U.K. Uses "SOPO" Laws To Impose Restrictions On "Paedophiles"

Registered sex offender downloaded child porn onto mobile phone

07 November 2007
Chester Evening Leader

By Hayley Maguire
A REGISTERED sex offender will be sentenced at Chester Crown Court for downloading child porn onto a mobile phone and breaching a prevention order (S.O.P.O.).

Richard James Hewitt, 31, appeared before Chester, Ellesmere Port and Neston magistrates and admitted two breaches of a sex offenders prevention order (S.O.P.O.) on March 1 and May 4 and 10 charges of making indecent photographs of a child.

Hewitt was placed on the prevention order and sex offenders register in January after being convicted of similar offences at Wrexham Magistrates Court.

The court heard Hewitt, of Law Street, Hoole, was arrested on August 31 and his mobile phone was seized.

Hewitt had been prohibited from using equipment that could download pornographic images, including mobile phones.

He was arrested again on October 31 after indecent images of children were found on the phone and he was remanded in custody.

Catherine Whincup, prosecuting, said 46 images were found on the phone including five level four
indecent videos of children.

Officers found 24 level one photographs, two level two, 11 level three and four level five.

Miss Whincup said: "Two officers in the case visited the defendant's home on two separate occasions prior to his arrest to ask him to give up any mobile phones. Full Story

Sex offenders' addresses do get checked

http://www.sunherald.com/201/v-print/story/202316.html

South Mississippi Sun Herald

Sex offenders' addresses do get checked
By ROBIN FITZGERALD
rfitzgerald@sunherald.com


-- A woman convicted of a sex crime against a child is wanted on a warrant in Harrison County. She's accused of giving a false address in her latest 90-day visit to a state driver's license office.

A sheriff's investigator obtained a warrant for 50-year-old Beatrice Garza Soliz after learning she doesn't live on Bohn Street in Biloxi, said Sheriff's Capt. Ron Pullen.

The owner of the home has never heard of her, according to a Sound Off. The caller blamed the Sheriff's Department for failing to ask for proof to confirm Soliz's address. But that's not the case, said Pullen.

"She was registered with us," Pullen said, "but once she changed her address through the state, they notified us of the change and we updated our records. We just found out that the state Department of Public Safety didn't ask for proof of address and doesn't require proof. We're trying to get them to change that."

DPS spokeswoman Delores Lewis said that's not her understanding of how the state keeps track of where sex offenders live.

"Generally speaking, we do address verification," Lewis said, "but I can't speak to that specific situation. I would have to look into it."

Mississippi requires convicted sex offenders to register with the sheriff's office in the county they move to after serving their time. A law change in 2005 requires them to verify their address in person every 90 days at a state driver's license office.

"We require them to show a power bill, a water bill, a rental agreement or something similar with their name on it when they register with us," said Pullen.

After an offender registers or moves elsewhere in Harrison County, the Sheriff's Department sends out a postcard to notify neighbors.

The state Sex Offender Registry shows Soliz, convicted in 1992 of indecency with a child/sexual contact, in Fresno County, Calif., last verified her address Oct. 24.

"If we send someone to their address and cannot make contact, we take it a step further and send an investigator," said Pullen. "If they don't live there, we don't hunt them down to ask them to register. We get a warrant."

Failing to register or providing a false address is punishable by up to five years in prison.

Anyone who knows of Soliz' whereabouts is asked to call the Sheriff's Department at 865-7060 or the nearest police department. Records show Soliz has used similar names, including Beatriz and Gutierrez as first or last names.

City's Mayor, A Registered Sex Offender, Can't Work In City Hall Due to Nearby Youth Center

Thursday , November 22, 2007

POTEET, Texas —
The mayor of this South Texas town is a registered sex offender who can be arrested for going to City Hall, but he still doesn't plan to resign.

Donato is required to stay more than 1,000 feet from places where children congregate, and City Hall is "well within 200 feet" of that limit from the Atascosa Boxing Club and Youth Center, City Attorney Frank Garza said.

