Sex-offender registries' effectiveness not clear

11-15-2010 Ohio:

DAYTON - On July 29, 1994, in a suburb of Trenton, N.J., a twice-convicted pedophile named Jesse Timmendequas lured a neighbor, 7-year-old Megan Nicole Kanka, into his home on the pretext of letting her see his new puppy. He raped her, killed her and dumped her body in a nearby park.

Public outrage about the murder led New Jersey to enact the first Megan's Law, requiring registration of sex offenders and public notification of their residences. Related federal, state and municipal laws and resolutions were quick to follow, restricting where registered sex offenders can live and establishing registration rules and classifications of offenders based on their threat of re-offending.

In southwestern Ohio's Warren County, a proposal considered by the Lebanon City Council would ban sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet not only of schools and day-care centers, but also of parks, playgrounds and libraries.

Similar restrictions have been enacted in Upper Arlington and other Ohio communities, including Deerfield Township in Warren County and Anderson and Sycamore townships near Cincinnati.

But even the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children cautions that Megan's Laws are no panacea. "Such laws are just a tool among a long list of tools," said President Ernie Allen. "Simply having a residency ordinance should not be viewed as, 'Hallelujah, we're safe.'"

Some research shows that registration and residency restrictions are having no demonstrable impact on public safety. Some say they might actually feed recidivism.

"Our experience suggests the get-tough-on-crime-and-criminals kind of ordinances do little but waste taxpayer money and give people a false sense of security," said James Hardiman, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio.

California enacted the first sex-offender registry law in the 1940s, but the idea didn't hit its stride until enactment of the 1994 federal Jacob Wetterling Act, which required states to create sex-offender registries. It was amended in 1996 with Megan's Law, which required that registry information be shared with the public.

Ohio's Megan's Law was implemented in 1997, creating a three-tier system for registration based on an offender's likelihood to commit new crimes, as determined by actuarial information about the offenders and their offenses. Last year, Ohio became the first state to comply with the federal Adam Walsh Act, which requires classification based on the crime an offender committed, rather than an actuarial risk assessment.

A study published in the January 2010 issue of the Sex Offender Law Report found that by classifying offenders by their crimes, the percentage of offenders in the high-risk category would jump from 55 to 87 percent. That adds to demands on law enforcement, researchers said, and could prompt more offenders not to register.

Registry laws assume that sex offenders are likely to commit new crimes and must be monitored even after they've served prison time and fulfilled parole requirements. Offenders who are released from prison must register their addresses for at least 10 years, and in many cases for the rest of their lives.

The Justice Department reported in 2003 that sex offenders released from prison were four times more likely than other ex-convicts to be rearrested for a sex crime within 10years, although sex offenders were less likely (43 percent) than other ex-convicts (68 percent) to be rearrested for any crime.

Sex offenders seem "hard-wired" to re-offend, said U.S. District Judge Walter Herbert Rice in Dayton. In the worst cases, "you're talking about people who are going to offend - I don't care if Batman and Robin are hovering over them," Rice said. "I don't think registration law changes behavior any more than the death penalty deters murderers. (But) they accomplish two things: They accomplish perhaps a false sense of security, and they provide law enforcement with a pretty good idea of who's in the community."

But Rice doesn't favor laws such as the one proposed for Lebanon. "I would say such a proposed ordinance, if not unconstitutional, would be almost impossible to enforce and at the same time provide these ex-offenders some place to live and work. I fully understand the public's need to be protected. (But) the law paints with too broad a brush sometimes."

Rice said low-level offenders who pose little threat are often lumped in with sexual predators.

Sex offenses have declined since Megan's Law, but so have all violent crimes - and the numbers were dropping long before Megan's Law.

Researchers in the New Jersey Department of Corrections who studied the original Megan's Law couldn't prove it was effective and said they were "hard-pressed to determine that the escalating costs are justifiable."

That hasn't stopped states and communities from enacting ever-tougher residency restrictions. Some experts are concerned that communities and states are making it nearly impossible for ex-offenders to rehabilitate themselves.

Upper Arlington adopted an ordinance in 2007 that bans sex offenders from living or working within 1,000 feet of schools, day-care centers, libraries and parks. A map shows that most of the city is off limits to offenders, and only three offenders live in the city.

Tom Hagel, a University of Dayton law professor, said it's "highly debatable" that registry laws protect children. They do, however, prevent ex-offenders from having the access to homes and jobs that help them be productive citizens.

"If they can't find a place to live, if they can't find a place to work, somebody's going to have to pay the price for their existence," he said. "You have cast them out of society, effectively." ..Source.. by Tom Beyerlein, DAYTON DAILY NEWS