Initiative aimed at protecting children is prohibitively expensive, unenforceable
Sacramento Bee
A little more than a year ago, California voters overwhelmingly approved Proposition 83, popularly known as Jessica's Law. That initiative, aimed at monitoring and controlling sex offenders, now is collapsing under its own excess. Virtually no local government is enforcing the law because its sweeping provisions are both unenforceable and prohibitively expensive. ...
The measure requires lifetime monitoring for sex offenders – not just those charged with child sexual abuse and rapists whose victims were adults, but also those convicted of consensual sex with a teenager and even misdemeanor indecent exposure. It also bars offenders from living within 2,000 feet of a school or park. ...
So for now at least, the law is not being enforced, and there is a real question whether it ever will or even can be. ...
State corrections officials predicted the residency restrictions in the law would drive sex offenders underground and make our communities less safe. Now it also turns out that the measure would bankrupt local governments if it is enforced as written. California will be wrestling with this mess for years to come. Full Story
Editorial: 'Jessica's Law' one year later: Empty promises
During evacuations, Texas plan to weed out sex offenders
Houston Chronicle AUSTIN —
Texans who board evacuation buses during hurricanes or other emergencies must first submit to criminal background checks, the state's emergency management director said. The policy is an attempt to keep sex offenders and fugitives from boarding evacuation buses with children, the elderly and the disabled, said Jack Colley, the chief of the state's Division of Emergency Management.
... "We're all entitled to privacy, but we're not entitled to anonymity," Colley said. Full Story
Lake County D.A. Explains Why Murdering Someone On Megan's List Is Probably A Bad Idea
Michael Dodele never molested a child, he was convicted of raping an adult. But that didn't keep Ivan Garcia Oliver from misinterpreting Megan's Law website and doing his "moral" duty by slaughtering Dodele with a knife like a farm animal on November 20th.
We waited for Dodele's murder to be revealed by local authorities as the hate-crime it appeared to be but heard nothing for weeks, leading some of us to speculate that the police and D.A. were actively trying to suppress Oliver's motivation in the murder as a means of keeping Megan's website in California from coming under attack. It was not until several confidential sources took their concerns to the Los Angeles Times who then investigated and corroborated their suspicions in a page one story earlier this week, that we began to hear some acknowledgment from Lake County officials confirming "Megan's" role in the slaying.
Today, KCBS-TV (San Francisco) aired a piece on this story, interviewing local people in Lakeport as well as Lake County Chief Deputy District Attorney, Richard Hinchcliff. He stated, "If people don't know what they're looking at, they might assume somebody has been convicted of a particular crime they haven't been convicted of and people can't take the law into their own hands because they might make a mistake."
Wait a minute, Mr. Hinchcliff. Surely you're not suggesting either:
a) Taking the law into your own hands can be justified if you're not mistaken?
or
b) It would be alright to kill a child molester if you could be sure that is a molester?
I might be more inclined to let his remark go as a slip of the tongue had it not been for a well-grounded suspicion that his office was not intending to prosecute the case as "Megan-motivated".
KCBS further reports that "People in Lakeport agree the Megan's Law website is for information, not a map to kill."
Do they? I'm afraid I'm not buying that entirely, either. Having read the vicious comments by readers to the various local newspapers supporting Oliver's actions and cheering-on any revenge killing of "molesters" and having my own comments removed not just once, but twice, by the "Santa Rosa Press Democrat", I think KCBS may be entirely too charitable to the "people of Lakeport". Here's the comment I wrote, not just once, but twice. Both times it was promptly removed by someone at the Press-Democrat:
"This reminds me of how, once whipped-up into a frenzy of anti-Jewish hatred, many Germans felt fully justified in inflicting violent revenge against any Jew at any moment of their choosing and did so with impunity. It is especially disturbing when this sort of blood-thirsty response becomes commonplace and goes unprotested."
Now here are a few of the other comments which the Press-Democrat did not feel compelled to remove and which remain on their website to this day:
"
By saunterelle | Tuesday, Nov 27, 2007 06:47P
Thank you to this latino for taking care of business.
By orvicehole | Tuesday, Nov 27, 2007 06:34P
tIME TO DIE LOSER.
By robert5523 | Tuesday, Nov 27, 2007 04:20P
Why do I suspect nobody cares that the troublemaker got himself murdered? And, who wants to bet that, yes, he goosed the wrong guy & thats what started it.
By saunterelle | Tuesday, Nov 27, 2007 03:58P
Good. One less pederass.
"
Interesting, isn't it? Apparently, the Press Democrat only accepts reader comments if they advocate acts of violence and the abolition of the U.S. Constitution (although I doubt they would like it if "freedom of the press" were also abolished).
I think that this is very telling and extremely disturbing.
Megan's Law of unintended consequences
The recent killing of sex offender shows dangers of legislating punishment by ballot box
Patt Morrison, Los Angeles Times
So now two more lives are ruined.
Michael Dodele is rotting in a grave, and his neighbor, Ivan Garcia Oliver, is rotting in a Lake County jail cell; soon, by his own accounting, Oliver expects to be spending "a numerous amount of years" in a California slammer.
Dodele was a convicted rapist, a 67-year-old registered sex offender who had been living in a Lakeport trailer park for about a month when someone stabbed him to death just before Thanksgiving. Oliver is his accused killer, a 29-year-old construction worker who lived in the same trailer park. He was arrested with more blood on him than Lady Macbeth.
Dodele had spent two decades in prison or a state hospital for raping women, at least one time at knifepoint. The Megan's Law sex offender website -- which tracks most sex offenders, not just child molesters -- described his offenses as "rape by force" and "oral copulation with a person under 14 or by force."
Such a small word, "or." So easy to go right past it, especially when the scarlet phrase "oral copulation with a person under 14" sizzles off the screen. "Or"? Who cares about "or"?
Is anyone surprised that this death happened? Or just surprised that it didn't happen sooner, as it has in other states amid the froth of undifferentiated public and political fury about all sex offenders, from pathetic flashers to bona fide monsters who hurt children?
To get onto the Megan's Law website, I had to acknowledge a disclaimer saying that the state doesn't guarantee that the information is complete or accurate.
Not accurate or complete? Who should that alarm more -- the public or the 65,000 people listed? Some information may be rendered in hard-to-decipher legalese -- as appears to have been the case with that fatal "or." Some of it is flat-out wrong. I interviewed LAPD detective Diane Webb about it on KPCC radio this week. She's the coordinator of the LAPD's REACT -- registration, enforcement and compliance teams for sex offenders and Megan's Law.
Website mistakes, she told me, are sometimes as "mundane" as a "misplaced parenthesis in a code section," which can completely change the description of the conviction. Or they could come down to something as simple as the "capitalization of a letter" in the code, which would make a crime against an adult "show [up as] an offense against a child."
Who usually spots the mistake? The sex offender. "They oftentimes say, 'I'm not a child molester, this was an offense at an adult,' " Webb told me. Police verify it and let the state know the listing needs fixing.
There was evidently no mistake in Dodele's listing. But as Webb said, the penal code section for forcible oral copulation "is very similar to that of child molestation. They're oftentimes misinterpreted."