"It's a huge issue," Hudson said. "The mayor of the city cannot attend city business because of his status as a registered sex offender." Full Story

[Ed: I predict that we will eventually realize every conceivable and absurd possible consequence of residency and mobility restrictions. This is just the beginning...]

No "Loitering", No "Living" in Lexington, GA

Ordinance would be tougher than one just ruled unconstitutional in Georgia
Robert Kittle, WSPA-TV, Wednesday, Nov 21, 2007

The Town of Lexington is about to propose an ordinance that severely limits where sex offenders could live, even though the Georgia Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled unconstitutional a similar law in that state.

Georgia's law banned sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of schools, daycare centers, churches, playgrounds, parks and anywhere else children gather. The Lexington, SC proposal, coming up at its town council meeting December 3, would ban sex offenders from living or loitering within 2,500 feet of those places. Full Story [Ed: Hmm... Does this mean that sex offenders can start withholding taxes they pay for public services they can no longer legally utilize?]

Finally, Some Reason To Give Thanks In Georgia

New York Times, November 22, 2007
Georgia Justices Overturn a Curb on Sex Offenders

ATLANTA, Nov. 21 — The Georgia Supreme Court unanimously struck down a state law Wednesday that limited where registered sex offenders could live, ruling that the statute was so restrictive it unconstitutionally deprived the offenders of their property rights.

The law, described when it was adopted in 2006 as the nation’s toughest restriction on sex offenders, prohibited them from living within 1,000 feet of schools, churches or any other place that children might congregate, including more than 150,000 school bus stops in the state. The ban applied even when a school, a church or the like opened in an area where an offender was already living.

“Under the terms of that statute, it is apparent that there is no place in Georgia where a registered sex offender can live without being continually at risk of being ejected,” said the seven-member court’s opinion, written by Presiding Justice Carol W. Hunstein.

The court ruled that the statute violated Fifth Amendment protections against the public taking of private property without compensation. ...

... Mr. Mann said in a telephone interview that the court’s decision brought great relief.

“You live kind of every day wondering if the sheriff’s office is going to come out and tell you that you have three days to move,” Mr. Mann said. “It’s happened to me twice.”

Mr. Mann said he had challenged the law to protect his family, but also because he had felt he was being unfairly punished for the sake of political pandering.

Full Story

Police alert residents to predatory sex offender running bike shop

[Ed: What's Next? He starts to Pay Taxes? Other bicycle shop owners must be delirious. Thank God "Bend Weekly" is playing its part in keeping kids safe!]

"Bend Weekly", Nov 21,2007
Police alert residents to predatory sex offender running bike shop
by Cheryl McDermott

Police alert residents to predatory sex offender running bike shop
Nov 21,2007 00:00 by Cheryl McDermott

The Oregon City Police Department is alerting businesses and residents that a convicted sex offender who preyed on boys and girls aged 9-to-15 has applied for a business license and is currently running a bicycle shop on Main Street.

Harry Alan Garret, 54, was convicted of first-degree sex abuse and third-degree sodomy in 2000, crimes that involved children, both male and female, between 9 and 15, police reported.

According to a news release, Garret was designated a predatory sexual offender by the Oregon State Police Sex Offender Unit, and officers are alerting businesses and residents in the area surrounding the bicycle shop at 724 Main Street.

Garret, a 54-year old white male who is described as 5-feet 5-inches tall weighing 180 pounds, has blue eyes and is balding with light brown hair. He has applied for a business license, but is open for business while the license is under consideration, the release stated.

Quebec says no to provincial sex offender registry

Wednesday, November 21, 2007
CBC News

The Quebec government will not create a public registry of convicted sex offenders in the province because it may spur vigilante justice, the provincial justice minister said.

Opposition party Action Démocratique du Québec presented a petition Wednesday with more than 62,000 signatures demanding a public registry for convicted sex offenders.

Justice Minister Jacques Dupuis was swift to dash hopes of a public registry, citing concerns about vigilantism and the potential of people hunting down offenders after they're released from prison.

