It’s been 20 years since New Jersey’s Legislature passed Megan’s Law. The two decades since have been filled with legal challenges and disappointment it didn’t accomplish what many thought it would. It’s what happens when politics and emotion team to shortcut the legislative process. Full Opinion Piece
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My Turn: State officials must accept that sex offenders can change
People change. This is an incontrovertible truth in life. Yet, this concept seems to be lacking in the wonderful state that has become my home – at least it’s MIA in the New Hampshire state prison system. (Fortunately, it hasn’t hit our schools yet.) The money to be made by an opposite view – people don’t change – is real. The flawed anthropology that argues that people can’t change has no place in any serious attempt at rehabilitation. The shallow promises to act on behalf of change are the result…
Read MoreSex Offender Registries (SOR’s): TIME-FOR-A-CHANGE
Editor’s Note: Although this article is clearly editorial in nature, it contains a substantial amount of fact and data that have direct bearing on the subject. It’s also a long article, and I hope you’ll have the patience to read it through to the end. The article is in five sections: The History of Sex Offender Registries in the US, Sex Offender Registries are Manifestly Unjust, Sex Offender Registries Don’t Work, Sex Offender Registries Cost a Lot of Money, Conclusion Full Editorial
Read MoreSteve Blow Is Right About Sex Offender Laws, and Dallas Should Pay Attention
The debate about media sensationalism and moral panic concerning sex offenders is always a tough one for me, mainly because I think most news media chase the public’s interest in stories more than we create it. Our rule usually is that the biggest story is the one the most people will read. In that sense readers tell us what to write more than we tell them what to read. But, yeah, that is what I would say, isn’t it? When I see somebody else in my craft bringing a sound…
Read MoreOp-Ed: Harsher Sex Offender Restrictions Won’t Make Anyone Safer
Steve Blow and Josh Gravens are two of my new heroes. I met them both when I went to Dallas three weeks ago to speak at the Reform Sex Offender Laws convention. Gravens is a sex offender who also spoke at the convention. I went with him to see what it’s like to register and that became a story in itself. Full Opinion Piece
Read MoreOp-Ed: Sex Offender Laws Have Gone Too Far
Our draconian policies about sex offenses reflect our ignorance of them. … The upshot, experts say, is that the United States has the most draconian sex registration laws in the world. As a result, the number of registrants across the nation has swelled—doubling and then doubling again to 750,000—in the two decades since Jacob’s Law passed, according to data collected by the Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Full Article
Read MoreTX: Research won’t support Dallas proposal that amounts to housing ban for sex offenders
In saner times, what Josh Gravens did would be called “playing doctor” or “adolescent curiosity.” General embarrassment and a stern talking-to would have followed. And that would have been the end of it. But in this age of hysteria, the childhood misdeed will never end for Josh. And now the city of Dallas considers making it worse by declaring a great majority of the city off limits for him to live. By extension, that would mean his wife and five children, too. Full Opinion Piece From the same author: Kids are…
Read MoreWe’re becoming paranoid about kids, parks (Opinion)
A couple of weeks ago, the Debra Harrell story made national headlines. Harrell was arrested in North Augusta, S.C., and charged with a felony for letting her 9-year-old daughter play at a park while Harrell worked a shift at a local McDonald’s. Now, it has happened again, in Port St. Lucie, Fla., where a mother was charged with child neglect after letting her son go to a park by himself. Full Op-Ed Piece
Read MoreOpinion: Public sex offender registries, like one created with Megan’s Law, are often unfair and ineffective: magazine editor
Jacob Sullum, senior editor at Reason magazine, writes that sex offender databases are both over- and under-inclusive, and often fail to distinguish between dangerous predators and those with nonviolent offenses. Further, one survey found that 90% of sexually abused minors were assaulted by relatives or acquaintances, not strangers. Full Opinion Piece
Read MoreOp-Ed: They’re killing sex offenders, by Chris Dornin
I was pleased to see a recent Sentinel editorial declaring the Internet sex offender roster punitive. My nonprofit group Citizens for Criminal Justice Reform filed an amicus brief in December supporting John Doe, a former sex offender challenging the New Hampshire sex offender shaming list as an unconstitutional ex-post-facto punishment. Opinion Piece
Read MoreOpinion: Does an angry parent killing a child molester ever serve justice?