No politician ever lost votes by crusading against sex offenders. But voters don't always reckon on what happens after the votes are counted. Some of the same law enforcement leaders who persuaded 70% of us to vote for Proposition 83, which among other things mandates the tracking of tens of thousands of sex offenders with GPS for the rest of their lives, now worry that it's unenforceable. The law doesn't spell out who'll run the program or who'll pay for it. California is $14 billion short of this year's budget ante. Maybe we could all send in the money from our Monopoly games -- fantasy dough to pay for a fantasy law.
The Lakeport killing could shake some thinking about such laws. Suzanne Brown-McBride chairs the California Sex Offender Management Board, and she told me that the Megan's Law website is a useful community tool -- but it's only one tool. The point is "not to create vigilantism," she said, or to "have people then act out ... in a way that may put offenders and quite honestly themselves at risk." Vigilantism could make offenders "less stable." Oliver told The Times' Maria LaGanga that he had to take "evasive action ... any father in my position, with moral, home, family values, wouldn't have done any different." He'd seen Dodele watching his son, he declared, "fantasizing, plotting." When LaGanga told him that Dodele's rape victims were adult women -- not little girls or little boys -- Oliver said it didn't matter. "There is no curing the people that do it."
Is there any curing us? Do we have the judgment to take serious crimes seriously without plunging ourselves into policy hysteria? Can we acknowledge that no protection, no punishment, is foolproof? Can anyone suggest that we fine-tune Megan's Law, or conclude that Proposition 83 is goofy, without being labeled a friend of child molesters?
Dodele's name and crimes were listed on the state's Megan's Law sex offender public website; Oliver found them on a computer. Oliver was on parole for assault with a deadly weapon, but his name and crime were not on any such public website.
But just wait long enough. We may get around to voting for a website listing that too. Hey -- we can call it Oliver's Law. Like that?
Neighbor convicted of stalking sex offender
By Beacon Journal staff report
POSTED: 05:04 p.m. EST, Dec 13, 2007
A Springfield Township neighbor who placed large signs with red letters announcing a convicted child molester lives next door has been convicted of stalking the man.
James Z. Cody, 50, was sentenced to 30 days in jail Thursday by Akron Municipal Court Judge Kathryn Michael. The jail sentence came, court officials said, after Cody declined to be placed on probation for six months.
Cody was acquitted by a jury of charges of violating a protection order, aggravating menacing and resisting arrest. He is set to begin his jail stay on Jan. 3.
Assistant Akron prosecutor Gerald Larson said Cody engaged in a personal crusade against Michael Harig, 45, who spent nearly a year in prison for fondling three boys, ages 12, 13 and 14 in 2004. Harig is registered as a sexually oriented offender and lives next door to Cody on Gregory Drive.
Larson said the stalking charge involved an on-going series of events perpetrated by Cody against Harig that included death threats, the placement of several signs outside his home and Cody bursting inside Harig's home and threatening him.
Harig said that he has been harassed, spotlights have been pointed into his bedroom window, a radio has been blared toward his home and physical threats have been made against him.
Hall was charged in August with criminal trespassing for entering Harig's home, but the case was eventually dropped. Full Story
Police monitor Santa's village for registered sex offenders
Linda Strowbridge, Owings Mills Times
Plain clothes officers from the Baltimore County Police Department are wandering among the holiday crowds at shopping centers this month, searching for a hazard that might be lurking near Santa's village, food courts or stores. Specifically, the officers are looking for registered sex offenders who have been prohibited from being near children.
The operation "seemed like a chance to find out if registered sex offenders are using the holidays as an opportunity to be around children when they shouldn't," said Bill Toohey, a police spokesman. "Just being in a place with kids might not be a violation. But if they're circling and watching, that could be."
Toohey declined to comment on the number of officers assigned to the detail or the project's budget. The initiative was funded through a $110,000 grant from the state Sex Offenders Compliance Enforcement in Maryland program, called SOCEM by law enforcement officials.
About 570 registered sex offenders live in Baltimore County. More than two-thirds are child sex offenders. So far this year, Baltimore County police have issued warrants on 40 sex offenders for either failing to sign onto the sex offender registry or failing to notify officials that they had moved.
"We don't know what we'll find" over the holidays, Toohey said.The county has not detected problems with sex offenders casing holiday crowds previously, he said.
Neither Baltimore County nor any other Maryland jurisdiction has previously sent undercover officers to watch for sex offenders in those crowds, said Elizabeth Bartholomew, a spokeswoman for Maryland's Division of Probation and Parole. The agency is working with Baltimore County police in piloting the surveillance program.
"I think Baltimore County will be a trendsetter in this area," she said. "They're trying to aid (offenders') attempts to become law-abiding citizens."
The division has already sent letters to local child sex offenders, alerting them to the surveillance program and reminding them to stay away from malls during high-traffic hours and to stay away from places where children might gather, such as food courts, game rooms and Santa displays, Bartholomew said. Full Story [Ed: Too loopy even to comment upon except to say that, it's great that the police have such prodigious resources that they're able to take care of real threats and do this too! (but oh, what a dangerous assignment!) ]
Contact Unit/Address Contact Name/Phone
Sex Offender Commitment Program
1600 9th Street, RM 250
Sacramento, CA 95814 Brenda Epperly-Ellis
916-653-1843
John Lofton talked to her on nov 19 and she responded by letter.
nov 19, "I am currently a patient being detained here at C.S.H. I have a very important question I wish to have answered concerning our unlawful detainment here. This issue should be made known to the public so they will know the truth about what types of people are brought here under the: Sexually Violent Predator Act. My question is, of the specific types of people that are detained here under the S.V.P.A. since 1996, its year of enactment, the media for the last 10 years has shown that gang members with sex crimes, but there are not any of these individuals at Coalinga State Hospital! Why?
We know that gang members have a considerable amount of sex offenses. What this boils down to is that we know for a fact that these types of individuals who have sex offense convications are being specifically excluded from the S.V.P.A. We believe that this is partially due to the administration not wanting to deal with the problems that would derive from having these types of sex offender/gang members housed here. For example, fighting, assaults on staff, assaults on other patients whose crimes were against children. We know for a fact that the administration does not want to deal with that kind of aggressive environment.
As a result, these individuals who are deemed aggressive and pose a threat to the hospital are then "Skipped" and therefore released from prison on parole. For the rest of the individuals who are not sent here, we believe it is due to their status and having ties with someone who is working within the Cal Dept of Corrections and Rehabilitation and/or the dep of mental health. This illegal process of seinding some infidivuals to the hospital and releasing others, constitutionally violates our rights to the equal protection clause of the us constitituion, as it is not fair that some sex offenders are forced to be confined in a hospital aand other sex offenders are released just because of their notoriety, fame, forturne, affiliation, etc. Could you please explain to me how and why this is occurring.
"dear mr. lauglin i am rwriting to you in regards to the question we discussed by telephone regarding gang members in the sex offender dcommittment program.
I have checked with both our legal dept and our experienced evaluators to provide a response to your concern.
There are no statutues that protect gang members from a sexuallly violent predator committment. Gang affilitation is considered in the evaluation because it is a significant risk factor for sexual reoffense. The sex offenses of gang members are one of many types of criminal offenses they commit.
"Gang members often commit a rape in concert and it is motivated by violence, not by deviance."
Generally, this is not due to a mental disorder and they stop doing those types of offenses as they get older.
Murder of Sex Offender Facilitated By the State of California
Monday, 03 December 2007 The cellmate of a prisoner found dead at DVI is now a homicide suspect. Rick Henry Kase, 39, left [Ed: the one who looks like, and is, a sociopath], is suspected of killing Randy James Rabelos, 28.