"We absolutely know that that was the case in some instances in the United States, where the registry was made public," he said. Full Story

Analysis: Sex offenders often homeless

U.S.A. Today

WASHINGTON, Nov. 19 (UPI) -- Many convicted sex offenders are homeless and living in tents, woods and on the street, a USA Today analysis published Monday said.

In Boston, nearly two-thirds of 136 high-risk sex offenders are homeless, while in New York City, more than 100 reported living at shelters, the report said.

Sex offenders, who are required to register with police, have difficulty finding a landlord who will rent to them and often are prevented by law from living near children. Those factors increase homelessness and make sex offenders difficult to track.

In its investigation, USA Today found at least a dozen states list hundreds of sex offenders as homeless, including California which registered 2,716 as "transient." Arkansas, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois and Maine were among the states where the number of transient sex offenders was rising.

Laura Rogers, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Justice Department told the newspaper that homeless sex offenders aren't necessarily more dangerous than those with housing.

"The people you need to be worried about most are the ones who aren't registering at all," Rogers said.

Saginaw Texas Limits Sex Offenders To Living In 1 Of 10 Houses

Saginaw shows no neighborly feelings for sex offenders
By BUD KENNEDY
Star-Telegram staff writer

Saginaw is scared. So scared, apparently, that the City Council has done something foolish -- and maybe expensive. The council voted two weeks ago to approve a map that effectively zones two neighborhoods where convicted sex offenders can move into the city -- and nowhere else.
More precisely, the council created giant "child safety zones" across nearly the entire city of 18,500 people. The zones force sex offenders into about 100 houses on the north or southeast edges of town.
That's not all.
Saginaw also did something else almost unheard of. The city told convicted sex offenders that even if they pick one of those 100 houses, they can't move within 500 feet of where another sex offender lives.
In other words, the way I read the map, Saginaw has basically banished sex offenders from all but about 10 houses. That means that Saginaw will be diverting sex offenders to other cities and into rural Tarrant and Wise counties, which don't have the same power. Full Story

Fed Appeals Court Upholds GPS Device/Scarlet Letter Combo

By KRISTIN M. HALL
Associated Press

Tracking devices used to monitor sexual offenders in Tennessee are not intended as additional punishment, a federal appeals court has ruled.

A three-judge panel voted 2-1 in Friday's ruling that the constitutional rights of a Knox County sex offender, identified in the case as "John Doe," were not violated.

But in a dissent, 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Gregory F. Van Tatenhove said the global positioning system device that must be worn at the waist outside of clothing [Ed:?!] amounts to a symbol of his crime — a modern-day "scarlet letter."

Doe was convicted and sentenced for aggravated kidnapping and sexual battery before the new laws took effect. He claimed the state couldn't retroactively reclassify him as a violent sex offender.
Full Story

http://tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071117/NEWS03/711170360/1017/NEWS

Sex Offender Limits "to Enter Buildings" Considered by Brookfield, WI To Somehow Make Sense

Brookfield aldermen back housing curbs
By BRANDON LORENZ
Special to the Journal Sentinel
Posted: Nov. 15, 2007

Brookfield - The Common Council's Legislative and Licensing Committee on Thursday night revised, and unanimously recommended approval of, an ordinance preventing sex offenders from moving within 1,500 feet of places where children gather.

If the council approves the measure, sex offenders would be prevented from moving into about 90% of the city's residential units, according to city data.

At issue Thursday was language that would require sex offenders to obtain permission from building owners to enter temporarily into restricted areas where children could gather, such as churches or schools.

But with similar restrictions enacted in most of the city's neighboring communities, some aldermen expressed fears that Brookfield could become an island where sex offenders would relocate.
Full Story

Nun Pleads No Contest in Sex Abuse

CATRIN EINHORN, New York Times

A Roman Catholic nun pleaded no contest yesterday to two counts of indecent behavior with a child in connection with accusations from the 1960s when she was a principal and teacher at a Catholic school in Milwaukee.

