Tuesday, April 7, 2015

URGENT CALL TO ACTION: Lifetime Monitoring Bill To Be Heard

This is URGENT!!!
 
The Lifetime Monitoring Bill is being heard on Tuesday (Today). That's this coming Tuesday!
 
If you are opposed to this bill it is important that you please call and email the senate committee. We are counting on our members to call and send emails by the thousands!!!
 
You do not need to mention if you are a registered citizen, related to one, or a friend of one.
 
You only need to tell them,
 
“HB203./SB134 is not good policy for Florida, It is not based on empirical research, and will be an unsustainable cost to the tax payers. You prefer they put these resources towards prevention, education and victim services.”
 
OR
 
“I’m calling about HB203 or (SB134) As a citizen of Florida I am really hopeful we will begin to create and pass legislation that is based on empirical evidence and this bill clearly is not. It also flies in the face of being fiscally responsible with tax payer dollars and public safety.  With all of the restrictions on registered citizens they will not be able to pay these charges for life and will be back in prison. The tax payer footing the bill. If the only reason we will re-incarcerate someone who is otherwise not breaking any law, living in a law abiding manner, but because they are poor and cannot pay a debt imposed by punishment, will be re-incarcerated makes no sense. Prison should be for those who pose such a concern to public safety they cannot be managed in the community, this would not be the case. DO NOT SUPPORT THIS BILL, I AM ASKING YOU TO VOTE NO!”
 
Points:
 
•     Does nothing for prevention, the monitor does not prevent new offenses and is contrary to allowing an offender to effectively re-integrate back into society. The monitor creates a hardship for an offender to even go food shopping. It goes off in most large retail locations. Publix, Target just to name a few, not allowing them to complete their shopping. They must go outside to re-establish their signal and vacate their purchase.
•     Burden for cost will fall back to the tax payer both for the cost of monitoring as well as the cost of incarceration for a violation. It will also present false information on numbers relating to recidivism.
•   Not supported by empirical evidence,.  After about 8 years and again in half after 10… After 15 years the risk drops to zero 0… NO greater risk than anyone else in the community who has never been convicted of a sex offense. Sex offenders have a low recidivism rate to begin with as compared to the other offender populations.
•   Creates a revolving door back to the prison, is contrary to public interest and contrary to smart justice.
•   Denies Liberty and Due Process
•   There is no basis other than punishment and ignorance which drives such policy.
 
It is your responsibility to reach out to your legislators and all those on the Criminal Justice Sub Committees in both the house and senate to advise them this is not what Florida wants or needs. (SEE 
LIST AND CONTACTS BELOW)
 
TO FIND YOUR LEGISLATORS:
 
www.myfloridahouse.gov click on Representatives or enter your address             

www.flsenate.gov click on senator or enter your zip code
Senate Criminal Justice Sub Committee
 
Chairman:
 
Greg Evers [R]
evers.greg@flsenate.gov     850.487.5002
 
Vice Chair
 
Audrey Gibson [D]
gibson.audrey@flsenate.gov  850.487.5009
 
Rob Bradley [R]
bradley.rob@flsenate.gov   850.487.5007
 
Jeff Brandes [R]  
brandes.jeff@flsenate.gov  850.487.5022
 
Jeff Clemens [D]  
clemens.jeff@flsenate.gov  850.487.5027
 
House of Representatives Criminal Justice Sub Committee
Chair  12/8/2014 - 8/1/2015
 
Trujillo, Carlos [R]
carlos.trujillo@myfloridahouse.gov  850.717.5105
 
Vice Chair  12/8/2014 - 8/1/2015
 
Van Zant, Charles E. [R] 
Charles.vanzant@myfloridahouse.gov  850.717.5019
 
Democratic Ranking Member 12/19/2014 - 8/1/2015
 
Bracy, Randolph [D] 
randolf.bracy@myfloridahouse.gov   850.717.5045
 
Baxley, Dennis K. [R]  
dennis.baxley@myfloridahouse.gov  850.717.5023
 
Fant, Jay [R]
jay.fant@myfloridahouse.gov  850.717.5015
 
Harrell, Gayle B. [R] 
gayle.harrell@myfloridahouse.gov  850.717.5083
 
Kerner, Dave [D] 
dave.kerner@myfloridahouse.gov  850.717.5087
 
Latvala, Chris [R] 
chris.latvala@myfloridahouse.gov   850.717.5067
 
Pilon, Ray [R]
ray.pilon@myfloridahouse.gov   850.717.5072
 
Plakon, Scott [R]  
scott.plakon@myfloridahouse.gov  850.717.5029
 
Pritchett, Sharon [D] 
sharon.pritchett@myfloridahouse.gov  850.717.5102
 
Spano, Ross [R]
ross.spano@myfloridahouse.gov  850.717.5059
 
Watson, Jr., Clovis [D] 
clovis.watson@myfloridahouse.gov   850.717.5020
 
You can also refer them to this report:
http://floridaactioncommittee.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/HighRiskOffenders_MayNotBeHighForever_Hanson_Harris_Helmus_Thornton.pdf
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2 comments:

  1. oncefallendotcomApril 7, 2015 at 6:44 AM

    Just a thought here but in the future you may want to take the emails and put them together in a way that is easy for us to just cut and paste them all at once. It would be a timesaver to those wanting to send emails.

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownApril 8, 2015 at 5:25 AM

    Thanks, oncefallendotcom, for the input and will keep that in mind to make it easier for others.

    ReplyDelete

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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.”