Officials at Deuel Vocational Institution are investigating the possibility that a man found dead at the prison Saturday was killed by his cellmate.
Lt. Ray Munoz, spokesman for the prison, said the California Department of Corrections has treated the death of Randy James Rabelos, 28, of Tuolumne County, as a homicide. Munoz said the San Joaquin County Coroner reported that Rabelos suffocated because of “blunt force” to his throat. Investigators have not released the likely cause of the injury, but Munoz said Rabelos’ cellmate, Rick Henry Kase, 39, of Santa Clara County, has been charged with homicide under the prison’s administrative regulations. He has yet to be charged with any crime by the San Joaquin County District Attorney’s office.
Munoz said the prison’s nursing staff discovered Rabelos dead at 7:20 a.m. Saturday in the lower bunk of a two-man cell. The nursing staff checked in the cell during its morning rounds of the cell block, when it gives medication to those prisoners who require it. Both men were in the prison’s special processing unit, a sort of protective custody separate from the general population for new arrivals, some sex offenders, ex-gang members, ex-police officers and some notorious criminals. Rabelos arrived at the prison Sept. 7. He had just started serving a three-year term after he was convicted Sept. 4 in Tuolumne County of one count of lewd acts with a child.
Kase is serving 11 years for felony assault and weapons-possession convictions. Munoz said he was in the special processing unit because he has been threatened by gang members. Eric Hovatter, the deputy district attorney from Tuolumne County who prosecuted Rabelos’ case, said Rabelos was convicted of committing a lewd act with a minor after he touched a 10-year-old girl’s chest. He said the girl was a friend of Rabelos’ girlfriend’s daughter and was at the house for a sleepover when Rabelos reportedly got the girls drunk while the mother was at work. Hovatter said the case went to trial in June and initially ended up with a 9-3 hung jury. Rabelos agreed in July to a plea deal on the one count of lewd acts with a child. Full Story
[Ed: Where to begin? The California Department of Corrections doesn't give two shits for the lives of sex offenders they imprison. "Molesters" are routinely housed with some of the most dangerous psychopaths one could imagine, even when being placed into protective custody (wink, wink). Those brutal animals wear a killing or maiming of a "molester" like a badge of honor in their advancement up the prisoner ranks. The "cops" (as they're called in prison, never "guards") make great sport of setting up a child sex offender by tipping off one of the animals who are allowed to openly prey upon and dominate and exploit weaker prisoners. That way, their (the cop's) hands are clean and they get to give full expression to their own perverse appetites. There are some employees in the C.D.C who are the equals of any sociopath imprisoned within its prisons. And I'm not convinced that it's uppermost administrators are not similarly motivated. Now follow the link provided above and look at the reader comments written to the Tracy newspaper where this story appeared. What you will find are some of the most vicious and vile appeals to violence against sex offenders imaginable, despite the fact that Rabelo's high crime was being accused of touching a girl on the chest (and there is grave concern that even this was a false accusation). And then ask yourself this question: are we not in the middle of a witch hunt?
Real Dangers Children Face
Shirley Lowery, September 3, 2007
The laws enacted to monitor and control sex offenders are extraordinary. I think we can all agree to that. The general public believes these extraordinary laws are justified. The faces of murdered children, killed by sexual predators, are flashed on the TV urging us to "consider the children." And who could resist? Who would want to? Surely it is justified to face the threats to our children. But what are those threats really? Is there a way to know?
Actually, yes... - The U.S. Government itself keeps track of these threats and is probably the most complete source for the statistics needed to intelligently quantify the numerous dangers children face in their lives. The U.S. Department of Justice, National Incidence Studies of Missing, Abducted, Runaway, and Throwaway Children is such a statistical resource. (http://www.missingkids.com/en_US/documents/nismart2_overview.pdf)
This report states that in 2002 an estimated 1,325,600 kids went missing. 797,500 were reported as missing. 628,900 of these children were identified as runaway/throwaway kids. Of the other 528,100 children their parents didn't even bother to file a report. Yet we hear the constant scream of "if it saves one child". Oh, there are so many more than that who need to be saved so let’s look at where the danger lies. Out of 1,315,600 missing kids 115 were snatched in the sense that everybody is worried about. And that includes kids that were snatched for ransom, and kids that were snatched by a disturbed or distraught person who wanted a child of their own, so how many are left that were snatched and killed by the sex offenders that are hiding behind every tree? That's what we're really worried about, right? Actually, the report tells us that number is 40 but let’s be generous and use the entire 115 who were snatched out of the 1.3 million who went missing.
You will find that less than 1/100th of 1% were snatched but the number that people care about and are willing to spend our resources on is much lower. To qualify for an outcry there must be a combination of sex, violence and death. Page 11 of the report states that "…40 missing children who were stereotypically kidnapped and killed (an estimated 35) or were still missing (approximately 5) at the time of the study." Yes, that is too many. But are we going to ignore all the others to concentrate on less than 1/200th of 1%? Now, it is a sad fact that there are more children who die each year than just these 40. Many more. How many more and how are they dying? Center for Disease Control http://webapp.cdc.gov/sasweb/ncipc/leadcaus10.html A quick look at Top Ten deaths in minors in 2002 shows that there were 17,759 kids who died (excluding infant mortality). Of those: 1296 were shot to death by someone, 145 were stabbed to death, 89 were strangled, 37 were burned alive, 17 were poisoned, 603 shot themselves, 559 hung themselves, and 6132 were killed in traffic accidents.*
This tells us that in 2002: Your child was 1400% more likely to hang themselves than be snatched and killed by a sex offender. Your child was 1500% more likely to shoot themselves than be snatched and killed by a sex offender Your child was 3200% more likely to be murdered by firearm by someone besides a sex offender. Your child was 4000% more likely to be shot, stabbed, strangled, burned alive or poisoned than snatched and killed by a sex offender. Your child was 15,300% more likely to be killed in a car crash than snatched and killed by a sex offender.*
We find more information here: The American Journal of Psychiatry, http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/162/9/1578
- Among children under age 5 years in the United States who were murdered in the last quarter of the 20th century, 61% were killed by their own parents: 30% were killed by their mothers, and 31% by their fathers - Compared to other developed nations, the United States has the highest rate of child homicide
61% of murdered children under age 5 were murdered by their own parents. We are not speaking of accidents or carelessness that leads to death. Statistically speaking, parents are, by far, the greatest threat to a child’s life. So much for "protect the children!"
You may have noticed above that car accidents were the leading killer of children. Sadly, many of these are completely avoidable.
The American Journal of Psychiatry Center for Disease Control http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5304a2.htm
- "Motor-vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death among children under 1 year old in the united states". - "One in four crash-related deaths among child passengers aged under 14 years involves alcohol use." -"…68% were riding with the drinking drivers; the majority of these children were not restrained." - "The majority of children who died while riding with drinking drivers were not restrained at the time of the crash." - "The majority of drivers in these crashes survived, suggesting that certain children killed in alcohol-related crashes might have survived had they been restrained properly."
This tells us that car crashes are killing our kids in great numbers. And that 25% of the time it’s because of drunk drivers. Where is the real rage? Where is the extraordinary response to an extraordinary threat?
It gets worse. It turns out those more than 50% of those drunk drivers was a parent of the dead child. Is this acceptable to Americans?
