3-21-2011 Ohio:
Homeowners associations increasingly are seeking to ban sexual offenders and predators in an attempt to improve safety and maintain property values.
"There's an explosion in Franklin County," said David W. Kaman, a lawyer with Kaman and Cusimano, which specializes in association law.
A 2003 state law and more-restrictive municipal laws already prohibit Tier 3 sexual predators - those convicted of the most-serious sex crimes - from living within 1,000 feet of sensitive areas such as schools, playgrounds and day-care centers.
The association laws are far more restrictive, however, and are considered outright bans intended to protect higher-density areas, such as condominium communities, said Kaman. He recently met with 40 associations in Delaware County's Genoa Township to discuss the issue and has meetings scheduled with 40 more in Springfield and nine in Westerville in late April.
In the past six years, 30 Tier 3 sexual offenders have been denied entry to association-run communities in Ohio, without a single legal challenge, Kaman said.
It's an issue associations are considering now because a new state law requires them to file their bylaws with county recorders or lose their ability to enforce them.
"It opened up some eyes," Diana Howell, president of the 47-home Lake of the Woods homeowners association in Genoa Township, said of the law change and Kaman's presentation.
"The Realtors check the neighborhoods for offenders. And that's an issue if you have one living next door to you," she said, citing a study showing that property values can drop about 17 percent in neighborhoods where sexual offenders live.
"I know I would not move in next door to a sexual predator. And I'm assuming that as a member of society, that there are other people a lot like me," she said.
"I think we're going to see more of this," said Charles T. Williams, a partner in Williams & Strohm, which also represents homeowners associations. "I think people are very, very concerned about personal safety and their security."
Critics of the bans say they violate offenders' civil rights and amount to cruel and unusual punishment.
"It's an understandable outflow from the notification provisions, where you get a postcard if you're living within 1,000 feet of a registered sex offender," said Stephen Johnson Grove, deputy director for policy at the Cincinnati-based Ohio Justice and Policy Center, an advocate for prisoners' rights.
But eliminating housing or jobs from offenders "is really a damage to our communities," he said. "If people can't get housing, none of us are safer."
He said the vast majority of sex offenders know their victims. Often they're related, or are in a position of trust, such as a teacher, coach, clergy member or youth leader.
Howell isn't sympathetic.
"It's also cruel what they've done to be labeled what they are," she said of offenders. "They've got rights; we have rights."
The 2,400 homes in Dublin's Muirfield Association don't have restrictions against people convicted of sex crimes, but residents have discussed them, said Walter Zeier, general manager of the association. "It's a huge concern."
Association members have been told that 100 percent of the voting residents would need to approve a rule change. "Our deed doesn't have provisions to change it," he said.
Zeier also worries about potential legal challenges.
"It shocks me that no one has challenged it here," he said, when told that such laws have been challenged, unsuccessfully, only in New Jersey.
Johnson Grove said he thinks that courts would uphold the restrictions.
Constitutional laws are "a limit on the powers of government, not on (homeowners associations)," he said. ..Source.. Dean Narciso
March 21, 2011
Homeowners associations adding bans against sexual offenders
February 28, 2011
Finding new homes for sex offenders
2-28-2011 Minnesota:
Minneapolis leaders want state lawmakers to stop the trend of concentrating Minnesota’s sex offenders in the city
Minneapolis is home to nearly half of all Level III sex offenders in Minnesota, even though the city’s population is only 7 percent of the state’s total.
Some of the city’s neighborhoods have a disproportionately high concentration of sex offenders. One zip code alone in North Minneapolis has 24 chronic sex offenders, more than in all of St. Paul.
Many others are homeless, and list addresses of Downtown Minneapolis shelters. The Minnesota Department of Corrections says they are known to spend their time on Downtown streets.
Studies show that Level III sex offenders have a low likelihood of repeating their crimes, but local officials say that concentrating them into small areas stresses communities and hurts property values. City leaders, including North Minneapolis Council Member Don Samuels (5th Ward), are asking that the Minnesota Legislature adopt a plan that disperses the sex offenders in a fair manner.
“If these guys are such a risk to society, they need to change the laws to incarcerate them longer. If they’re not that big of a risk to society, spread them out so it’s a level playing field and one community isn’t unduly burdened with them,” said Deb Wagner, a Jordan neighborhood resident whose 55411 zip code has the most sex offenders in the state.
Why does Minneapolis bear such an uneven burden? It’s a complex problem involving opportunistic landlords, a lack of local control, sex offender networking and the location of community resources.
Residents and leaders are worried that tight state budgets will lead to the release of more sex offenders that eventually end up in Minneapolis.
North side home to most offenders
Level III sex offenders are, by definition, the riskiest of sex offenders. Their public profiles posted on the Minnesota Department of Corrections website often show histories of using weapons so they can rape and sexually assault women and children.
There are 229 released Level III sex offenders living in Minnesota. Of those, 107 live in Hennepin County, with all but five living in Minneapolis.
North Minneapolis is home to about 50 of those offenders. About 25 live Downtown and 19 live in Southeast. Only four live in Southwest and one offender lives in Northeast.
Dennis Wagner, Deb’s husband, said North Minneapolis neighbors have become more and more aware of the problem in recent years. He and others have become active on the issue, testifying to the state Legislature and meeting with officials.
He and neighbor Troy Kester put together a spreadsheet of Minneapolis zip codes and their sex offenders in comparison to the rest of Hennepin County. They found that some Minneapolis zip codes house 400 to 3,200 percent of what they should, based on the county’s population of 1.1 million.
“It’s kind of that dirty little secret that appears to have been going on for a while and all of a sudden some of the locals started looking and saying, ‘God, we seem to be getting a lot of these Level 3 [notification] flyers around here,’” Dennis Wagner said.
Sex offenders, since 1991, have been required by state law to register their addresses with local law enforcement. Local law enforcement is then required to notify the community, which usually consists of a public meeting and flyers sent to neighbors.
The DOC also identified all Level III sex offenders on its website.
The road to Minneapolis
When a Level III sex offender is to be released from lockup, it’s up to him to come up with a plan for where he will live while he serves the remainder of his sentence in the community, said Tom Merkel, director of Hennepin County Community Corrections.
Merkel said Minneapolis has a few halfway houses, which are attractive to those on parole. Once they live in a halfway house, sex offenders often become connected to the community and will often choose to stay in Minneapolis once their parole has ended.
Because it’s the offender’s decision, Minneapolis is housing sex offenders that didn’t live or commit their crimes anywhere near the city.