What do you think of a man who has been charged with killing an unarmed man? Inexcusable, right? Now, would it change your mind if the dead man had molested a child and the accused shooter was the child’s father? All right, here’s more information: The molestation happened a dozen years ago. Finally, would it change your thinking to know the dead man had already served time in prison for the crime and paid restitution? Opinion Piece
Read MoreWhy single out sex offenders? Drug dealers, drunken drivers live among us
Letter to the Editor – This is in response to the uproar of a registered sex offender living in Allouez: I would rather know if a convicted drug dealer, wife beater or, for that matter, a person convicted of having DUIs lived next to me. They are not monitored such as a registered sex offender and therefore are not under as much scrutiny as the mentioned offender. Full Letter
Read MoreIs Our Approach to Sex Offender Risk and Policy on the Mark?
Sex offender registration laws and policies appear to have been based on popular misconceptions regarding sex offenders. That is, law and policy were based on the premise that ALL sex offenders are a danger to society, a danger to children, strangers to their victims, and likely to reoffend (Levenson & D’Amora, 2007). However, this is not the case. Full Editorial
Read MoreOf sex trafficking and International Megan’s Law and cabbages and kings
A piece of legislation called International Megan’s Law—HR 4573—passed the U.S. House of Representatives, according to this article, June 20. The bill’s sponsor, U.S. Congressman Chris Smith, has been pushing this bill, in various forms, for years. It is aimed at sex trafficking in general and will largely affect American registrants traveling out of the country, but named after Megan Kanka, a seven year old child who was murdered twenty years ago, and touted as “…the model needed for the U.S. to persuade other countries to take action to stop both…
Read MoreCO: Reasonable residency rules for sex offenders in Commerce City
Commerce City’s solution to deciding where sex offenders can live is a model for how communities can reasonably handle residency requirements. Commerce City on Monday passed an amendment to its residency requirements, allowing registered sex offenders who aren’t sexually violent to seek exceptions to rules that ban them from living within 1,000 feet of a school, park, playground or day care center. Full Op-Ed Piece
Read MoreGrand Theft O.C. – The Ballad of Tony Rackauckas
I don’t live in Orange County, but I’ve been there. I enjoyed a couple of trips to “The OC” after my mom passed away about 3 1/2 years ago. The beaches are nice and there is a lot to see and do. I even visited a couple of the parks while I was there on 2011. The year 2011 was a landmark year for me, as I had to rebuild my life after losing my mom and my fiancee the year before. Apparently, 2011 was a landmark year for Orange…
Read MoreA Criminal Justice System in Crisis: Suspect Serial Killers Slip Through the Cracks in OC (Op-Ed)
In light of the recent arrests of two registered sex offenders in connection with four murders in Orange County, I’d like to share an article that I originally wrote a few months ago for OC Lawyer Magazine. The tragedy brings into focus the critical shortcomings of our state’s sex offender registry and the stress it puts on a criminal justice system already in crisis. As far as public policies goes, the laws regulating sex offenders are incredibly difficult to approach and reform, but we owe victims (and potential victims) a…
Read MoreNot Really, But Sort Of In Defense Of The ‘Pillowcase Rapist’ (Commentary)
Now I know that for some people, sex crimes are worse than actual murder. I know there a contingent of people who believe that rapists and sex offenders should be punished as if they committed murder, including having the death penalty on the table as option. For them sex offenders, especially those who committed crimes against children, should never see the light of day again (Hi John and Ken). I get that. What I’m about to touch on isn’t for you because I know that for you no amount of…
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