"The majority of drivers in these crashes survived, suggesting that certain children killed in alcohol-related crashes might have survived had they been restrained properly"
Your child is 2600% more likely to be killed by you because you couldn’t be bothered to put their seatbelt on when you felt like driving drunk with your kid in the car. Are these the same parents who scream for tougher laws to protect their children against sex offenders??
These are huge numbers of children being killed in brutal ways - it's like a war zone out there. Or is that an exaggeration?
We, as a nation, are so outraged by our causalities in Iraq. Cindy Sheehan let the world know of her personal outrage and why not? Losing a child is not easy.
The war in Iraq started in March 2003. As of 7/11/2007 we had lost 3610 fine men and women. That is an average of 902.5 lives per year. Let’s do some more comparisons of numbers using the numbers above.
More kids are shot to death each year in America than Soldiers are killed in Iraq. 1296 versus 902 More kids kill themselves each year in America than Soldiers are killed in Iraq. 1162 versus 902 More kids are killed by drunk drivers (usually their parents) than Soldiers are killed in Iraq. 1533 versus 902
Combine just those categories and you get 3991 kids who are either shot to death, kill themselves, or are killed by drunk driver versus 902.5 soldier killed in the Iraq war - that's four times as many. Considering that one of the main points of contention of the Iraq war is the casualties, you’d think we’d be at least as concerned about our children.
Remember this? The American Journal of Psychiatry, http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/162/9/1578
- Among children under age 5 years in the United States who were murdered in the last quarter of the 20th century, 61% were killed by their own parents - Compared to other developed nations, the United States has the highest rate of child homicide 61% of murdered children under age 5 were murdered by their own parents. We are not speaking of accidents or carelessness that leads to death. Statistically speaking, parents are, by far, the greatest threat to a child’s life. So much for "protect the children!"
Some of our children manage to make it to adulthood in spite of the adults in their lives. I kept wondering why a nation would make a mockery of child safety by latching on to the least likely threat. The answer is not so difficult.
Hating sex offenders is easy. Screaming loudly shows your concern about your children. No action is required on the part of the parents except an opinion that is acceptable in society.
Dealing with a runaway or unruly child takes a lot of hard work. A suicidal or addicted child can tear your heart out. A drink now and then saves your sanity. And kids know how to push your buttons and make you mad enough to kill but, of course, you would never do such a thing.
Adults no longer have a vested interest in their children and everyone in the family goes their own direction. Ignoring is much simpler than arguing and disciplining. They are going to do what they want anyway so why bother with a ruckus. Right?
When next you rail against sex offenders ask yourself why you aren’t taking on the big risk issues? The reason, in many cases, is that it would draw negative attention to lifestyles that are counter-productive to a child’s safety. By trying to divert attention elsewhere you expose yourself as a phony and it will come full circle. Count on it.
http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=36622 American Chronicle - Beverly Hills, CA
Megan Needs an Editor
Reason Magazine, Matt Welch
Convicted rapist Michael Dodele was freed Oct. 16 after serving two decades in jail. By law ("Megan's Law," to be specific), his name was put on a public database of convicted sex offenders. Thirty-five days later, Dodele was stabbed to death in his mobile home.
Police arrested his next-door neighbor, 29-year-old Ivan Garcia Oliver, who gave the L.A. Times a jailhouse interview:
Oliver said he has a son who was molested in the past, and he took action to protect the child.
"Society may see the action I took as unacceptable in the eyes of 'normal' people," Oliver said. "I felt that by not taking evasive action as a father in the right direction, I might as well have taken my child to some swamp filled with alligators and had them tear him to pieces. It's no different."
Although Oliver did not say he killed Dodele, he said that "any father in my position, with moral, home, family values, wouldn't have done any different. At the end of the day, what are we as parents? Protectors, caregivers, nurturers."
There was a crucial flaw in Oliver's logic.
In fact, Dodele was not a child molester. But a listing on the Megan's Law website could have left Oliver with the impression that he had abused children because of the way it was written.
Although Dodele's listing has been taken down since his death, a spokesman for the state attorney general said the site described the man's offenses as "rape by force" and "oral copulation with a person under 14 or by force."
"He was convicted of other bad things, but nothing involving a minor," said Richard F. Hinchcliff, chief deputy district attorney for Lake County. But "it would be easy to understand why someone might think so looking at the website."
Dodele's crimes involved sexual assaults on adult women, records show.
Story here. Brian Doherty warned us about "Megan's Flaws" a decade ago.
Did Megan’s Law Website Target Rapist for Murder?
ABA Journal, Martha Neil
One common argument against publicly listing home addresses and other identifying information for convicted sex criminals is that it might put them in danger. But proving such cause and effect in real-life cases is difficult, to say the least.
Now, however, officials in California say they might have the first-ever murder of a convicted sex criminal by a neighbor alerted to his presence by an Internet listing implemented by Megan's Law. Ironically, although the website implied that murder victim Michael Dodele, 67, was a child molester, in fact all of the convicted rapist's crimes were committed against adult women, reports the Los Angeles Times.
The man charged with Dodele's murder, a 29-year-old construction worker named Ivan Garcia Oliver, has pleaded not guilty to charges of first-degree murder, burglary and elder abuse. However, he said in a jailhouse interview last week that he has a son who had been previously molested, and hence took unspecified action to protect the boy.
"Society may see the action I took as unacceptable in the eyes of 'normal' people," Oliver said. "I felt that by not taking evasive action as a father in the right direction, I might as well have taken my child to some swamp filled with alligators and had them tear him to pieces. It's no different."
The Megan's Law website in California gives home addresses for some but not all persons listed.
As the website, which is maintained by the California attorney general's office, explains: "Megan's Law is named after 7-year-old Megan Kanka, a New Jersey girl who was raped and killed by a known child molester who had moved across the street from the family without their knowledge. In the wake of the tragedy, the Kankas sought to have local communities warned about sex offenders in the area. All states now have a form of Megan's Law."
Megan's Law listing may have led to slaying
Los Angeles Times
By Maria L. La Ganga
Lake County prosecutors have investigated the possibility that information in the Internet database might have been the motive for the killing of a convicted sex offender.
LAKEPORT, CALIF. — Convicted rapist Michael A. Dodele had been free just 35 days when sheriff's deputies found him dead last month in his aging, tan mobile home, his chest and left side punctured with stab wounds.
Officers quickly arrested Dodele's neighbor, 29-year-old construction worker Ivan Garcia Oliver, who made "incriminating comments, essentially admitting to his attacking Dodele," the Lake County Sheriff's Department said in a statement.
Prosecutors said they have investigated the possibility that the slaying of Dodele, 67, stemmed from his having been listed on the state's Megan's Law database of sex offenders. If so, his death may be the first in the state to result from such a listing, experts said.
Oliver pleaded not guilty to charges of first-degree murder, burglary and elder abuse when he was arraigned Nov. 30.
In a jailhouse interview Wednesday night, Oliver said he has a son who was molested in the past, and he took action to protect the child.
"Society may see the action I took as unacceptable in the eyes of 'normal' people," Oliver said. "I felt that by not taking evasive action as a father in the right direction, I might as well have taken my child to some swamp filled with alligators and had them tear him to pieces. It's no different."
Although Oliver did not say he killed Dodele, he said that "any father in my position, with moral, home, family values, wouldn't have done any different. At the end of the day, what are we as parents? Protectors, caregivers, nurturers."
