american public, if that were possible, I’d bet the farm that the
needle on the meter would be all over the place if you’d subject the
subjects to child ####. hmmm!

Stranger danger has been extensively overplayed and for all this poster’s concern that parents are concerned about child molesters, may be he should realize it is those said say parents, relatives and close family friends who pose the greatest risk to children, not the strangers.

But maybe it’s too difficult to get around the fact that most abused children are abused by their own families and not the guy down the street.

Genarlow Wilson

Exactly.

My purpose for writing my initial commentary was not to defend sex offenders from having to get special license plates. It is my very real and valid question for vehicle safety that leads me to believe that the requirement for offenders to display sex offender plates can lead to road rage as I described above, and my concern was frankly for innocent citizens in other cars or on foots around the potential road rage contact point.

Now, you said that offenders should be in jail for life, and I find that sentencing on a whole is finally getting to that point. However, there are over half a million sex offenders in the country who have ALREADY spent their sentence in jail and are now either on probation or, in many cases, free of the correctional system altogether except for the requirement to register. In my opinion, we need to segregate them from society, and to do that legally, it has to be done within Constitutional contraints. That is why I am in the process of creating an amendment to the constitution to restrict the residency, employment, and communications of ALL registered sex offenders to that of sex offender zones, or colonies, for the remainder of the time they have to register.

Nobody wants sex offenders to live in their neighborhoods, or even their cities. I’m a parent, and I would fight tooth and nail to prevent sex offenders from living anywhere that children may live.

Unfortunately, these sex offenders have rights. If they are not in prison, they will probably get the ACLU to sue the city and we will have to spend thousands of dollars defending the restrictions.

The ONLY thing, therefore, is to create an amendment to the US Constitution, creating sex offender colonies to restrict where these convicted sex offenders live in the first place. How to do this?

The first thing that needs to be done is to create an outline of such an amendment. I looked at the process for how an amendment is created. Here is the process:

Under Article V, there are two ways to propose amendments to the Constitution and two ways to ratify them.

To propose an amendment

1. Two-thirds of both houses of Congress vote to propose an amendment, or
2. Two-thirds of the state legislatures ask Congress to call a national convention to propose amendments.

To ratify an amendment

1. Three-fourths of the state legislatures approve it, or
2. Ratifying conventions in three-fourths of the states approve it.

I would submit that the state legislature route would probably be more effective, but the congressional method can be tried first. It can effectively be used as a litmus test for voting, i.e., if someone doesn’t want to vote for proposing the amendment in congress, their 2008 opponent can have a field day in saying that the incumbent protects sex offenders at the expense of children’s safety, etc.

Such an amendment would solve many problems. First of all, the registry would not exist in its current form. Parents don’t have to worry where the monsters live, as they all would, by law, have to live in the colony. This also eliminates the need for GPS, as the sex offenders would be restricted to the colony in the first place. No worries about convicted child molesters stalking your children’s school or favorite park, or trolling on the Internet.

Next, registrants would constitutionally have to be subjected to non-court ordered search of their premises within the zone. In addition, all their mail and phone calls would constitutionally be authorized to be monitored for illicit activities. Internet usage would also be strictly regulated, with all file storage for every computer actually done at the server-level. In addition, emails would be assigned by the administration, no Instant messaging or accessing MySpace or other children sites allowed, and all keystrokes and sites visited will be recorded 100%. All costs for such usage would be borne out by the offender, incidentally.

All registrants would be required to work, with their paychecks being handled by the administrators. Deductions for medical, rent, all services, and everything else would be done automatically, and any credit the registrant have be used for discretionary income ONLY from the colony store. Also, EVERY registrant will be required to go through treatment appropriate to his crime, and be certified as cured; otherwise, he can be subject to a felony charge and returned to prison.

Now, please keep in mind one thing: The sex offender colony is NOT…repeat…NOT a replacement for tough, appropriately long, non-paroleable sentencing guidelines in the first place! THAT IS PARAMOUNT. The colony would exist because society cannot handle the large amounts of offenders in their neighborhoods, with the inherent terror parents have with the knowledge that offenders are around their children. Therefore, the colony is SPECIFICALLY for offenders to spend their entire registration periods in a constitutionally-approved manner, eliminating the need for registries as they exist now.

Keep in mind, many offenders also are able to leave the registry for certain crimes after a specified amount of time has passed. Therefore, once a registrant’s time period has expired, he can petition the administration to be relieved of the duty to register and live in the SORERA zone. A panel of professionals, law enforcement individuals, and the offender’s victim representatives, will go over the request. If they feel the offender is ready to join society, then he can leave the zone and live anywhere he wants, although he will have to permanently register with law enforcement wherever he goes for the rest of his life. Bear in mind, also, that any registrant who has to register for life will NEVER get the opportunity to leave the zone. Only the most benign of the registrants will ever be allowed to leave.

Incidentally, I am working in conjunction with some of Nancy Grace’s fans and hopefully, she will introduce such an amendment this summer.

I believe child sex offenders should never ever be let out of a secure penal institution. Never. They cannot be treated.

Mark—I’ve heard the same from others who’ve worked in your field, and I believe it. I think the aforementioned idea of sex offender “colonies” is a bit extreme, but I do believe that if we really believe a sex offender is dangerous for life, we should make the penalty match that reality. To me, it is disingenuous for US lawmakers to suggest that marks on driver’s licenses, fluorescent-green license plates, or mandatory registries and community notification are really appropriate solutions. If they are dangerous for life, they should be in prison for life. The steps we’re currently taking to try to isolate and identify sexual predators work neither to deter crimes from occuring in the first place, nor to stop repeat offenders. A special license plate is such a politician’s answer to a societal ill.

Of those 4 groups, the first are impossible.
The drive is too deep, the scheming so clever, the time they will take so long.
I have had to open the door for a guy who I knew was going to go and abuse some children that night. I had no legal grounds to detain him. He knew, I knew. There was nothing I could do. He went to court, agreed to “treatment” and when he was told to go he laughed when he got back to the unit and left to “celebrate” no doubt.

These are dangerous dangerous people.

My wife has worked with the most dangerous in the UK and in all her experiences, they are the worst.
She went to one unit and on her first day was told not to be worried about the murderers – they had got who they wanted. The rapists were pointed out and she was told to be very careful indeed because they were not finished.

I believe sex offenders should be known, be findable.
I believe child sex offenders should never ever be let out of a secure penal institution. Never. They cannot be treated.
How do you treat sexual urges? You can’t. If you can’t treat then you control.

To have the right to life in a community you need to have the responsibility to do so.
If you can’t handle the responsibility you lose that right.
It’s that simple in the end.