MI- Police sweep Grand Rapids to issue citations to sex offenders who missed registration deadline

More police misconstructions which are likely to result in charges for this man! Study my highlights, is he guilty of "failure to register" ????

7-25-2009 Michigan:

GRAND RAPIDS -- As city police Officer John Wetzel and Detective Kristen Rogers pulled along the curb on Turner Avenue NW, a head peeked through the front door window of a brick house.

Out poured three residents and a small black dog, greeting Wetzel and Rogers on the front porch.

The police were there to see a 53-year-old convicted child molester who failed to renew his address with police between July 1 and July 15, as required by law.

Like about half of the offenders targeted during the Grand Rapids Police Department's quarterly searches for sex offender who fail to renew their address, the man told police he simply forgot.

"I should have, but I have a hard time keeping track of things," he told the officers. "I know I can get in trouble for not doing it and it's not a big deal to go down there."

Six Grand Rapids officers swept across much of city Friday evening, issuing citations to sex offenders who hadn't renewed address or failed to pay registration fees.

The sweeps typically target 20 to 25 people who failed to register, or about 3 percent of the city's estimated 750 registered sex offenders. On Friday, about 30 offenders were sought, Wetzel said.

Officers don't make arrests during the sweeps, but citations put sex offenders back in front of judges and reinforce the need to renew addresses.

"It sends a message that they need to be compliant or they're going to be involved in the court system once again," said Wetzel, who has performed more than a dozen concentrated sweeps. "Word tends to get out that we're looking for them."

The responses typically follow a few patterns -- the offenders are either apologetic for forgetting, away from the residence at the time, or on the lam.

For Wetzel and Rogers, a stop at a small Northeast Side house on Cusick Place NW yielded information that a 41-year-old man had given a false address when registering.

When Wetzel and Rogers drove up to the house, where Michael Jackson's "P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)" blared and a dog yipped in the background, a woman came out to speak with the officers.

"He stayed here but he never lived here," the woman said of the delinquent offender. "I don't want no problems."

The facts: Police go to this home, obviously he had registered there. The woman says "he stayed here but never lived here," followed by "I don't want no trouble." If he was staying there, he was living there and her last comment implies she is afraid she will be charged with something.

Did he fail to register, no, he is in jail on some other charge. BUT, the police look only at a portion of her comment "he never lived here" and decide to charge him with the crime of failure to register.

How lame is this, facing jail on a police misconstruction. Hopefully the lawyer will read this news article and have that charge dismissed.

The missing offender, who was convicted for criminal sexual conduct, was found to be in the Kent County Jail on larceny charges. He likely will face charges for providing a false address, and the woman's address will be removed from the sex offender registry.

If the offender can't be immediately located, officers will "pound the pavement, knocking on doors" in next few days, Wetzel said.

"It's not like the case is going to sit around for another couple weeks," he said. "We all work together."

For all offenders, a citation with a maximum penalty of 93 days in prison is issued. If an offender has been delinquent in registering twice, the sentence could climb to one year. For a third offense, the maximum penalty is four years in prison.

The six officers receive overtime pay for the sweeps as part of a grant provided specifically for tracking sex offenders. The sweeps are designed to ensure sex offenders aren't moving to new residences, hopefully reducing recidivism rates among the convicted.

For Rogers, a detective on the department's sex crimes unit making her first registration sweep Friday, the crimes are familiar.

"I like doing the sex investigations because you feel like you're doing something really positive, maybe compared to some of the other crimes," she said. ..Source.. by Jacob Carpenter | The Grand Rapids Press