In 2010, 20 of the city’s 89 sex offenders at that time were from outside Hennepin County. They came from counties as close as Anoka to as far as Crow Wing and St. Louis. One even came from Wisconsin.
Merkel said the county has appealed some parolees’ placement plans to the state, but said the appeals are usually denied.
It’s important to note that about 60 percent of Minneapolis registered sex offenders are off parole and the county or state has no say in where they can live, although offenders must still notify law enforcement of their residence.
Merkel said a network exists amongst locked up sex offenders, and that extends into finding a home after their release.
Samuels is also a resident of the Jordan neighborhood, and he’s been outspoken about the high level of sex offenders is his ward.
He said landlords in Minneapolis target sex offenders as tenants because they are required to have jobs.
“There are landlords who will only rent to sex offenders,” Samuels said. “It’s a source of guaranteed employed tenants who are under supervision and have a certain amount of predictability in their lives.”
Samuels said that when the county proposes putting a sex offender in a suburban community, residents will fill the high school gymnasium in protest. In North Minneapolis, he said, the community is fatigued from fighting drugs, violence and prostitution.
Perception, not crime, drives down property values
The Wagners have lived in their same home for 26 years and they’re raising their daughter, a freshman in high school, in the neighborhood.
“We’re raising our daughter here and if we felt it was unsafe, we wouldn’t be here,” Deb said.
But Deb Wagner is also a real estate agent and does most of her business in North Minneapolis. When potential buyers get their hands on a real estate contract, they are notified that they should check the area for sex offenders on the DOC Web site.
“It’s mentioned several times in real estate contracts” she said. “For people to disregard that, it takes somebody pretty unusual. Unless they’re not super paranoid about that, but who isn’t when you mention sex offenders? Especially if you’re planning to move into a community with your children.”
The recidivism rate for sex offenders is 12 percent, which is lower than for other criminals, according to Minnesota Department of Corrections 2007 study.
“It creates a perception that this is not a safe place to live,” Wagner said.
City wants laws enforced
The state is struggling with budget deficits — $6.2 billion this biennium — and incarcerating sex offenders at $300 per day is costly. To have those same offenders living under supervised release costs only $90 per day, per offender, according to the DOC.
The DOC says it may release an additional seven sex offenders within the year.
The city of Minneapolis has tried to combat the problem locally, but found that it is illegal for the city to make ordinances restricting where sex offenders can live.
For the last few years, the city has listed the issue as a priority on its legislative agenda. While new sex offender laws are adopted frequently at the state capitol, Minneapolis has not gotten its wish.
“Sex offenders seem to get a lot of attention at the Legislature, maybe not always focused on things we hope they would focus on,” said City Council Member Elizabeth Glidden (8th Ward), who chairs the committee that drafts the legislative agenda.
Local officials say the solution is twofold. The state needs to come up with a better plan for placement of sex offenders and clarify and enforce language in state statutes that prohibits high concentrations of sex offenders.
According to state law, “The agency responsible for the offender’s supervision shall take into consideration the proximity of the offender’s residence to that of other level III offenders and proximity to schools and, to the greatest extent feasible, shall mitigate the concentration of level III offenders and concentration of level III offenders near schools.”
Samuels would like that law enforced in Minneapolis.
The Wagners hope so, too.
“Other people don’t want to pay to have these guys locked up,” Dennis Wagner said. “Then put them in your backyard too. Share the pain, share the gain.” ..Source.. Nick Halter
August 1, 2009
CA- CDC halts, reduces financial aid to Salinas sex offenders
8-1-2009 California:
The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is cutting or reducing aid to about 10 sex offenders this month in Salinas, officials said, due to a policy enacted in May to prevent parolees from living off taxpayer money.
As a result, sex offenders will have to find help from friends or family, be able to afford their own housingor become homeless.
The policy was enacted May 1 after CDCR officials decided to limit a parolee's rehabilitation assistance, which includes housing, to 60 days, said spokesman Seth Unger.
"We are no longer going to be subsidizing sex offenders indefinitely," Unger said. "It was always supposed to be transitionary."
The Salinas sex offenders to lose financial backing in August - approximately 90 days since the change was enacted -all reside at the Inns of California motel at 1215 De La Torre Road, said Wes Ellison, unit supervisor in Salinas for the CDCR's parole department.
The motel's manager, Bakul "Buck" Panchal, told The Salinas Californian in February he has housed parolees for the past three years at the going rate of $1,100 per month. He could not be reached for comment Friday.
According to the Megan's Law Web site, Salinas is home to 230 registered sex offenders, 32 of which live at the motel.
The state pays about $20,000 a month for rooms at the Inns of California, Ellison said, adding that the reduction of assistance to the 10 sex offenders would save the state another $5,000 - case-by-case reviews prompted the department to only reduce aid to some parolees.
But Unger said the policy change is not a direct result of California's new budget, passed last week, which included numerous spending cuts to offset a $26 billion deficit.
Instead, he said, it was done to prevent sex offenders from abusing the system designed to get them back on their feet.
"We found some have been consuming a large quantity of dollars," Unger said. "The goal of the program was to help the parolees - not for them to live off taxpayers for their entire parole term."
For fiscal years 2006-07 and 2007-08, the state used $36.6 million in taxpayer money to pay for housing, Unger said.
Officials added that many of the parolees already pay all or part of their own rent, while others have applied for Social Security Income payments or are seeking employment.
Along with rent, Ellison said, some parolees received help to pay for bus fare and work attire.
"We're not just dumping them out of the system," he said. "This has been ongoing for months, and they knew it was coming."
Ellison said the public should not be concerned that sex offenders are free to roam the streets of Salinas at will.
He said all sex offender parolees have been ordered to wear GPS devices allowing parole agents to know their whereabouts at all times.
"It tracks them 24 hours a day," he said. "It also tracks where they've been." ..Source.. by KIMBER SOLANA
July 19, 2009
FL- Businessman finds homes for other sex offenders
7-19-2009 Florida:
Habitat for Sex Offenders.com angers neighbors
Randy Young calls himself "a Robin Hood" for Florida's sex offenders. Neighbors say he ruins communities.
For about three years, Young has been buying and renting houses, condos and trailers throughout the state and leasing them as "habitats" for registered sex offenders.
He targets properties, often in foreclosure, within the few remaining zones where convicted sex offenders can legally live in Florida. He once ran an entire trailer park for sex offenders in Orange County and was cited for cramming 24 men into a three-bedroom house in central Broward County.
