NY- DELMONTE: The story on civil confinement law

8-5-2009 New York:

I would like to clarify any confusion and/or misconception regarding our state’s civil confinement law. Since New York state instituted its first civil confinement law in 2007 to keep dangerous sex offenders off the streets after completing their prison sentences, 56 convicted offenders have been committed to secure treatment facilities, according to information compiled in 2008 by the state Office of Mental Health. Another 36 offenders were court-ordered to the state Division of Parole and placed under Strict and Intensive Supervision and Treatment (SIST).

I voted for the legislation creating civil confinement in New York state as did my colleagues representing parts of Niagara County including Sen. Antoine Thompson, Sen. George Maziarz and Assemblymembers Schimminger, Hawley, and Hayes. The legislation passed with overwhelming bipartisan support—127 to 19 in the Assembly and 53 to 8 in the Senate.

State OMH estimates up to 144 dangerous sex offenders per year will be eligible for civil confinement or SIST oversight. It did not take long after the law came into effect before one such offender from Niagara County found himself, at the direction of Supreme Court Justice Richard Kloch Sr., ordered into Strict and Intensive Supervision and Treatment and placed at the Midtown Inn in Niagara Falls.

The placement of James McKinney to the Midtown Inn ignited a firestorm of protest that has been simmering for years from parents, neighbors and business owners nearby the Midtown who object to the concentration of sex offenders and parolees housed at the Niagara Street location and its close proximity to Niagara Street school. State law prohibits sex offenders from being within 1,000 feet of a school but a patchwork of local laws, including one in the city of Niagara Falls, raises the prohibited distance to 1,500 feet.

A meeting I hosted in July with Division of Parole officials and parent representatives, Niagara Street Business Association representatives, Block Club representatives, Niagara County DSS Commissioner Anthony Restaino, area police and fire officials and local elected and school district officials offered a constructive dialogue of Parole’s responsibilities supervising offenders and public discontent with the situation at the Midtown highlighted with McKinney’s placement there. Three weeks after the meeting, Parole moved McKinney to a new location in North Tonawanda and is working to find housing for other sex offender parolees.

New York’s civil confinement law is a serious, thoughtful measure that can go a long way toward keeping dangerous sex offenders off our streets. The law gives judges the authority to determine whether certain “dangerous” sex offenders should be civilly confined in a secure state treatment facility or subject to intense supervision. I will continue to be a proponent of strict enforcement of our state’s civil confinement law as a means of protecting children from dangerous sex offenders. ..Source.. by Francine DelMonte, Member of Assembly