Monday, February 28, 2011

National laws dealing with sex offenders - Article 3

Original Article: http://www.helium.com/items/1668370-sex-offender-laws-in-the-us?page=2

by Kathrine Mills

December 01, 2009

Assuming rehabilitation is possible, America releases convicted sexual predators into society daily and quite frankly, has its down falls, and not just on the side of the public safety. Due to the fact that there truly has been no real rehabilitative program put into place, we are very strict with the right we give the convicted sex offenders. Lets take a look at what a "rehabilitated offender" is forced to follow under the current system.

Some major examples of these guidelines would be the sex offenders register, behavior monitoring systems, laws declaring they must openly tell people that they gather with, that they are convicted sex offenders, and these so called banishing laws that keep them from living and going into areas where children are present. 

Let's talk about a more specific example that impacts all sex offenders in many states.

A Sex offender in North Carolina is filing a law suit after he was arrested for attending a church in March.


The zones we spoke of earlier are places in which that they aren't allowed to go, based on the presence of minors or proximity to places where minors gather. The man who is filing the suit was arrested for going to church because the church had a daycare center in it.

He is not the only one who is following the trend of sex offenders protesting the current laws dictating their lives. Georgia's Southern Center for Human Rights is suing the state because of this and some other issues addressing the rights of 16,000 + sex offenders in that state.

"Criminalizing the practice of religion for everyone on the registry will do more harm than good. With these laws, states are driving people on the registry from their faith community and depriving them of the rehabilitative influence of the church." -Sara Totonchi, policy director for theSouthern Center for Human Rights.

Now, it is very important for us to protect minors by limiting what kinds of communities these people can live in, such as how far they live from schools (especially elementary) because many kids have to walk to school for lack of bus service through the schools. Over 20 states have set up zones in which these offenders are not legally allowed to live including church areas.

Having sex offenders in or even around churches is a big deal because there are many children running the halls of most church buildings. However, if we ban sex offenders from church, how can they heal? I hear the argument all the time that television preachers aren't good enough mainly because church is supposed to be 3 things:

1. Fellowship of believers (fellowship/having fun/socializing)
2. Corporate Worship and prayer (coming together as a larger body to worship and pray)
3. Establish and execute ministry of both internal and external focus.

Now the fact that they are vulnerable isn't solely because they don't go to church, but because they are removed or have removed themselves from the constant fellowship and uplifting of those who share their belief system.

The third is controversial, but as long as the ministry has nothing to do with kids, like the nursery, children's program, Youth Group or Women's ministries, there shouldn't be an issue as far as minors are concerned.

Plus most people agree that for the most part, those sex offenders who participate in Church are more likely to complete a more successful assimilation into the community again, which usually leads to less cases of offenses in the future.

"It's not clear that there's any public-safety purpose to these laws. They continue to ostracize previous sex offenders in a way that could be dangerous in the end. If they can successfully transition to the community, to include going to church, they are less likely to re-offend." - Sarah Tofte, Human Rights Watch legal researcher.

While we should definitely limit activity of such offenders, there has to be a place for them somewhere when it comes to the body of Christ! If a person commits a crime and gets saved afterwards, repents of his sins and God changes him, he completes his punishment and is released, then they are being sent back into the world with the same rights as every other citizen.

While we still are responsible for making sure they are monitored outside through probation and residence limitations, we have to realize that they still have rights as an American citizen.

As long as the pastor and leaders are aware of the persons status as a sex offender, there should be no problem. That will almost definitely become an issue though because gossip among church people is ridiculous.

Someone is bound to sue the church at some point for spreading the word, even though they aren't supposed to. Ultimately
it comes down to this one question as far as going to church is concerned, cliche as it may be, 

What Would Jesus Do?
 
The bigger picture here is about the rights of a sex offender. The act of telling a person who has paid for their crime and has been released under probation, from the view of Criminal Justice, is violating several of their first amendment rights.
We cannot put these offenders behind bars permanently, though many people would adore that idea, or even banish them to some far away place where no women or children live.

When we do release them, we must make sure that they are rehabilitated and monitor their behaviors. This is what the probation program has been set up to do. Setting conservative guidelines to protect minors and women are a absolute necessity for these convicts, however, it should not be a means to take away their basic constitutional rights.

Before we could even try to figure out how to develop better laws regarding the lives of these offenders, we must first figure out how to allow them to become a part of free society and possess such rights as going to the mall, church, or being with their families at family friendly places.