"I am providing a service people need," said Young, 53, a registered sex offender himself. "In the world of sex offenders, it's either a mattress inside a room with other offenders, or living under a bridge."
But for the neighbors living next door, Young's business is a nightmare.
"He has no respect for us, and no shame for what he's done," said Wilfredo LLantos, whose family lives next to a home Young owned in the Broadview Park neighborhood in unincorporated Broward.
Young's business model is straightforward. He advertises his house-hunting services as "Habitat for Sex Offenders" on his website, Housingforsexoffenders.com. The website also helps match visitors with "sex offender friendly" attorneys, counselors and employers.
Young is registered as living and working from Cocoa, and as living part-time in Broward, St. Petersburg and Zephyrhills in central Florida. An accountant by training, he once owned an upholstery business.
He was convicted in 2003 in Volusia County of lewd or lascivious conduct on a minor and was sentenced to 11 months of incarceration and seven years of probation. He is labeled a sex offender for life. He says a teenager had sex with an adult at a party at his house.
Young declined to say where his homes are located, fearing neighbors and local officials would torment his company and tenants. Over the past three years, he said, he has purchased 15 Florida homes and found housing for about 300 sex offenders.
He says he charges from $400 a month for a mattress-size flop to $1,000 for a private room. He declined to say how much money he makes, but says it's not much. He describes himself as a soft touch.
"A lot of these guys can't find jobs," Young said. "So many of the times they just give me 20 bucks, and I let them stay until they can find somewhere else."
Corrections officials said they don't keep track of how many houses Young runs, but are aware of several in South Florida and Central Florida, including in Orlando and Cocoa. At one point, Young operated an trailer park in Orange County called Lake Shore Village Mobile Home Park. Young said he sold park after neighbors and local authorities started to crack down on his business.
Young routinely e-mails probation officers listings of his available housing and they, in turn, give the lists to the sex offenders they supervise, to help them find places to live, state officials said.
Florida Department of Corrections spokeswoman Gretl Plessinger said her department, which supervises sex offenders on probation, takes no position on Young's business venture. It's all legal as long as the homes meet local codes and are outside the restricted boundaries.
"It's a [probationer's] responsibility to find housing," she said. "They give us an address, and all we do is tell them whether or not it's legal for them to live there."
Neighbors in Broward's Broadview Park know the locations of at least two of Young's homes. The neighborhood, less than a square mile, is one of the last few legal areas left for sex offenders in the county. Ninety-two registered offenders live there.
Earlier this year, Young rented 24 sex offenders space in a three-bedroom house at the 4100 block of SW 22 Street. Broward officials cited him for code violations, and now the home has five residents.
Several blocks away on 44th Terrace, Young purchased a foreclosed home for $48,000 in March and turned it into what he calls a "professional house" exclusively for offenders with professional jobs.
One of his tenants, a former medical researcher, says he heard about Young's place about a year ago through the sex offender grapevine. With a 2007 conviction for lewd or lascivious molestation of a minor, the tenant insisted on being identified only by his initials. He said he feared repercussions to himself and his family.
"I really wouldn't have a place to live if it wasn't for him," M.L. said of Young. "This is like any other home anywhere. We don't bother anyone, and nobody bothers us. We all have the right to live somewhere."
M.L. pays Young $500 a month for his own bedroom in the 3,500-square-foot home he shares with three other men. The neatly kept house was recently refurbished with a new tile floor and a new kitchen. It has a pool, a hot tub, and a line of palm trees in the yard.
The home has been a nightmare for next-door neighbor Heinz Bodmer. Bodmer, who has lived there since the 1970s, says he wants to move, but can't.
"Real estate is a bust. I can't sell my house, much less with all these creeps running around," Bodmer said. "I can sell it to Young, but he'll probably only offer me a couple thousand dollars." ..Source.. by Ihosvani Rodriguez South Florida Sun-Sentinel
February 11, 2009
CA- Sex offender subsidies capped
The minds of lawmakers, they are not to be understood except in the context of further punishment not resolving the societal problem.
2-11-2009 California:
Taxpayer-funded rent money to stop after 60 days
The 69 paroled sex offenders in Shasta County who each receive a subsidy of more than $800 a month to live in apartments, trailer parks and residential motels now have 60 days to pay their own way.
This week, officials at the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) put a two-month cap on the amount of time paroled sex offenders will receive taxpayer-funded rent subsidies.
"The able-bodied individuals who don't want to work because the state is paying (their rent), well, for them, the free ride was over," said Dave Nichols, administrator of the CDCR's northern district, who oversees an area from north of Sacramento to the Oregon border.
But the decision alarms area homeless advocates, who say the removal of the subsidy will force more sex offenders on the street.
Don Meek, director of the City of Redding and Shasta County Homeless Continuum of Care Council, called the stipend a "safety net" that keeps sex offenders from becoming homeless.
"I'm not sure what they're going to do when they cut them loose and say, 'You're on your own,'" Meek said
But CDCR officials maintain the living allowances only encouraged sex offenders to live off the taxpayers longer than they had to.
Nichols said 60 days is more than enough time for a parolee to find a job and a place to live.
The subsidies, paid directly to landlords to cover rent and utilities, were originally intended so that sex offenders could easily be tracked and monitored, Nichols said.
"What it turned into was another subsidized welfare program," he said.
Since the CDCR has placed satellite tracking monitors on every sex offender on state parole, the problem of locating sex offenders is now moot, Nichols said.
The CDCR had originally projected to have the devices attached to every paroled sex offender by June, but the department was able to do so six months ahead of schedule.
The requirements were mandated in 2006 after California voters passed Proposition 83, known as Jessica's Law, which banned sex offenders from living within 2,000 feet of a school or park.
The change comes after MediaNews reported last month that the state spent nearly $22 million in 2008 to house paroled sex offenders, in some cases paying in excess of $2,000 a month to help them abide by Proposition 83's strict rules.
The news organization found some parolees received the free housing for more than two years, and some motels in the San Francisco Bay area have become home to as many as 18 sex-offender parolees at once.
Shasta County currently has 130 sex offenders on parole; Tehama County has 45, Nichols said.
Of those, only one in Red Bluff has his or her rent paid by the state, while 69 in Shasta County do, Nichols said.
Nichols said north state sex offenders generally receive between $800 and $850 a month for housing.
Redding Police Chief Peter Hansen said many of the paroled sex offenders live in downtown Redding's residential motels.
Richard Kuhns, director of Shasta County's Housing and Community Action Programs, said the sex offenders no longer receiving the subsidy may look for help elsewhere - and likely won't find it.