The nun, Norma Giannini, 79, faces up to 20 years in prison for what prosecutors say was sexual abuse of two male students.

Although dozens of nuns have been accused of sexual abuse, often in civil lawsuits, Sister Giannini is one of the first to face criminal charges, said Anne Barrett Doyle, co-director of BishopAccountability.org, a group that compiles reports about abuse in the Roman Catholic Church.

Mary Pat Fox, president of Voice of the Faithful, a lay group formed in response to the Catholic sexual abuse scandal, said she hoped the case would encourage more victims of nuns to come forward. “I think this is the tip of the iceberg,” Ms. Fox said.

According to a criminal complaint filed by the Milwaukee County district attorney’s office, Sister Giannini repeatedly assaulted the two boys while they were in middle school at St. Patrick School. The complaint said the assaults included intercourse and occurred in numerous locations, including a convent and a classroom. Full Story Ed: Apparently, they're running out of priests. Seriously, though, does it trouble anyone else that we are seeing yet another big scare that is said to be "the tip of the iceberg"?

Head Found, Teens Arrested in 'Thrill Kill' Death of Decapitated Sex Offender

Monday , November 12, 2007
Fox News, Detroit

Two teens have been charged in the brutal decapitation death of a registered sex offender in Michigan whose headless body was left to burn in a subdivision in what prosecutors are calling a "thrill kill."

Not guilty pleas were entered Monday in Romulus District Court for Jean-Pierre Orlewicz, 17, and Alexander James Letkemann, 18, on one count each of first-degree premeditated murder, felony murder and mutilation of a corpse in the death of 26-year-old Daniel Gene-Vincent Sorensen.

"A crime like this surprises us all," Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy said at a press conference. "Any time anyone kills just because they want to — and that's what the evidence seems to suggest here — is bone-chilling. Why anybody would want to do that, especially being 17 years old, it makes us think and ask a lot of questions about our society." [Ed: This crime is not at all surprising and the state is complicit in this violence through its inflammatory use of sex offender websites, flyers and community notification]

Prosecutors allege the men lured Sorensen to the Canton Township home of Orlewicz's grandfather.

"They lured him in the garage where they prepared a space to kill him," Worthy said.

A tarp had been spread on the garage floor, and Sorenson was stabbed multiple times in the back. His head was sawed off and his body wrapped in the tarp, authorities said.

There, on a tarp they allegedly spread out for the attack, they slit Sorensen's throat with a knife and repeatedly stabbed him before cutting off his head with a hacksaw, prosecutors said.

They allegedly used a blowtorch on his hands and feet in an attempt to remove his fingerprints, officials said.

His torso was driven in a pickup truck and dumped in a Northville Township cul-de-sac where it was set on fire with gasoline. A utility crew found it the next morning, police said.

His head was dumped in the Rouge River near the border between Dearborn Heights and Detroit. It was found Saturday.

"They made plans on how they were to clean up the blood," Worthy said. "They made plans on how they were going to dispose of the body. No matter how malicious we all think it may be, it was very thought out and very methodical."

"I want to put a face to these people," Sorensen's father, Jim, told MyFOXDetroit on Sunday. "And if it’s a friend I want to know who would call themselves friend and do this to my son."

Sorenson was convicted in Tazewell County, Ill., when he was 17 of having sex with a 14-year-old girl, said Northville Township police Lt. Greg Rhodes. His troubled past had nothing to do with the murder, Worthy said. Full Story

As Frank Valado Lay Dying...

Mike St. Martin reports on the death of Frank Valado at Coalinga State Hospital. His account recounts Valado's final moments and t Mike St. Martin reports on the death of Frank Valado at Coalinga State Hospital. His report recounts Valado's final moments and the seeming indifference with which his life was regarded by California Department of Mental Health staff. Listen To Report

Committing sex offenders is costly, not very effective

By The Daily News

Douglas Allen Alsteen, a repeat sex offender, has done his time. Now he's back in a Cowlitz County courtroom, facing the possibility of indefinite confinement at Washington's Special Commitment Center on McNeil Island.