In fact, Dodele was not a child molester. But a listing on the Megan's Law website could have left Oliver with the impression that he had abused children because of the way it was written.
Although Dodele's listing has been taken down since his death, a spokesman for the state attorney general said the site described the man's offenses as "rape by force" and "oral copulation with a person under 14 or by force."
"He was convicted of other bad things, but nothing involving a minor," said Richard F. Hinchcliff, chief deputy district attorney for Lake County. But "it would be easy to understand why someone might think so looking at the website."
Dodele's crimes involved sexual assaults on adult women, records show.
A neighbor at the Western Hills Resort & Trailer Park, a tattered collection of mobile homes and bungalows, said that two days before the killing, Oliver "told every house" in the park that he'd found Dodele listed on the website of convicted sexual offenders and was uncomfortable living near him.
"He looked it up on the computer . . . ," the neighbor said. "He said [Dodele] can't be around here."
The park resident requested anonymity because of a fear of reprisal, but reported Oliver's visit and statements to sheriff's deputies after the slaying. "A lot of people told them" about Oliver's claims, the person said.
Officials in Lake County -- a patchwork of wealth and poverty, vineyards and mobile home parks just north of Napa Valley -- would not offer a motive for the killing.
Hinchcliff acknowledged, however, that one possible motive investigated by the district attorney's office was that Oliver knew Dodele was on the Megan's Law list and did not want him as a neighbor.
According to court documents, Dodele committed his first offenses at age 15 and spent the last two decades either in prison or at Atascadero State Hospital receiving treatment.
His last attack was the 1987 knife-point rape of a 37-year-old woman on a Sonoma County beach.
Those were the charges that were listed on the Megan's Law website.
"I think [Oliver and Dodele] are both victims of the Internet," said Charlene Steen, a psychologist who examined Dodele on behalf of the defense in two 2007 trials about whether he should be recommitted to Atascadero.
Both ended in hung juries. Dodele was freed Oct. 16 and was hoping to start over in the crowded little mobile home park, where neighbors described him as open and friendly.
"The family is just sick," Steen said. "They finally got him back. They all thought he had made such great progress, and then this happened. It's pretty bad."
At 10:14 a.m. Nov. 20, an anonymous woman called 911 to report that a man was bleeding from his hands and directed medical personnel to Dodele's space at the mobile home park, according to a written statement from the Sheriff's Department.
When deputies arrived, they found Dodele's body.
The dead man's "immediate neighbors and other residents" sent the deputies to Oliver's home, the statement said, because "he had been seen recently leaving Dodele's residence with what appeared to be blood on his hands and clothing."
There was blood on a car in front of Oliver's house and at the front door of the concrete-block duplex. Inside, deputies reportedly found Oliver with blood on his hands and clothing and "injuries to his hands, consistent with having been in a physical altercation."
Authorities will not divulge exactly what Oliver said when he was arrested.
Steen wrote a letter to a local paper decrying Dodele's death "simply because he was a sex offender whose name and picture were on the registry."
Shortly after the letter was published, Steen said, a woman describing herself as Oliver's wife called to complain.
"She said, 'We have a child who was molested, and my husband is very upset to have a child molester living nearby'," Steen recounted, noting the irony that Dodele's crimes all involved adult women.
Steen said she had not talked to police about the phone call. Oliver said that the woman with whom he lived in the trailer park was his girlfriend, and the two were not married.
Attempts to reach the woman failed. One neighbor said she had moved away after the slaying.
Oliver is being held without bail, a police statement said, because he was convicted of assault with a deadly weapon in San Diego and was on parole when Dodele was killed.
Speaking from behind a thick glass divider in the visiting area of the Lake County Correctional Facility, Oliver said his son had been molested, but he declined to give the details of his son's assault or to give the child's name.
Although he spoke of "the action I took," he would not describe what happened in the aging mobile home the Tuesday morning before Thanksgiving.
Oliver would not comment on whether Dodele had ever approached his son.
But Oliver said he saw the older man looking at the boy.
"It was more than watching," Oliver said. "You could see his eyes. He was fantasizing, plotting. Later on down the line, who knows how many other children he could have hurt."
Research indicates that, in general, the older rapists get, the lower their risk of re-offending, said L.C. Miccio-Fonseca, chairwoman of the California Coalition on Sex Offenders, a group of treatment providers, probation and parole officers.
In addition, she said, sex offenders who target grown women over the course of many years are unlikely to victimize children.
But when told that Dodele's victims were women and not children, Oliver seemed unfazed. "There is no curing the people that do it," he said.
Oliver's preliminary hearing is scheduled for Jan. 7.
Asked about what he thinks will happen to him, he said, "It's hard to tell at this point. There's no doubt I'm looking at a numerous amount of years. I'm not a lawyer. We haven't gone over the evidence."
But he also said that he "would never change who I am or what I do because of what society thinks is right or not right. I have always been who I am and always will be." Full Story
County Approves Sex Offender Tracking Van
KESQ.com news services
The Board of Supervisors Tuesday approved the purchase of a $109,000 surveillance van for Riverside County law enforcement agencies to use during compliance checks of registered sex offenders.
The district attorney's office requested the high-tech vehicle for future operations by the county's Sexual Assault Felony Enforcement (SAFE) team, which includes investigators from the D.A.'s office, sheriff's department and several municipal police agencies.
The van will be outfitted with remote-controlled cameras connected to a 900 Megahertz "integrated radio and control system" that will allow an investigator to operate cameras on the vehicle while seated at a desk, potentially miles away, according to the district attorney's office.
The county will cover the cost of the vehicle through funds left over from a $731,950 grant issued by the governor's Office of Emergency Services in May. The grant was intended specifically for SAFE team operations. [Ed: And this is for what "Emergency"? Does the van follow "predators" around as they run errands?] Full Story
St. Lucie eyes fee for registering, tracking sex offenders
SARAH PROHASKA
Palm Beach Post
Detectives in the sheriff's sex offender unit came up with the idea to begin lobbying for the creation of a statewide fee that all sexual offenders and predators would have to pay during the mandatory registration process. The sheriff's attorney last week pitched the idea to St. Lucie County's legislative delegation and this week will attempt to find lawmakers to sponsor the legislation during a trip to Tallahassee. Full Story
[Ed: This is reminiscent of the Chinese government which, upon executing a "criminal" by shooting them in the head, charges the relatives of the executed for the bullet. Or, if you will, the Jewish community being forced to compensate the German government for all of the damage caused by Kristallnacht even though they were the actual victims of the mob violence, not the perpetrators]
Sex offenders in school: What are the rules?
BRENT CHAMPACO; The News Tribune, Tacoma, WA
Last updated: December 8th, 2007 01:22 AM (PST)
Gig Harbor High School suspended four students this week for posting fliers warning peers about two juvenile sex offenders who attend classes there. Full Story
State Sen. Tim Grendell wants to test 'sex offender radar'
Reginald Fields, Plain Dealer (OHIO)
Columbus- A state lawmaker is promoting a Cuyahoga County company's idea for a new electronic device that could warn people when a sex offender is near.
The personal alert system, called Offendar (short for offender radar), would be about the size of a key fob and would vibrate when an offender wearing a monitoring bracelet is within 50 yards.