Sex offenders are not eligible for federal Section 8, low-income housing assistance.
"More people are going to be calling," Kuhns said.
That could put more pressure on homeless assistance agencies, who are already struggling to help people in the weakening economy.
Melinda Brown, director of People of Progress, said parolees are among the most difficult members of the homeless community to assist with finding employment because so few employers will hire them, especially given the influx in unemployed people currently seeking work.
Meek said living restrictions on paroled sex offenders also make it extremely difficult for them to find a place to live, subsidy or no.
"It's a tremendous issue that the community is going to have to deal with," Meek said.
But Hansen said the stepped-up cutoff from the subsidy will only speed up the transition process.
"It just will force them to find their own home - which they have to do any way - sooner," Hansen said. ..News Source.. by Ryan Sabalow
January 14, 2009
KY- Charity buys house for sex offenders
1-14-2009 Kentucky:
On Friday, the Catholic Action Center plans to begin moving convicted sex offenders into a home it is buying for their use.
The four-bedroom home on Detroit Avenue will house as many as four men, said Ginny Ramsey, co-founder of the Catholic Action Center.
Since 2006, when a new state law went into effect that placed tighter restrictions on where sex offenders can live, Ramsey said, it has been difficult for many lower-income offenders to find housing.
Clarence Green will be one of the men living at the house.
He was convicted in 1980 of first-degree manslaughter in Campbell County and first-degree sodomy in Kenton County, according to Department of Corrections records. Green said he had been drinking and abused a young girl. He served 22 years at the Kentucky State Reformatory for the crimes.
"It shouldn't affect me because it happened a long time ago," he said.
Green, who for unknown reasons does not appear on the Kentucky Sex Offender Registry, said he was living in a house until about six months ago.
"I had to move because I was too close to a school," he said.
Sex offenders are prohibited from living within 1,000 feet of schools, public playgrounds and licensed day care centers, which has made much of the area inside New Circle Road off-limits for them.
"You just don't find places unless you can spend $600 or $700 a month," Ramsey said.
The Fayette County Sheriff's office has confirmed that the house on Detroit Avenue is in an area where sex offenders are permitted to live.
Ramsey said the center has already taken possession of the home and expects to close on it by Friday. A donor gave the organization the money for the down payment.
The men who move in will pay rent as they are able. Ramsey said having a stable address should help some of them get jobs and get on their feet.
"It's not a flophouse by any means," she said.
Circuit Judge Sheila Isaac, who is retired but continues to work as a senior status judge, said stability is a key to helping sex offenders re-enter society after their convictions.
She said they need to work and get treatment, but because of the residency restrictions, they often end up living in remote areas where finding jobs and mental health services can be difficult.
"These restrictions isolate people. They cause a lot of financial and emotional stress," she said. "They have to live, and society isn't making it very easy for them to do that."
The Detroit Avenue home has been named Our Brother's Inn.
"They're the modern-day lepers," Ramsey said of sex offenders. "It's not that we in any way are condoning their behavior. We are just upholding their God-given dignity.
"Jesus was pretty straight about it. He didn't say feed the hungry who have the right paperwork ... shelter the homeless who are not sex offenders."
Isaac said she has seen several cases in which sex offenders had nowhere to go.
One homeless offender registered as living under a bridge near Henry Clay Boulevard. None of the emergency shelters in town is in an area where sex offenders are allowed to live, Isaac said.
Ramsey said some homeless offenders will come to the Catholic Action Center only on the coldest nights, because they are afraid of not being found where they live, even if it's not really a home.
Police check periodically to ensure that registered offenders are living at the address where they are registered. If not, the person can be arrested.
"We're not shy about doing that," said Sheriff Kathy Witt, whose office enforces the residency requirements.
She said her office also sometimes arrests people who have moved into areas where they have been told they are not permitted to live.
Ramsey said each of the residents of the Detroit Avenue home will have undergone a background check so that the Catholic Action Center knows their histories. Ramsey said she does not intend for pedophiles to live there.
They will also be required to undergo psychological counseling, she said.
"If anyone in any way is out of line, we will evict them, and the sheriff will be notified," Ramsey said.
Witt said her office and the Catholic Action Center will hold a meeting for neighbors to provide information about the house.
"This situation definitely calls us to bring as many people in the neighborhood together as possible," Witt said. "It creates a different level of concern."
She said two other offenders already live on nearby Dayton Avenue.
As of Tuesday, there were 265 offenders registered as living in Fayette County, Witt said.
She said she thinks Lexington has adequate housing for them. She said people who are homeless have difficulty securing housing, whether they are sex offenders or not.
"There are a lot of areas in our community where offenders, if they choose, can live according to the law," she said. "I believe that there are available addresses in every segment of our community."
Green gets a small retirement check but said he's had trouble finding another place he can afford.
"The rents are high. The deposits are high," he said.
Green, 63, said he'll pay $250 a month rent to the Catholic Action Center.
"These people been good to me, trying to keep me living somewhere," he said.
..News Source.. by Karla Ward
October 15, 2008
FL- Filing May End Rental To Offenders
So many facts, but what is really happening here? The financial bailout worried me, in that, I feared that investors holding properties where they cannot get top rents, for whatever reason, might wish to get out from under such debt using terms of the Congresses financial bailout. Here we have additionaal factors, existing rentals to RSOs, which councilmen may want out, then the newly issued day care permit, are they connected? The critical point to this advocacy is, are we seeing a new more egregious way to banish folks using new constructive pretexts? Just thinking out loud....
10-15-2008 Florida:
SEMINOLE HEIGHTS - Apartments rented to sex offenders that were at the center of a city zoning debate last year could be headed for foreclosure, court records show.
Aurora Loan Services filed two lawsuits in September alleging that owner Christian Stover has missed payments since April 1 for the property, 6601 N. Nebraska Ave. As of Sept. 6, nearly $199,000 was owed on a 2007 loan, records show.
Stover said he hopes to renegotiate loan terms or, in a worst-case scenario, sell the property.
"I'm going to see what terms they come up with," he said.
Aurora is a subsidiary of Lehman Brothers, but its Web site states it is not part of Lehman's recent bankruptcy filing.
The apartments are across the street from a day care center recently opened by St. John Calvin Presbyterian Church. Last year, the city council approved zoning for the day care center.
About 35 children, most from low-income families with working parents, are expected to enroll, church officials said. The site is secured with fencing and video cameras. The Rev. Earl Smith said teachers are with children at all times.