Creating a successful and effective rehabilitation program for this specific type of offense is the most important step in making sure we get them back into society and out from behind bars. After all is said and done, can we truly say that these laws are really helping these convicts get better?

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"When an American says that he loves his country, he means not only that he loves the New England hills, the prairies glistening in the sun, the wide and rising plains, the great mountains, and the sea. He means that he loves an inner air, an inner light in which freedom lives and in which a man can draw the breath of self-respect."
~Adlia Stevenson U.S. Vice President (1893–1897) and Congressman (1879–1881)

On a Personal Note

Thanks for the opportunity to express my thoughts regarding the issue of citizens’ rights, particularly addressing certain sex offenders’ crimes that do not fit the devastating, inequitable and endless punishment given.


As you know, many young men and women lives across the nation are being destroyed by incarceration, life-time registry and restrictive laws that do more harm than good. For those individuals, there is no second chance.

Below is a personal letter to President Obama:
* * * *
“Dear President Obama,

I truly agree with your sentiments that individuals, such as ex-felons, should be able to receive a second chance at life. Since we all know that one can veer off that path of life and travel along rough, rocky terrain, sometimes running off and ending up in some ditch. We all have made our fill of mistakes and sometimes those held a costly consequence that changed life forever. So we lived through it, trying harder to make things right with family, friends and those around us, but what about those who aren’t able to make things right even if they tried…because they’re labeled as too dirty, a leper, a person who is rejected from society and home.

But what if they’re a seventeen year old and had sex with a fifteen year old, consensual at that? Or they’re a teen that had gotten so enraged after a breakup that he sent out naked pictures of his girlfriend on his cell phone or email? Or an individual urinates where someone just happens to see them?

All are wrong and a travesty but do they deserve the life of no second chance with a registry that ends all. They are labeled, no jobs, no where to live…they have been deemed a menace to society, a plague. These certain circumstances, and many other situations similar to these, I believe still deserve a second change.

Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

After my son’s early release and two years of prison, I thought I had handled that fact graciously knowing after serving his time he would be able to get that fresh start, that second chance. He was an exemplary inmate, GED, college courses and vocational classes. Little did I know that a second chance on the outside was the farthest from the truth? He now struggles and lives in a trailer park sharing a trailer with another and surrounded by others in the same rocking boat, one to float endlessly in shark infested waters. I see him little because of probation requirements (he couldn’t live with us because we were 800 feet near a school). My family is afraid of what would happen to them if he lived with them…vigilantism. My son has no other place to stay since others condemn him of his crime that is screamed from the highest rooftop. Sex offender, sex offender!

Not all sex offenders are pedophiles or predators but some are simply young kids that make one stupid and rash decision that eventually changes everything, and they have no idea what they’ve done until their life is never their own. Exactly, where is that second chance for those sex-offenders who are lumped together with pedophiles and predators? Now, it makes me sick to think of my son’s future and many like him that are on the registry and many with no second chance…ever. I am asking you as a mother and as another concerned citizen of the United States that these laws are looked at again and taken into serious consideration in what they are doing to the Constitution of the United States, not for sex offenders in general but the future rights of every citizen, before anymore are put into effect. They unjustly strip an offender of their rights and place them in a guillotine that can be easily set off by anyone and at anytime. Where is the second chance for ex-sex offenders in the present, pending and future laws?”
* * * *
What truly saddens me is the weakness and deterioration of what the sex offense issue is doing to our once, great nation. Across Europe, others are seeing the injustice and disregard of rights, but we ignore this problem and it makes me wonder where humanity is heading….

We have become a hysterical society in which our latest witch-hunt is a sex offender--no matter his/her crime.

Below is a email sent from a foreign advocate to a father of a sex offender:
* * * *
“The tragic story of your son's death is just so sad that it's difficult to explain how. It was very hard to read your letters. It seems almost unbelievable that this can take place in a democracy! From our point of view, there is no justice in this. Not in any way: not for you, your son, the former girl friend – or even the state.

It is an abusive legal system. It seems barbaric. And we are so very sorry that this takes place. That's why it's so important for us to try to neutralize the debate with this…, hopefully making some changes. ….. to show the every day life of the sex offenders, trying to show how they keep on being punished, even after served prison time…..But we will for sure tell the story of the injustice that your son has been exposed to.”
* * * *
I appreciate everyone's commitment and backing to protect everyone's civil rights, plainly as noted in the Constitution of the United States and is presupposed, giving ALL men are “life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.”