By Deborah Jacobs
There
are few crimes more heinous than child molestation. Whether violently
attacked by a stranger or preyed upon by a trusted adult in the home,
school or place of worship, children who survive such assaults are often
left to walk a lifelong path of sorrow and pain.
Unfortunately,
our government has failed to take steps that will make a meaningful
difference in preventing sex offenses. Megan's Law, civil commitment,
and the newest trend in anti-sex offender legislation, banishment zones,
which restrict sex offenders from living within certain geographic
areas, all play to the fears of the public. But when it comes to
stopping sex assaults, these measures do more harm than good.
To understand why, one must look at the realities of sex crimes in America today. The vast majority of sex offenses are committed by trusted adults-family members, friends, clergy-and
go unreported because of manipulation of the victims, unconscionable
decisions by other adults, or both. We saw this most vividly when
lawsuits uncovered that the Catholic Church hierarchy had hidden and
ignored countless cases of child sexual abuse for decades, choosing to
protect its reputation over the children under its care. Unfortunately,
this happens in family hierarchies even more frequently.
Because
the most common type of sex crime so often goes unreported, most sex
offenders never become part of the criminal justice system and therefore
are not affected by Megan's Law or banishment zone laws. As a result,
these laws give the public a false sense of security, letting us believe
that sex offenders have been exiled from their neighborhood, or that if
a sex offender does live nearby, we will receive notification of his
presence. If we believe that, we are fooling ourselves and, worse, doing
our children a disservice. Sex offenders live in every American
community, and children need supervision no matter what.
Laws
like banishment zone ordinances actually make us less safe, as they
impede offender rehabilitation and thereby increase the likelihood of
reoffense. People who transition from prison into society face countless
challenges, and most have very limited resources, financial or
otherwise. People who want to lead law-abiding lives after serving a
prison sentence need to establish stability in their homes, jobs and
families. Those are difficult things to achieve, but add to this the
consequences of Megan's Law and limits to where offenders can live, and
few have hope
of succeeding. Indeed, the fear of the stigma of Megan's Law can force
offenders underground, out of the watchful eye of police and parole
officers.
Banishment
zone laws may very likely force sexual offenders to move from
environments in which they have support networks into other communities
in which they have no support, putting residents in their new
communities at risk. Further, people who are labeled as sex offenders
lose jobs, get evicted, are threatened with death, and harassed by
neighbors.
Some
have had their homes burned down or been beaten in acts of vigilantism.
Coping with this kind of stress is almost impossible, and without
exceptionally strong support systems, most are doomed to fail.
If
you doubt whether we should care about the stress and suffering of
someone who committed a sex crime, consider the consequences for society
when the ex-offender fails. When nothing works out - job, home,
family-individuals are more likely to give up and
reoffend.
Rather
than banishing sex offenders and asking them to succeed in a hostile
environment, we should focus resources on programs and policies that
will actually reduce the likelihood of sex offenses occurring in the
first place. We need to develop and fund public education programs that
teach about the effects of sex abuse and the importance of reporting
abuse so that it can be stopped.
We
need to improve our systems for handling reports of abuse, looking to
models like Wynona's House in Essex County, which brings different
agencies together to ease the burden on victims reporting abuse. And we
need to provide mental health treatment for victims and offenders, in
prison and out.
There
is no simple fix to the devastating problem of sex abuse. Instead of
politically popular measures that make no difference or in fact make us
less safe, we need to turn our attention and resources to ways of
addressing the epidemic of sex abuse that, while perhaps not as
politically popular, will actually work so that more potential victims
can be spared.
The
issue is not whether our children should be protected from sex
offenders, but how to accomplish that in an effective and meaningful
way. Our children deserve nothing less.
Deborah Jacobs is the Executive Director of the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey.
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