Stover opposed the council's decision, saying he would not be able to continue renting to sex offenders if the day care were allowed to open. He sued the city in August 2007, but the case is pending after a judge ruled Stover must provide official transcripts of the council's hearings and decision.
Stover is seeking more than $15,000 in damages and revocation of the day care center's permit.
Under state law, sex offenders convicted after 1995 are prohibited from living within 1,000 feet of places where children gather.
County records show Stover bought the apartments in March 2007 for $255,000. Stover said he would not have done so had he known the church planned to open the day care center.
In August, the state's probation department ruled that four of the 10 sex offenders living at the apartments had to move.
Stover said that if he resolves the financial issues he will continue renting to sex offenders. Six offenders live there now, and Stover said he expects to rent additional units soon.
"They have to have some place to live," he said. "It's better than to have them walking the streets or living under a bridge." ..News Source.. by Reporter Kathy Steele
August 9, 2008
PA- Sex-Offender Appeal Vowed
8-9-2008 Pennsylvania:
Unfazed by a decision against him Wednesday night, Tom Armstrong this morning vowed to fight the latest ruling so he can continue to house three convicted sex offenders in his Marietta house. "I am going to appeal and I'm going to win the appeal," the former state representative said. "The ordinance clearly states up to four unrelated people are allowed. This is nonsense."
Marietta Borough's zoning officer, Mark Harman, issued Armstrong a cease-and-desist notice June 18, ordering him to move the sex offenders from his 704 E. Market St. home.
Armstrong appealed that order.
On Wednesday, the Marietta Zoning Hearing Board ruled after three hours of testimony that Armstrong's housing of the men in his large Victorian home did violate borough rules.
Armstrong said that when he gets the official notice of that decision, he will appeal it, too.
Borough attorney Shawn Long of Barley Snyder did not return a call this morning for comment.
Wednesday night, he described Armstrong's relationship to the men as a business arrangement, pointing out that each man pays $100 a week to live in the house.
Armstrong's attorney, Jim Clymer, argued that Armstrong has long housed three or more veterans at once over the past 18 years without interference from the borough.
Clymer also said that the borough's ordinance allows families to reside in the historic residential zone and that Armstrong welcomed the men into his home as a family, sharing expenses, cooking, yard work and other responsibilities, just like any other family.
The borough's own ordinance includes the definition of a family as up to four unrelated individuals sharing a common household, Clymer said.
Long argued that there is no Megan's Law Web site for veterans, so that comparison does not stand up, and if Armstrong were housing veterans now, that too would violate the borough's zoning ordinance.
Long said several Pennsylvania court decisions disallow similar boarding situations in residential areas for drug addicts, alcoholics and even abused children.
The Megan's Law Web site, www.pameganslaw.state.pa.us/, lists home addresses of the state's registered sex offenders.
Marietta residents had called Harman to complain about the sex offenders. Harman confirmed they were living with Armstrong by checking the site.
Armstrong first rented housing in Conestoga Township for the men earlier this summer. Township officials there ordered them moved out because the township's zoning does not permit boarding houses.
Today, Armstrong said he wants to house the men in his home only until a permanent place can be found for them.
He said several people have offered him use of their properties for such a home, but nothing has yet been arranged. ..News Source.. by Robinson, Ryan
August 7, 2008
PA- Former State Rep. Barred From Housing Sex Offenders
8-7-2008 Pennsylvania:
Marietta Residents Take Issue With 'Family' Living Situation
MARIETTA, Pa. -- A halfway house for sex offenders in Marietta is under fire and could be closed.
Former state Rep. Tom Armstrong opened his house to three convicted sex offenders.
Armstrong said he believes the sex offenders have become like a family. But debate is raging in the town on whether the arrangement meets the legal definition of is allowable.
“I see them as brothers. My wife and I have reached out to them,” Armstrong said. "We're all kind of in this thing together. Living together, eating together, doing a lot of things together."
But his neighbors said they aren’t comfortable with the men being convicted sex offenders.
According to borough code, his home is designed for a single family that may be defined as four non-related people.
The borough's zoning officer issued a cease and desist order to Armstrong to remove the offenders from the home.
He said they aren’t family.
“There's no connection between these men other than incarceration,” zoning officer Mark Harman said.
Some residents have also questioned Armstrong over the $100 per week he charges them rent.
"He has brought people in, really under the table and unannounced, and is charging them rent. And that's not what renting is all about," resident Wendy Codd said.
The zoning board ruled against Armstrong, effectively breaking apart what he calls his family.
The details of the decision won’t be available until the board releases its written report.
Armstrong said he plans on appealing the decision. ..News Source.. by WGAL.com
April 8, 2008
CA- Housing options few for molester
4-8-2008 California:
Sheriff Mike Kanalakis cautioned that "vigilantism will absolutely not be tolerated" after an angry group of Lockwood residents appeared in a Salinas courtroom Monday to protest the contemplated placement of a high risk sex offender in their community.
Fifteen people showed up with petitions signed by more than 500 others who oppose "sexually violent predator" James Lamb's placement near their rural properties. The residents were not allowed to address the court Monday, but vowed to return in greater numbers April 17 when Judge Richard Curtis said he will hear their concerns.
Curtis said he had received a sealed report from the sheriff's office reviewing the appropriateness of two properties. Lamb's attorney said one of those properties had been nixed because it backed up to a greenbelt where children played.
Curtis said he was withholding judgment on the other until he could drive to South County and view it and the surrounding area himself. While the location was not released, the residents shared a letter from San Antonio Union School District Superintendent Linda Irving that indicated the site was near Lockwood.
Curtis said he was keeping the location secret for the time being for fear it would be burned down if the address was revealed.
Lamb, 50, is the first Monterey County man to be ordered released under supervision from the state's Sexually Violent Predator program. The former Spreckels resident, who has admitted molesting 50 children, has completed the four inpatient phases of the program and was voluntarily physically castrated.
On Monday, Curtis tried to assure the residents in the gallery that Lamb had undergone stringent treatment and would be "intensely supervised." In addition to 15 pages of restrictions, Lamb will wear a global positioning device that will be monitored by a state contractor 24 hours a day.
In his 18 years on the bench, Curtis said, Lamb's was his most difficult case. While he "is and always will be a pedophile," the judge said, tests showed physical and chemical castration had left Lamb with the testosterone level of a 6-year-old boy.
Curtis said Lamb was the only one of 11 sexually violent predators who'd come before him from the program who had done everything that was asked and more. All five of his doctors and the state director of the Department of Mental Health agreed that he was not a danger to the community if supervised.
