USA FAIR, Inc., a national organization founded by family members of former sex offenders, today strongly opposed the proposed contract between Suffolk County, New York and Parents for Megan’s Law, a not-for-profit private organization, to provide monitoring of people required to register with the sex offender registry.
Under the contract, Parents for Megan’s Law would be responsible for monitoring registrants in what Suffolk Police chief James Burke called "the toughest monitoring and enforcement program in the nation" for dealing with the county's more than 1,000 registered sex offenders. The organization would be paid $2.7 million over 3 years.
“Suffolk County has every right to implement as tough a program as its legislators desire, so long as it is permissible by law. However, the monitoring of sex offenders has traditionally been a law enforcement function throughout the country. To outsource this important task to a private organization with a history of demonizing the very people they are contracted to monitor is unprecedented and unwise. It amounts to government-sanctioned vigilantism,” said USA FAIR Executive Director Shana Rowan.
According to Rowan, “Parents for Megan’s Law and its Executive Director, Laura Ahearn, have promoted the myth of high sex offender recidivism, a falsehood that is contradicted by every major study, including a landmark study by the U.S. Department of Justice that found that sex offenders actually have one of the lowest re-offense rates of any offender group in the criminal justice system.”
“Laura Ahearn has shown herself to be a strident ideologue on sex offender issues, not open to a dialog with the former offender community and their family members. USA FAIR has repeatedly tried to get her to take down misleading statistics form her organization’s website and she has failed to even respond to our requests. Our only conclusion is that the “big lie” of high recidivism serves her agenda and her finances.”
USA FAIR raised particular objections to County Legislator Jay Schneiderman’s (I-Montauk) desire to see this $2.7 million contract hastily approved today by circumventing the normal committee process, which Rowan called a “rush to judgment without due diligence that will undoubtedly lead to unintended consequences and future lawsuits.”
Rowan concluded, “Law enforcement should be performed by objective and well trained professionals - not issue advocacy ideologues.”
How about compost?
Are all the people in the trailers (westhampton) predators and offenders? Are they all marked on the web page that locates convicted offenders/predators. I believe the answer to these questions establishes if there is indeed a difference as far as the law is concerned.
Here a guy, Dad of 3, uses obvious humor to deal with your earlier vicious and intolerant and horrible posts, and you go and distort that into a matter of possible intention. I can't wait to see what you will try next.
While on probation or parole, residency restrictions apply to all equally, and some states do not have residency restriction. They have read the research and know they do not work toward public safety. Individual jurisdictions can apply them, and they do. Even when supervision has ended, a jurisdiction can have restrictions in place, and they will apply to anyone on the registry. Some of these are being challenged on constitutional grounds and are being struck down, but while they are in place, it is "one size fits all." I cannot answer the last two questions. There is no difference in the eyes of the public, prospective employers, or owners of rental property: if one's name is on the registry, be it for a misdemeanor or for the most serious of crimes, the registrant is treated the same. The same is true for law enforcement. The difference there is that some l.e. entities feel all on the registry are scum and do all they can to make their lives miserable, which does not serve public safety. Some l.e. entities are decent and respectful and...human.
Her husband was "convicted of sodomizing and inappropriately touching his six year old step-sister". I'm all for doing away of the stupid offenses that can get one on there, but how the hell is he "mislabeled"? Moreover, how can one complain about a teenager sexually abusing a 6 year old girl being registered as a sex offender? Most behavioral scientists will concede that people who engage in this type of behavior at an early age are much more likely repeat or get worse as they grow up. The same SHOULD be done for other criminals, such as murderers, and kids who kill animals as well, and people like someone who abuses a 6 year old is EXACTLY the type of person the registry attempts to protect others from, regardless of the CHANCES of them reoffending . Your husband made a choice. And you made a choice knowing the choices he made, and now you have to live with those choices. That doesn't mean that the people who harass you are justified though, but it's the choices you both have to live with. http://www.wwnytv.com/news/local/Feedback-Woman-Fights-for-Rights-Of-Sex-Offenders--Families-147190125.html
"Human Rights Watch found there is scant justification for ever registering juvenile offenders, even those who have committed serious offenses. Most are likely to outgrow such behavior, particularly given treatment. Recidivism rates for juvenile offenders are extremely low, and few adult offenders ever committed sex crimes as youth." http://www.hrw.org/news/2007/09/11/us-sex-offender-laws-may-do-more-harm-good " 'Children do not go out and hide in the bushes and attack strangers,' said Nicole Pittman of Human Rights Watch. 'It's usually inappropriate behavior, and longitudinal studies that tracked children from the time of their offense to well into their 30s found that less than 2 percent committed another sex crime.' " http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2011-12-27/news/ct-met-juvenile-offender-20111227_1_offender-registry-alternative-behavior-treatment-centers-felony-criminal-sexual-abuse
http://www.iloveasexoffender.blogspot.com/2012/10/he-is-not-monster.html https://www.youtube.com/user/sosupporter http://www.usafair.org/about_shana_rowan Your interpretation of that particular blog post was not my intended message. Should you truly have an interest in speaking with me and learning about what USA FAIR advocates for, feel free to contact me at shana.rowan@usafair.org. I think you'll come to see that we most likely agree on more than it seems.
I didn't see any part of this story talking about (and avoiding the very distasteful thing you wrote) someone's genitalia "hanging out". Please give your specific reference.
" and kids who kill animals as well" That would cover roughly half the kids i grew up with. Shooting squirels was a game when i was young. Should we all be labeled and monitored incase we kill again?? Kids are kids. Adults are the problem.
1) Regardless if the offender is any type of victim or not, there comes a time where someone commits a certain type of crime that they forfeit all of their rights and privileges, and, in my opinion, that includes sexually abusing a child, among others. 2) If there isn't a 100% chance that they won't reoffend (and you really can never determine for 100% if they will or not), they shouldn't be given the opportunity to. They have already demonstrated their ability to harm. One more victim is one to many, regardless of the chances 3) It's also tragic that minor misunderstandings can land one on the registry, that needs to change. But as far as the type who intentionally hurt children, no, in my opinion they need to be monitored for the rest of their life, if not locked up, because one more victim, especially a child, is not worth the risk. 3) This isn't just for child abusers. This goes for rapists, murderers, molesters, spouse abusers etc. It's a joke the amount of people we let out who continue to prey on the weak. Maybe if we weren't constantly releasing these type of offenders, people will start to see you will be punished severely.
B) Slapping a girl on the butt is inappropriate behavior. "sodomizing" a 6 year old girl is not "inappropriate behavior". It's molestation. C) You're willing to put more people at risk, I'm not. If I'm wrong, someone who molested a child was watched closely for the rest of his life and never committed a another crime. You claim we let to many children get abused as it is, and If you're wrong about the offender, like you are 8% of the time, that's one more person we let get attacked. Not worth the risk. I'd rather someone who sexually attacked anyone be closely watched for the rest of their life than risk putting someone else at risk, just so the criminal can be comfortable
CRHHs: The Registries are unacceptable - don't just ensure that they are worthless, ensure that they are counterproductive. If the Registries were actually about public safety, protecting children, or any of those other lies, then many, many other types of Registries would have been created well before the year 2000. But they weren't. Intelligent, informed Americans have never support the Registries.