Lawmaker seeks new registry for child abusers

12-2-2010 Michigan:

December 01, 2010 - Legislation recently introduced in the Michigan House of Representatives would create a statewide registry for convicted child abusers and set punishments for offenders who don't comply with registration procedures.

House Bills (HBs) 6568 and 6569, introduced as a tie-barred pair last week, would force convicted child abusers to register with local law enforcement agencies and create a graduated system of jail sentences for failure to register.

The bills' sponsor, state Rep. John Espinoza (D-Croswell), said the idea for the legislation came out of an incident in Port Huron where a toddler was found to be physically abused by both her mother and her father. Both had been charged with the crime, but during the investigation of the case it was found that the father had been a person of interest in another child abuse case.

"The father hadn't been charged, but he was confronted by officers in a case where a child had died under suspicious circumstances," he said.

According to Espinoza, there's a great mechanism in place for tracking people who have been convicted of being sexual predators, but nothing of the kind exists for convicted child abusers. He said his legislation would give law enforcement officials a way of keeping tabs on these abusers and give residents a tool for keeping an eye on situations they suspect might be abusive. Hopefully, he said, a registry would keep a situation like the one in Port Huron from happening again.

Still, Espinoza said he's aware of the problems inherent in creating broadsword legislation when a scalpel is the tool that's called for. Criticisms of the state's sex offender registry have pointed out that some people have landed on that list for activities that don't exactly rise to the level of sexually predatory behavior.

"You're not going to get arrested for spanking your child," Espinoza said. "You have to get convicted of child abuse. Giving a kid a swat on the butt for crossing the street the wrong way — the swat on the butt I got — is not going to get you on the list."

He said a spanking is different from abuse and the two can't be categorized the same way. He said he was concerned that the legislation not be too broad so that incidents like verbal abuse — which can certainly be seen as a red flag of abuse elsewhere — isn't a way to get on a child abuse list.

Espinoza is term-limited and said the likelihood of a non-emergency bill clearing the House and Senate before the end of the lame-duck legislative session is slim.

"Hopefully I can convince the legislators who are coming back to pursue this in the new session," he said. ..Source.. Alex Lundberg