"I am required to follow the law," said Curtis.
His assurances did little to assuage the Lockwood residents, who said there was no data showing the Sexually Violent Predator program was effective and that the only grocery store in Lockwood doubled as a school bus stop.
Residents and mothers Tricia Martinus and Paula Roth said it would be unfair to foist Lamb on Lockwood, which already has three registered sex offenders, a higher ratio than any other community in Monterey County.
They also complained that sheriff response times to their isolated community can be up to an hour. Roth said there have been times when deputies could not respond at all when she's called to complain about the presence of one of the community's sex registrants at the local market.
"If we said, 'It's OK, don't come, we just shot him,' then they would come," said Roth, her voice breaking.
Curtis and Kanalakis said that while they were focused on the community's safety, they were also charged with protecting Lamb.
"I'm not at all pleased by this entirely unpleasant situation," Kanalakis said. "But I will tell you, vigilantism will absolutely not be tolerated under any circumstance."
Martinus noted that Lamb has indicated he wants to go to Arizona and be with his mother and questioned why he's not allowed to go.
Ironically, Supervisor Simon Salinas, who represents Lockwood on the Board of Supervisors, wrote the state law that requires Lamb to be placed in the county of his most recent offense for at least one year before he is released from supervision. Salinas said Monday he wrote the law as an assemblyman after the state placed sexually violent predator Brian DeVries in a trailer in Soledad when Santa Clara County was unable to find housing for him in 2003. DeVries was allowed to go to Washington to live with his father a year later.
Salinas said he realized when he wrote the law it was only a matter of time before Monterey County would have to follow through. Now, he said, he wonders if a local ordinance is not needed to prevent South County from becoming a sex-offender dumping ground.
But the alternative to placing Lamb in a house, Salinas said, would be to eventually release him as a transient.
"Then who's safe?" he asked.
Lamb's attorney, Deputy Public Defender Deana Davis, said her client just "wants someplace where he can be protected and safe."
If Judge Curtis approves the proposed housing at the April 17 hearing, she said, the matter will be referred to the state Department of Mental Health, which then has 30 days to notify local law enforcement of the pending placement.
Once law enforcement is notified, she said, the location would become public. The case would then return to the court for final approval.
Kanalakis said he would await a court order on whether residents would be individually notified.
"We've never had this happen before," he said. "We're in uncharted waters." ..more.. by Virginia Hennessey can be reached at 753-6751 or vhennessey@montereyherald.com
March 24, 2008
FL- Sex offenders tend to live in clusters
There is a new theory developing one that has no basis in fact, that lawmakers should enact "no loitering" laws instead of residency restrictions. All this theory is, is a compromise with lawmakers. Reality is, there is no proof whatsoever, that, loitering is a factor in sex offenses or contributes to sexual offending. I would like to see a single study which shows "loitering" contributes to sex offenses.
3-23-2008 Florida:
Down a widely known street, where beautiful houses and inexpensive apartments share a canopy of trees between U.S. 1 and the Indian River, lives a registered sex offender.
And another. And another. And another.
The tiny white bungalows, cottages and trailers at 2664 Pineapple Ave., two miles north from Eau Gallie Boulevard, are home to four registered sex offenders and the last known address for a fifth who fled from house arrest.
No other Brevard County address boasts that many registered sex offenders, according to a FLORIDA TODAY analysis of more than 900 offenders identified by the Brevard County Sheriff's Office Web site.
Some addresses show two offenders living in one location, but no single address with such a concentration.
And according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement Web site, 13 sexual offenders live within one mile of that address, including at least one more on Pineapple Avenue. Bobby Joe Helms, who pleaded guilty and served 13 years in prison in the rapes of a dozen women in the Tampa area, resides on U.S. 1 about a mile and a half north of the Pineapple address.
The fact that so many sex offenders chose the Pineapple Avenue address -- Rocky Water Park Cottages -- is no accident. Property managers Ruth and Jack Sauder consider the complex to be a weigh station for those trying to get back on their feet and those who are maybe on the way down.
"I don't have a problem renting to them," Ruth Sauder said. "They are careful to mind their p's and q's and they give me less trouble than the other tenants."
Florida law requires a 1,000-foot buffer between registered sex offenders and schools, day care centers, parks, churches or libraries. Finding that kind of location -- as well as a willing landlord -- can be tricky.
"There are several residential locations in Brevard County where more than one designated sexual offender or predator may currently live," said sheriff's Cmdr. Doug Waller. "This usually occurs through word of mouth after an offender has found a property owner or manager who will rent or lease and the property location does not conflict with any legislative or ordinance mandate."
Options limited
Child safety advocate Kevin Gillick, who publishes a newspaper devoted to the whereabouts of sexual offenders in the county, says seeing registered offenders living close together may not be a bad thing.
"There are probably some advantages as far as monitoring or tracking offenders," Gillick said. "Concentrating the population has been a traditional way of dealing with a despicable segment of society."
Yes, the Ghetto mentality, which society has used for eons. As long as they are over there then that is OK, because then they are not here -whereever the speaker is-. Society then further denies them based on their ghetto address, a subtle way of further punishing them. eAdvocate
Gillick agreed with Waller that housing options are limited for registered sex offenders.
"When people do background checks and credit checks, then there are not many choices for sex offenders," he said. "It's also likely that they are financially destitute."
Sauder said the only offender she has ever turned away was Helms -- known as the Hyde Park serial rapist from Tampa -- just a few months ago.
"The people here are struggling and trying to make it," she said. "I try to look at the person and not the circumstances."
Helms has been forced to move a couple of times. He finally settled at 3735 N. Harbor City Blvd. Sauder said letting Helms move in would have upset too many people in the complex that has 64 housing units.
Buffer zones vary
While state law already limits housing options for offenders, some municipalities have made it tougher by imposing more restrictions.
In South Florida, for example, many cities and at least two counties have raised the buffer-zone requirements from 1,000 feet to 2,500 feet. This, according to Lynn University Assistant Professor Jill Levenson, has created a transient and homeless population of sex offenders.
A newly proposed state bill would raise the mandatory buffer zones to 1,500 feet statewide and would supercede the 2,500-foot zones.
"Research shows that sex offender restrictions increase transience, homelessness and instability," Levenson said, adding that a population of homeless sex offenders has taken up residence beneath a bridge in Fort Lauderdale.
What Levenson does like about the bill is another facet that would institute "no loitering zones" around schools, playgrounds and bus stops. She recommends keeping the statewide buffer zone at 1,000 feet and starting the "no loitering" zones.
