be committed civilly. An Associated Press survey of those programs found that ____ is one of only nine committed female sex offenders, and the only one living in an all-male unit, which experts called shocking. Full Article