State Sen. Tim Grendell, a champion of lock-'em-up-and-throw-away-the-key legislation, has invited the Chagrin Falls company behind the technology to demonstrate it today during a Statehouse hearing.
"If there is someone in your area that the state has decided should be wearing an ankle bracelet, you have no idea," said Jerry Pignolet, one of the principals in Offendar LLC. Offendar "is not going to deter him, but it gives you an opportunity to gather your family, get in the car and lock the doors." [Ed: Extraordinary! These are dangerously stupid people!]
But David Singleton, executive director of the Ohio Justice & Policy Center, said the system plays on fears in the community while penalizing people who have already served time in prison for their crimes.
Singleton called Offendar "utterly ridiculous and absurd."
"What are we trying to do, make it impossible for people to get on their feet again and be productive citizens?" he said. "This is crazy, and I'm outraged by it, because it doesn't make my daughter any safer."
The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio said Grendell shouldn't waste state taxpayers' time or money on such a system.
"The assumption that someone once did something bad and is still a danger to everyone else is simply false," said Jeffrey Gamso of the ACLU. "It's going to keep people scared, when the majority of these people are unlikely to ever offend again." Full Story
Accuser of Jailed Sex Offender Says He's Innocent
BALTIMORE CITY PAPER, by Chris Landers
...When Marian first accused Barnes, in 1996, he was dating her sister Tabitha, who was using drugs and working as a prostitute. Marian now says it was jealousy over her sister's closeness with Barnes, and a desire to break them up, that led her to accuse him of rape.
"The only way I knew how to stop him," she says in an interview after the tests were over, "was if I made it to where she was never able to see him again." Full Story\
[Ed: Remember, all that is needed to convict anyone of child sexual assault is the word of a child on the stand. No other proof is needed]
Warning sex offenders; 'Offendar' may find you
Cleveland Plain Dealer, Reginald Fields
State Sen. Tim Grendell of Chester Township, a vocal supporter of various measures aimed at getting tougher on crime, says he is excited about a Geauga County company's proposal "to take real-time monitoring of sex offenders to a new level."
He has invited the company to make a presentation Wednesday to a Senate subcommittee on a device it is developing and seeking to patent called "Offendar," short for offender radar. Offendar LLC is marketing it as a "personal threat detection system featuring a key-fob sized electronic device." The device would give the person carrying it "a vibrating, auditory or visual alarm when a sex offender or other person wearing a court-ordered electronic ankle bracelet is in the immediate vicinity."
Why is the company proposing it? "The public wants more than after-the-fact tracking of sex offenders. Many people want to know when a threat is in the vicinity so they can take steps to protect themselves and their children before something happens," according to the company's presentation.
The idea is sure to be provocative, especially among those who think efforts targeting sex offenders have gone too far.
Grendell seems to have no reservations about the company's proposal. "In seeing their idea and understanding how it can enhance what Ohio is already doing, I was very impressed," he said in a memo Monday to fellow lawmakers and the media. [Ed: So stupid and so bizarre it needs no further comment. An appeal to sheer stupidity!]
Comment from Reader:
Why don't we put a monitoring device on lawmakers so we know when they are in the area. They seem to feel that the State of Ohio needs to monitor and know all, so I think that should include monitoring them as well. Course, then everyone would know their dirty laundry too and the game is that they only get to know others dirty laundry...
Inmate (Sex Offender) found dead in Tracy prison cell. Officials investigating incident as possible homicide
TRACY — An inmate was found dead inside his cell at Deuel Vocational Institution Saturday morning, prison officials said.
Prison staff handing out the morning doses of medication to inmates found Randy James Rabelos, 28, unresponsive in his cell around 7:20 a.m. who appeared to have been dead for a "couple of hours," Lt. Ray Munoz said.
Investigators from the prison, along with the California Highway Patrol and the Department of Justice, are investigating the matter and have questioned Rabelos' cell mate, Rick Henry Kase, 39, from Santa Clara County.
"They were in the cell together for the last 12 hours," Munoz said. "We got started into looking at how Rabelos died and immediately started to look at his cell mate. The case is being investigated as a possible homicide."
According to preliminary findings from the San Joaquin County Coroner's Office, Rabelos appeared to have died from asphyxiation with blunt force trauma. An official cause of death is pending a toxicology report which can take up to six weeks to complete.
Rabelos arrived at DVI in September from Tuolumne County and was serving a three-year sentence as a sex offender, Munoz said.
Kase arrived at the prison a little more than a month ago and is currently serving a term for parole violation, and being a convicted felon in possession of a deadly weapon. [Ed: Sex offenders tortured and murdered in prisons are among the least publicized crimes today]
Police ID man found dead in Lincoln apartment
Associated Press - November 6, 2007 9:35 AM ET
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - Lincoln police have identified the man whose body was found in an apartment this weekend.
Police say 44-year-old Andrea Williams died of a stab wound. His body was found Saturday morning inside the apartment after police were called there.
No arrests have been made, and police have yet to rule it a homicide. They instead are calling his death suspicious.
Police say Williams was registered as sex offender and had recent run-ins with police.
Information from: Lincoln Journal Star, http://www.journalstar.com [Ed: Another likely vigilante killing]
Convicted child rapist went to ground after becoming the target of a hate campaign
Blackpool Gazette (U.K.)
A CONVICTED child rapist went to ground after becoming the target of a hate campaign.
Pensioner John Harness moved from Blackburn to Blackpool but did not tell the police.
Harness, 71, was put on the sex offenders register for life and jailed for eight years after being found guilty in 1998 of five charges of raping a girl under the age of 16.
The pensioner, formerly of Hornby Road, Blackpool, who told the court he now had no fixed address, pleaded guilty to breaching a sex offenders registration order by failing to notify police of his address between September 1 2006 and March 28 this year.
He was sentenced to five months imprisonment by Blackpool magistrates.
Prosecutor Julie Fogarty said in March this year police went to flats on Hornby Road, Blackpool, on an unrelated matter and were told Harness had lived there for three weeks.
Checks revealed Harness was a convicted sex offender and the address he had registered with police was Bolton Road, Blackburn. When police went to that address the landlord said Harness had left in 2006.
Harness said he had not told police about his move because police would tell people he was on the sex offenders register.
Gerry Coyle, defending, said his client had originally lived at Leeds Close, Blackburn.
Mr Coyle added: "Police decided to check he was still there and because they spoke to people in the street, he became the target of threats and abuse.
"Petrol was poured through his door and lit. He then moved to a bed and breakfast in Bolton Road.
"After spending time in hospital that address was no longer available to him. He moved to Blackpool and did not tell the police of his address because he feared they would tell others."
Man, accused of fondling, found hanged at Mayer home
By Jim Schultz
Thursday, October 4, 2007
Redding, CA
LEFT BEHIND: Redding police Detective Bill Schueller pets a dog at the La Rinconada Place home of former Redding Bank ofCommerce CEO Michael Mayer on Wednesday after Schueller and others investigated an apparent suicide there. The dog was later taken to the home of a friend of Mayer’s for safekeeping, Schueller said.
LEFT BEHIND: Redding police Detective Bill Schueller pets a dog at the La Rinconada Place home of former Redding Bank ofCommerce CEO Michael Mayer on Wednesday after Schueller and others investigated an apparent suicide there. The dog was later taken to the home of a friend of Mayer’s for safekeeping, Schueller said. View gallery »
A middle-aged man was found hanging Wednesday from a rope attached to an oak tree in the backyard of the upscale home of former Redding Bank of Commerce CEO Michael Mayer.