"Right now a sex offender can hang out in a park all day long," Levenson said. "The loitering bill would restrict daytime activities, instead of where someone sleeps at night." ..more.. by Torres at 242-3649 or jtorres@floridatoday.com.
CA- An Assessment of current management practices of adult sex offenders in California
January 2008
PREFACE
Sexual assault continues to bring tremendous and long-lasting suffering into the lives of its victims, and the communities in which they live. The mandate of the California Sex Offender Management Board (CASOMB) is to play a key role in reducing sexual victimization in our state, particularly that perpetrated by individuals who have already been identified as sexual offenders. Consequently, every effort of CASOMB must be informed by a clear perspective on the experiences of victims – viewed individually as well as collectively. California is an exceptional state. Its size, diversity, distribution of resources and variations in practices, make any assessment of public safety strategies a complex and expansive challenge. The legislation that created the CASOMB in statute acknowledged this reality by requiring the board to focus the first phase of our work, and thus this report, on current practice and existing research.
When passing and signing AB 1015 (Chu) in 2006, California’s legislature and Governor wisely recognized that in order to truly, and effectively, improve sex offender accountability and management strategies it was necessary to understand the current state of practice. The safety of the public, victims and those who could be potentially victimized depends on the deployment of public safety strategies that are effective and achievable.
By studying evidence-based sex offender management practices and gathering information with regard to what California is currently doing to either conform to evidence-based practice or to diverge from such practice, the CASOMB is taking a first major step toward its mandated goal: “…address any issues, concerns, and problems related to the community management of adult sex offenders...to achieve safer communities by reducing victimization.”
The CASOMB, in preparing this Report, has been primarily interested in assembling the “currently available” information about sex offender management in California. The reader of this Report will, it can be assumed, share with its authors an awareness that there is much information that is desirable but not provided. It is not provided because it is not readily available at a statewide level. Noteworthy “gaps” in the ready availability of information needed to develop recommendations for improved policies and practices are pointed out throughout the document.
The strengths, gaps, research recommendations and policy analysis included in this document should be considered an initial assessment of California’s practice – one of the first of its kind ever produced in this state. It should be noted that, as most readers of this Report are already aware, the reality of having so many jurisdictions, laws, systems, agencies and perspectives directly involved in the management of California’s sex offenders results in a very complex web of policies and practices that defy ready simplification. It is precisely this complexity – at least in part – that has created the need for instituting a Sex Offender Management Board as a locus of cohesive information and integrated expertise. This report represents the CASOMB’s first step towards the board’s vision to decrease sexual victimization and increase community safety.
.....
OVERVIEW OF THE SECTIONS OF THE REPORT
There are many domains of sex offender management and, for effective functioning, each must interface productively with some or all of the other components of the total system. Although, for purposes of clarity and ease of understanding, each of the following sections is addressed somewhat separately, important interactions with other elements of the overall system will be regularly noted.
SECTION One – Prevalence of Sexual Assault and Services for Victims
SECTION Two - Numbers and Distribution of Offenders,
SECTION Three – Sex Offender Recidivism,
SECTION Four - Investigation and Prosecution,
SECTION Five - Supervision,
SECTION Six - Housing,
SECTION Six - Supervision,
SECTION Seven - Treatment,
SECTION Eight – Registration, Notification and Post-Superversion Management
..page 1 of this 225 page report.. by California Sex Offender Management Board
March 8, 2008
FL- Arrest In Fatal Stabbing At Sex Offender Park
3-8-2008 Florida:
ST. PETERSBURG Pinellas County sheriff's deputies arrested a transient early today in the fatal stabbing of a woman at a mobile home park for registered sex offenders.
Christopher Robertson, 41,((is not a registered sex offender nor is he part of that Park's RSO Program) was arrested at 12:15 a.m. while he was sitting in the carport of Lot 348 at the Palace Mobile Home Park, according to the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office. A witness had reported seeing him at the park, 2500 54th Ave. N., near Interstate 275.
Robertson is charged with second degree murder in the stabbing of 22-year-old Anna Marie Kasvicis about 1 p.m. Friday. Sheriff's detectives said Robertson admitted in an interview his involvement in the crime.
The investigation continues.
Deputies said Robertson knew Kasvicis and that they were arguing when the stabbing occurred in Lot 274. Deputies have not said what the argument was about. They said the pair was not dating.
Kasvicis was pronounced dead at a hospital.
Palace Mobile Home Park has Pinellas' highest concentration of sexual offenders and sexual predators, but Robertson isn't an offender or predator, sheriff's spokeswoman Marianne Pasha said.
A similar mobile home park in Palm River recently became controversial when nearby residents tried to force the sexual offenders living there to leave. ..more.. by TBO Staff Report
FL- Suspect sought in stabbing death at Lealman mobile home park
3-8-2008 Florida:
LEALMAN -- A petty argument turned deadly Friday for a pregnant mother of two, who was fatally stabbed at a mobile home park for sex offenders.
Pinellas County Sheriff's deputies are searching for Christopher Robertson, 41, who they said stabbed Anna Marie Kasvicis, 22, about 12:40 p.m.
Robert Piccolo, 20, said his fiancee was dropping off groceries at his lot at the Palace Mobile Home Park on her way to a job interview. He said she commented to Robertson, who had been staying there since he got out of jail, that he wasn't to touch the food.
Piccolo said that triggered a back-and-forth that ended when Robertson, 41, grabbed a butcher knife from the kitchen and stabbed her in the chest. Piccolo witnessed the altercation.
"I wish he would have stabbed me," said Piccolo, who said he met Robertson in jail and was doing him a favor by taking him in. "She was a wonderful person."
Piccolo said Kasvicis was two months pregnant with his baby and leaves behind a girl and a boy, ages 7 and 4.
Robertson is described as a white man with short salt-and-pepper hair, about 6 feet tall and 170 pounds. He was last seen wearing a black shirt and blue jeans.
Neighbor Maribel Guzman, 44, said she saw Robertson running out of the park as she was on her way back from the store.
"She was a baby, a gorgeous young lady," said Guzman, who said she's known the victim for five years. "She didn't deserve this."
Kasvicis was taken by ambulance to Bayfront Medical Center in St. Petersburg, where she was pronounced dead, said Cecilia Barreda, spokeswoman for the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office.
The Palace Mobile Home Park houses nearly 100 sex offenders. They have found it a haven after manager Nancy Morais persuaded the owner to start admitting them a few years ago. The move was inspired by her son, himself a sex offender, who struggled to find a place to live.