The violent sexual predator law state prosecutors are hoping will keep Alsteen locked away continues to stir controversy 17 years after its enactment. Critics say the law smacks of double jeopardy and fails to accomplish its expressed purpose, which is to treat violent sex offenders until they no longer pose a threat to society.

According to a recent New York Times report on costs at McNeil Island and civil-commitment facilities at the 18 other states that enacted laws modeled on Washington's, this state pays an average of $127,632 anually for each person committed under the law. That compares to $29,055 annually for each prison inmate. Washington's civil commitment program now has 266 residents. It's budget for fiscal 2007 totals $45 million. Full Story

Burned, Headless Man is ID'd as Child Sex Offender

November 9, 2007
BY BEN SCHMITT, Detroit Free Press

Northville police have identified the burned, headless body found on a cul-de-sac as a River Rouge man who was a registered sex offender.

Northville police, with the assistance of the Michigan State Crime Lab, used a fingerprint Thursday to identify the man as Daniel Sorensen, 26.

Sorensen was registered as a sex offender in Michigan and in Tazewell County, Ill., where records indicate he was convicted of fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct involving a victim between 13 and 16 years old. Full Story

Chesapeake ( VA) Wants To Add Community Centers, Parks and Libraries to List of Places Sex Offenders Can't Approach

November 8, 2007
Associated Press & 13News

CHESAPEAKE, Va. (AP) -- Chesapeake leaders want to add community centers, parks and maybe even libraries to the list of places that sex offenders can't approach.

The city plans to ask state legislators to amend the Virginia code to prevent convicted sex offenders from going within 100 feet of any public recreational area, community center or park.

Delegate John Cosgrove is supportive of the effort. He says it's a way to protect children and is "something we should have done a while ago."

"It just didn't make any sense to see that a sexual predator could have that type of access to a place with kids and vunerable folks," Cosgrove told 13News. "So, we need to make sure that that loophole is closed."

Board member Steve Johnson says he has heard of web sites that point predators to parks and recreation centers to find children. Full Story

Ohio Bill Would Make Sex Offenders Display Green License Plates

Thursday, November 08, 2007
A controversial bill to require sex offenders to display neon green license plates is making waves between Ohio lawmakers and law enforcement officials, MyFoxCleveland.com reports.
Prosecutors, sheriffs and police chiefs oppose Kristen’s Law, named for 14-year-old Kristen Jackson, who in 2002 was lured from a fair by a paroled sex offender, murdered and her body dismembered.
They say the perpetrators are smart enough to find other ways to corner their victims and fear the plates will cause vandalism and harassment against the offenders, as well as road rage and traffic hazards. Full Story

15-Year-Old Boy Charged with Failing to Re-Register as S.O.

by Raymond Rivera
11/08/2007 11:12 AM ET

DOVER, Del.- Delaware State Police arrested a 15-year-old Magnolia boy on charges of failure to re-register as a sex offender.

Police say the boy was arrested Wednesday afternoon in Meadowbrook Acres after police received information that he might be in the area. The boy is a tier-two, moderate-risk sex offender stemming from a 2005 fourth-degree rape conviction.

According to authorities, detectives also arrested the boy on an outstanding warrant for unauthorized use of a motor vehicle. Police say that charge was the result of an Oct. 23 investigation.

The boy was arraigned at Kent County Family Court, and ordered held at the Stevenson House Detention Facility.

Little Elm restricts where sex offenders live and go

The Dallas Morning News, http://www.dallasnews.com
© 2007 The Associated Press

LITTLE ELM, Texas — This North Texas town has adopted new rules restricting not only where registered sex offenders can live, but also where they can go.

The Little Elm Town Council on Tuesday approved ordinances covering about 68 percent of the town's land.

Under one ordinance, registered sex offenders can't live within 1,000 feet of places where children commonly gather, such as schools, parks, libraries and day care centers.

A second ordinance prohibits registered sex offenders from going within 1,000 feet of places where children commonly gather. Full Story