But Redding police would not confirm that the victim was the 51-year-old former bank executive charged with molesting a 16-year-old girl in August.
The man's identity won't be released until relatives are notified, said Redding police Capt. Peter Hansen.
No one else was home at the time of the apparent suicide, Hansen said.
Flanked by newspaper, radio and television reporters, Hansen said police went to Mayer's La Rinconada Place home about 4:30 p.m. after a neighbor reported seeing someone hanging from the tree inside the wrought-iron fence enclosing the backyard.
Speaking from Mayer's manicured front yard, Hansen said it appeared that the man's death was a suicide. He declined to say if a suicide note had been left and said that the case has been turned over to the Shasta County coroner's office.
Most of those who live on the street in Mayer's quiet and heavily treed neighborhood stayed indoors as police investigated the hanging, and those who did briefly venture outside politely declined to talk to reporters.
Mayer was arrested Aug. 19 after a 16-year-old family friend told police that Mayer had sexually assaulted her at the house where the body was found Wednesday.
Eight days later, Redding Bank of Commerce fired him from its top job, which last year paid him $455,000 in salary, benefits and other compensation.
When he was arrested, police reported that the 16-year-old girl had told them that Mayer massaged her shoulders and back in a darkened family room where Mayer's daughter and niece were lying on the floor watching television.
She also told police she was "not sure what to do" when the massage allegedly went too far and Mayer fondled her breasts and groin, the police report said.
Mayer's wife told police that her husband, who had been drinking heavily that day, "lost it" after being confronted by the alleged molestation, and that he had threatened to kill himself, the report said.
Charged with two counts of felony sexual penetration and misdemeanor counts of annoying a child, sexual battery and indecent exposure, Mayer was released from jail on $100,000 bail.
The court also ordered him not to drink or to have firearms, and to stay away from female minors unless a responsible adult was present.
Mayer's last Superior Court appearance was on Sept. 17 when Judge William Gallagher agreed to hear the case after two other judges recused themselves.
Reporter Jim Schultz can be reached at 225-8223 or at jschultz@redding.com.
Sex-offender checks in schools
Prince William County Public Schools is implementing a new electronic Visitor Identification System in all schools.
Effective December 3, Adults visiting Prince William Public Schools will have to present government-issued identification under a new security measure designed to keep sex offenders out. The computerized system runs each visitor against state-run offender databases nationwide to keep track of who visits students.
"This gives us an instant check on whether or not somebody coming into a school, be it a parent, an offender, what have you, is in a national [sex offender] database," incoming school board Chairman Milton Johns said.
The new computerized system, which costs $130,000 to start and about $37,000 each year, has been used on three campuses since a pilot program began in the spring. [Ed: Wait a minute! I can do this check with my $1,000 computer and an Internet connection. Why $130K + $37K/year? Also, when was the last time you heard of a sex offender (who wasn't a teacher) entering a school during classes and either molesting or kidnapping a student? This is sheer madness!]
"When you walk in, they run your driver's license through a scanner the size of a hand-held stapler. It takes your name and date of birth and runs it against the sex-offender databases in every state and would look for a match," he said. Photos will be used to compare people with identical names and birthdays.
If a parent with a legitimate educational reason for being on the campus has a hit on the database, the school staff will take extra caution and restrict him or her to the office area, Crowe said.
Sex Offender Registries: Putting Lives At Risk?
Double Murder of Maine Men Sparks Debate About Online Sex Registries
By GITIKA AHUJA
April 18, 2006 —
The brutal slayings of two convicted sex offenders from Maine have re-ignited national debate on whether online sex offender registries should provide extensive personal information on their registrants.
Twenty-year-old Stephen Marshall of Nova Scotia, Canada, killed himself aboard a Boston-bound bus after allegedly murdering two convicted sex offenders in Maine, whom he'd found on the state's sex offender Web site.
One of the victims, 24-year-old William Elliott, was convicted four years ago of having sex with a girlfriend who was only days away from her 16th birthday. Elliott served four months in jail.
Marshall, who had no previous criminal record, had earlier gone online and obtained personal information on both Elliott and Joseph L. Gray, 57, another convicted sex offender, whom Marshall is also suspected of murdering earlier that day.
Investigators also revealed that Marshall obtained the addresses and other information of 34 people from Maine's online sex offender registry.
Now some are asking, what about the privacy rights of sex offenders? Do state Web sites provide too much information and even promote vigilante violence?
Without the registry, "he'd still be alive today," Shirley Turner, Elliott's mother, told The Boston Globe. "He didn't say anything; he just shot him in cold blood," she said.
She described her son as a "warm, loving young man" who suffered from disabilities and "was doing so good."
The state of Maine makes photos, names, addresses, ages and criminal histories of about 2,200 registered sex offenders available online.
The online sex registry in Maine was temporarily taken down after it got word of the deaths, but it has since been re-established.
Outrage Across State Lines
The Vermont chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union has argued that its online state registry should be removed in light of legislation the state Senate recently approved that would would make it easier to post information on sex offenders by expanding the kind of offenses that would require registration. "This is a stark reminder that there's no evidence that online sex offender registries increase public safety. In fact, they might just do the opposite," said Allen Gilbert, executive director of the Vermont ACLU.
"They should not be making any changes to the online registry unless they can determine that, indeed, the registry increases public safety. We think they never should have created it. They should just pull it immediately."
Still, even while the horrific Maine murders have raised new questions about the safety of the offenders, state authorities continue to defend the public's right to know about their neighbors' criminal activity.
"Anyone in this day and age can log on and find the addresses of anyone in the world," said Steve McCausland, with the Maine Department of Public Safety. "It doesn't have to be a sex register; it could be any of the search engines that are out in the world, including the telephone book."
"Our view is that this is an isolated incident and the value of the registry to parents and communities outweighs the impact of one isolated incident," said Jason Gibbs, spokesman for Vermont Gov. Jim Douglas.
Although there has been no definitive link between the Web site and the murders, investigators have confirmed that Marshall had been on the state's sex offender Web site because the site requires users to register. In this case, Marshall registered with his real name and address, allowing police to see which profiles he had viewed.
However, Web site users could theoretically use a fake name and address.
Following Federal Law
While federal law requires each state to work within the requirements of community notification, some states have gone beyond the obligation by posting the personal information of sex offenders online.
"It's easier to meet the requirements by providing information on the Web site," said Charles Onley, research associate for the Center for Sex Offender Management, an office of the Department of Justice. "But there is no [federal] requirement of Internet access."
The states' Web sites are not always comprehensive. It is within the individual state's jurisdiction to determine which sex offenders pose a higher risk to the community, and it can make their information more accessible than others'.
Onley said some states, like Pennsylvania, have been more conservative about the information they provide the public. Other states, like Florida, have been more liberal in their approach.
"There has been a drift toward full disclosure [of personal information]. The thought was to go out and inform the community," said Onley, who explained that there was a lot of public hostility toward sex offenders when federal law required that their whereabouts be made available to the public.
"The thing is, you have the mandate and the public wants the information. The information might be less valuable [without addresses]," said Onley. "The public would want addresses."
All states do not require that sex offenders' addresses be made public, though many do provide that kind of detail.
