NY- Sex offender bill will be introduced to legislature

This seems to be the nth degree of a sick mind to say to homeless people, that we will give you a place to stay IF you give up your constitutional rights and become a prisoner following certain rules only applied to prisoners. Clearly cruel and unusual, but it is politics speaking which supposedly makes it acceptable. Hopefully the ACLU will jump on this.

10-7-2008 New York:

Suffolk Legislator Jay Schneiderman’s bill to limit the number of registered sex offenders the county may place in emergency housing without extensive monitoring has been finalized after a review by the counsel to the legislature.

With the names of the East End’s two legislators listed as co-sponsors—Mr. Schneiderman of Montauk and Legislator Edward Romaine of Center Moriches—the bill is to be formally introduced when the legislature meets Tuesday in Hauppauge. The bill will be considered in committee after its introduction next week.

The proposal calls for a limit on the placing “more than four registered sex offenders in emergency housing at a single facility and/or location.” It provides an exception if the county “successfully implements a program whereby an employee or agent of Suffolk County escorts any sex offender leaving the grounds of the facility” or, as an “alternative, any sex offender leaving the grounds of the emergency housing facility agrees to wear a GPS tracking device until they return to the facility.”

Mr. Schneiderman began working on the bill after the county’s Department of Social Services installed a large trailer last month, with room for 20 sex offenders on the grounds of the county jail in Riverside, in the northwest corner of Southampton Town. Last spring, it placed a smaller trailer there able to accommodate eight people.

In the text of the bill, the sponsors declare that “the devastating impact of sex crimes, particularly against children, and the alarmingly high rate of recidivism among sex offenders” have caused Suffolk “to enact a series of laws designed to protect residents from the dangers posed by sex offenders.”

They cites as a precedent for their measure a 2006 law limiting the placement of “more than one registered sex offender at the same residence in an area zoned for residential use.”

They cite the placement of the eight-person trailer on the grounds of the county jail last spring and the larger trailer more recently and add that “according to the State Sex Offender Registry, 15 sex offenders now list” the 20-person “trailer as their home address, 13 of whom are designated as Level 3” sex offenders, the category of offenders deemed to have the highest chance of repeating their crimes. “Nine were convicted of victimizing children,” they said.

Also, the sponsors write, “recent media reports indicate that the sex offender trailer is not as secure as the surrounding communities were led to believe by county officials.” It is a reference to stories about a large hole in the fence that encircles the parking lot where the trailer sits. Journalists and public officials, including Messrs. Schneiderman and Romaine, were given a tour last month of the site by a Riverhead town assessor, Mason Haas, who pointed out the gaping hole to them. ..News Source.. by Karl Grossman