VT- Expanded Internet sex registry sought for Vermont

4-15-2009 Vermont:

MONTPELIER – Proposed legislation would quintuple the number of people on Vermont's Internet sex-offender registry and add the home addresses of residents convicted of certain crimes.

The provisions, included in a package that also decriminalizes the practice of so-called "sexting" among consenting teenagers, have drawn fire from the Vermont ACLU, which has constitutional concerns about a registry expansion that it says it will do little to improve the safety of Vermont children.

However, Sen. Richard Sears, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said his committee has heard from a spectrum of Vermonters seeking broader access to the state's criminal database.

"The idea is that knowledge is power," said Sears, a Bennington County Democrat.

The bill, which passed through the Senate last week and is set for debate in a House committee today, expands the list of crimes that make sex-offenders eligible for the Internet registry. Vermont currently has about 2,400 sex offenders on its statewide registry, but only about 400 meet the threshold required to land on the more public Internet registry. The Senate bill would add another 1,600 names to the Web.

"The idea is that the community would be aware of these individuals and that this, by and large, is not a punishment, but rather a warning system," Sears said.

The bill also would revise the registry to include the home addresses of registered sex offenders. The existing registry lists only the offenders' hometowns.

(eAdvocate Post)

"So many people said they wanted that information," Sears said. "If their daughter is going to a friend's house for a sleepover, they want to be able to check and make sure there's nothing amiss at that house."

Sears said the registry expansion stems from a series of summer hearings held after the rape and murder of 12-year-old Brooke Bennett. A federal act, passed by Congress in 2006 and set to take effect later this summer, also has given rise to the issue. The Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act seeks to unify Internet registry standards across all 50 states, and imposes financial penalties for states that fail to meet certain minimum requirements.

Sears said the state has held off on many provisions in the Adam Walsh Act – notably the retroactive addition of old juvenile convictions to the Internet registry. The committee did add certain crimes – such as lewd and lascivious conduct, second-offense voyeurism, and all sexual assaults – to the list of crimes that would land offenders on the publicly accessible Internet database.

Allen Gilbert, head of the Vermont ACLU, said there's no data to support a link between bigger registries and better public protection. He points to a 2005 legislative study, conducted months after Vermont first implemented its Internet registry, that found "no studies or statistics regarding a correlation between the establishment of sex offender Internet registries and rates of recidivism."

"We've always contended that Internet registries are a bad idea, mainly because there's no evidence that they work," Gilbert said. "They provide an illusion of public security, and we also think they stigmatize offenders, thereby making it difficult for them to be assimilated into society again."

Gilbert also opposes the inclusion of home addresses on the online registry. In 2006, two men were gunned down in their Maine homes by a 20-year-old Canada man who reportedly targeted them after finding their names and locations on the state's Internet sex-offender registry.

Gilbert said the practice of including offenders' home addresses risks similar vigilantism in Vermont.

"We think it's a really bad idea," Gilbert said.

Retroactively applying new Internet registry protocols to previously adjudicated cases, according to Gilbert, could be constitutionally questionable.

"We think it is indeed a punishment and should not be applied to people who were convicted prior to the time when the provision goes into effect," Gilbert said.

Sears said Vermont has received a one-year extension for compliance with the Adam Walsh Act. The state risks losing as much as $500,000 in federal aid if it does not comply, though Congress is reconsidering aspects of the law after objections were raised by a number of states, including Vermont.

Sears noted that, if passed, the registry expansion would not take effect until 2010. Technological and staffing shortcomings at the state's registry program have resulted in out-of-date and incorrect information being posted online, he said. The year-long implementation delay, Sears said, is intended to give the Department of Public Safety time to solve the problems and streamline the processes.

The House is set to deliberate on the registry component of the bill this week. ..News Source.. by Peter Hirschfeld Vermont Press Bureau