The National Sex Offender Registry provides online information on sex offenders in each state except Oregon and South Dakota.
"It's not just that it is online, [anybody] could have gone down to the sheriffs office to get the information," said Onley.
Not the First Case
While incidents of vigilante violence against sex offenders are rare, this week's case is not the first.
In September Michael A. Mullen of Bellingham, Wash., was charged with the murders of two convicted sex offenders after he admitted to police that he wanted to kill them after he saw the information listed on the state's online sex offender Web site. He sits in jail awaiting trial.
In a 2004 case, the state of New Hampshire sent 57-year-old Lawrence Trant to jail for 10 to 30 years after he pleaded guilty to charges of attempted murder on two convicted sex offenders whose names and addresses he'd located on the state's sex offender registry.
In an interview with The Boston Globe, Trant said, "I don't want people to steal the souls of little kids. I'm doing 30 years for something I think is morally justified."
Maine investigators have yet to examine a laptop computer Marshall carried with him on the bus before he committed suicide.
Investigators hope it can explain why Marshall was apparently driven to kill the two men from Maine.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2007 ABC News Internet Ventures
Psychologist Says Registry Contributed to Murder
By Dr. Charlene Steen -- Letters to the EditorArticle Last Updated: 11/27/2007 10:48:49 PM PST
Thanks to the internet registry, which has done nothing to decrease recidivism, a client of mine is dead murdered in Lake County, simply because he was a sex offender whose name and picture were on the registry.
He had recently been released from the hospital after years of treatment. He had changed his life, and, at age 68, had plans for a positive future, family love and support, a job, etc. A man broke into his trailer, stabbed him numerous times someone he didn't even know, only because he was on the registry.
I am sickened, not only because of his murder, but because we have not condemned the stigmatization of offenders through useless laws which will not decrease reoffense, and may even increase offending.
I am sickened by our lack of humanity. How many more such murders will there have to be? Will no one stand up and change these draconian laws which protect no one, and cause pain, suffering, and even death to persons who have committed no new crimes?
Charlene Steen, PhD
Licensed psychologist
Napa
Dodele Murder: An Inconvenient Truth?
Michael Dodele, age 61, was murdered November 20 in Lake County California. His alleged assailant was Garcia Oliver, 29, who lived in the same trailer park. In contention is Oliver's motivation in the brutal knife attack. Many suspect Oliver to have been motivated to kill Dodele after learning that Dodele was listed on California's Registered Sex Offender website. Others are denying that this was a factor in Dodele's murder, including some public officials.
This raises a question: are police investigators and District Attorneys (most of whom favor "Megan's Law" websites and "name and shame" flyers) less likely to publicize the motivation of an accused assailant when their investigations turn up evidence that "community notification" may have provided the impetus to commit a murder? Are we less likely to learn these details than if it were any other "straightforward" murder?
-Allan Marshall
Sex offender gets 1 year for teaching driving
William T. Webb, 46, of Milwaukee was charged with committing the felony in December 2005 while he was employed as an instructor for Arcade Drivers School out of Brookfield Square in 2004 and 2005. His case was believed to be the first use in Waukesha County of the 10-year-old law and among the first uses statewide.
Webb, who was convicted of a child sex offense in 1992 in Washington state, claimed he was not aware of the Wisconsin law barring him from working with children. Nonetheless, Schimel said, Webb violated the law and should be punished.
Webb told Waukesha County Circuit Judge Lee S. Dreyfus Jr. that he "never had any ill or sinister intent" when he took the driving school job. At first, he was employed only to train driving instructors. He began instructing students because he needed more work hours. "I took the job seriously. . . . I never took advantage of anyone. I never put anyone in danger," Webb told Dreyfus.[Ed: Keep in mind, he was not on Parole or Probation during the time he worked as a driving instructor. He had served his time. Nonetheless, he was committing a FELONY by working in an occupation that brought him into contact with minors]
Psychologist says registry contributed to death
Thanks to the internet registry, which has done nothing to decrease recidivism, a client of mine is dead murdered in Lake County, simply because he was a sex offender whose name and picture were on the registry.
He had recently been released from the hospital after years of treatment. He had changed his life, and, at age 68, had plans for a positive future, family love and support, a job, etc. A man broke into his trailer, stabbed him numerous times someone he didn't even know, only because he was on the registry.
I am sickened, not only because of his murder, but because we have not condemned the stigmatization of offenders through useless laws which will not decrease reoffense, and may even increase offending.
I am sickened by our lack of humanity. How many more such murders will there have to be? Will no one stand up and change these draconian laws which protect no one, and cause pain, suffering, and even death to persons who have committed no new crimes?
Charlene Steen, PhD
Licensed psychologist
Napa
Mason County sex offender missing
Briggs was convicted of first-degree child rape in 2000 when he was 13-years-old of raping a nine-year-old girl. He also admitted to sexually assaulting the girl on another occasion.
Last June, Briggs moved from Yakima County to Mason County, but did not tell authorities. He was arrested and pled guilty to failing to register as a sex offender.
If you see him, police say to call them immediately, but do not approach him. [Ed: Oh, please! As if he's terribly dangerous! This is a perfect example of the press printing whatever the hell the police ask them to print. Also, this is a good time to point out that the word "rape" as it is used to describe sex acts with minors is about as reliably accurate as the term "sexually violent predator". Take it with an entire box of salt!]
Perils of bans on ex-sex offenders
Christian Science Monitor
Politicians should heed a state supreme court that has voided a ban on where sex offenders live.Last week, Georgia's supreme court became the first high court in the US to overturn a state law that restricts areas where former sex offenders may live. More than half the states have such laws, and many amount to banishment. Perhaps this decision will nudge politicians to reconsider these laws.
The Georgia case wasn't argued on the emerging view that the residency bans are counterproductive. Rather, it turned on an unusual application of the Fifth Amendment, which says the government may not take private property without just compensation.
The case concerned Anthony Mann. In 2002, he pled no contest to "indecent liberties with a child," then served four months in jail, followed by probationary supervision. In 2003, he married and bought a home in Georgia. Mr. Mann made sure it did not lie within 1,000 feet of any area where minors gather as defined by the state.
But a day-care center moved to within 1,000 feet of the Manns. His probation officer said he must move or face arrest. Mann sued, arguing the law was unconstitutional because it amounted to an illegal "taking" of private property.
The state supreme court unanimously agreed, adding that Mann faced repeated uprooting. This time, a day-care center broke the 1,000-foot barrier, the court found. Next time it could be a playground, a school bus stop, a skating rink.
The ruling voided the residency part of Georgia's sex-offender law. The decision, though, may not have much legal impact outside the state. Most state residency bans aren't as severe, and the case rests uniquely on property rights.
But the ruling will do well if it persuades lawmakers that blanket residency bans are no response to public fears stemming from tragic, high-profile cases of convicted child predators repeating their crimes.
Such fears are understandable but misplaced. About 80 to 90 percent of child sexual abuse occurs with a family member or someone a child knows. And sex offenders have among the lowest recidivism rates of any class of criminals. Yet sweeping residency restrictions that focus on "stranger-danger" have multiplied in states and cities.
Several studies show no correlation between child sex offenses and where perpetrators live. Law enforcers now argue that bans make things worse. Zones overlap, ruling out living possibilities in urban areas. Offenders are forced into rural America, far from jobs, treatment, and family, which provide stability and rehabilitation. Full Story
Posts