Robertson has faced charges of aggravated battery and kidnapping and was released from the Pinellas County Jail last month, after which he started staying at the park.
Tucked in the southwest corner of 54th Avenue N and Interstate 275, the park was quiet Friday afternoon as deputies with cameras guarded three rows of mobile homes wrapped in caution tape.
But he is not a sex offender, and Palace manager Morais said the residents of lot 274, where the stabbing occurred, are not part of the sex offender program either. Neighbor Richard Reckert, 59, said Robertson had been hanging around the park lately, sometimes walking the dog of the residents at lot 274.
Morais said she has more trouble with the private owners in her park than with the sex offenders. Because offenders are on probation, they're easier to refer to police when they cause problems, she said.
He lamented the way the killing would appear to the public.
"This place is going to get buried," he said. "It's going to get blown up like some sex offender did it."
Morais spoke to reporters before driving to Hillsborough County, where she's involved with a similarly controversial park. Her nonprofit organization, Florida Justice Transitions, runs a Palm River mobile home park housing a small group of sex offenders.
On Friday, county officials determined they could not remove the offenders based on a county ordinance.
"I'm very proud of what the guys have done here, and I don't want this to come up against them," Morais said.
Times researcher Angie Drobnic Holan contributed to this report. Stephanie Garry can be reached at sgarry@sptimes.com or (727) 892-2374. ..more.. by Stephanie Garry, Times Staff Writer
March 7, 2008
FL- Sex Predators Won't Be Booted From Palm River Park
3-7-2008 Florida:
Sexual predators will not be evicted from a Palm River mobile home park, according to the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office.
"We have not received any complaints," spokeswoman Debbie Carter said. "We see no violations at this point. We have consulted and reviewed the ordinance with the state attorney's office."
According to the ordinance, Carter said, "They are within their legal rights of residing within their homes."
"We started getting phone calls, hearing that we were going to be arresting individuals at midnight," she said. "That is totally new to us."
The county attorney's office began investigating the situation after Palm River residents spoke during the public comment session at Thursday's commission meeting, protesting Florida Justice Transitions' plan to house sex offenders in Juli's Mobile Home Park.
At least eight sexual predators and two sexual offenders already live in the mobile homes, and the founder of the nonprofit group has announced plans to house up to 24 at the park, which sits across the street from families living at J&L Mobile Home Park.
The plans have enraged residents at J&L, including Michelle Williams.
Born and raised in the Palm River area, Williams extended an emotional plea to commissioners requesting they take action. She said she was sexually assaulted in 1984, and her attacker went on to victimize 17 more children.
"I'm a survivor. You never get over it. Make them go somewhere where there aren't any children. Yes, they've served their term, but what they've done to us is a lifetime thing," she said. "I can't allow this in my community, not now, not ever."
Faith-based Florida Justice Transitions operates a transitional program for sex offenders at a mobile home park in St. Petersburg, where offenders receive counseling and close monitoring by the sheriff's office and probation officers, according to founder Nancy Morais.
Veronica Moore, president of the Palm River Civic Association, who spoke to commissioners with her 18-month-old foster daughter, Dixie Lee, in her arms, said she doesn't think any amount of monitoring will keep children in the community safe.
Moore is organizing a community protest march at 1 p.m. March 15 that will begin at 78th Street and proceed along Causeway Boulevard to Palm River Road. The Palm River Civic Association will discuss the march at 6:30 p.m. Monday at the First Baptist Church of Palm River, 5415 Palm River Road.
Tony Spino, who has daughters ages 4 and 2, built a $400,000 home about a mile from the mobile home park and said he's worried not only about the safety of children but also declining property values. Spino has launched a petition drive to close the transitional program, so far gathering about 200 signatures.
County code enforcement supervisor Bill Langford said Thursday, and property records confirmed, the property the mobile home park is located on, at 5011 24th Ave. S., is owned by Rooring Lake Gilbert LLC.
After hearing residents speak Thursday morning, Commissioner Jim Norman asked the county attorney to immediately file an injunction to stop Florida Justice Transition's plans.
"The last thing we need to do is bring another predator into this community," he said. "We need to jump on this right away."
Commissioner Kevin White was especially disturbed to learn one of the sex offenders living at the Palm River mobile home park had been released after raping and carving his initials into the chest of a 15-year-old girlfriend.
"It sounds like our judicial system is failing," he said. "This needs to be a collaborative effort with all government agencies involved."
By late Thursday afternoon, the county attorney's office announced the county could legally force the eight sexual predators to move because of the 300-foot rule. The rule covers only sexual predators, who are categorized as having committed more serious crimes than sexual offenders. ..more.. by A Tribune staff report
February 29, 2008
FL- A pedophile's paradise? Parents protest a mobile home park.
2-28-2008 Florida:
Palm River, Florida – Parents call it a pedophile’s paradise.
And, it makes them sick.
A mobile home park in the Palm River area is becoming a haven for sex offenders. They use the park as a rehab of sorts. Currently, 8 offenders live there and more could be on the way. Families across the street have had enough.
“They walk the street all the time. Every day I see them, and there isn’t anything I can do about it. I’ve just got to leave it alone,” said Carla Bowling.
Carla’s opinion is suddenly changing.
She felt empowered after a meeting at First Baptist Church Thursday night where fellow parents spoke up, wanting sex offenders out.
“If they want to go out in the country and do something like this, where it’s not around children, I wouldn’t have much of a problem. If they want to go into a community, an all-adult community, I don’t like that either, but they have to go somewhere. But, don’t put them in the middle of a candy jar,” pleaded Judy Cornett, a mother who knows firsthand the pain a sex offender can cause.
Her son was molested when he was just a boy. And, he wasn’t the only one. Other children were also hurt. Since then, Judy has been on such shows as Oprah and Leeza Gibbons. She was at the meeting to educate parents on how to shut down this mobile home park.
The park is called the “Florida Justice Transition” program located at 5015 24th Avenue South. The manager, Patty Morais, works with offenders every day on their probation and watches them constantly.
She says, “We’re watching these guys. The probation officers are watching these guys. They’re going through their counseling. They’re doing everything they’re supposed to be doing.”
But, is what they’re doing legal? Should sex offenders have their own mobile home park?
Hillsborough County code enforcement says it may not be legal. They are investigating the case right now. They have not issued any citations, but they have started an active case. Case officers are going after the park for improper use of zoning.
So, who owns this park? Tampa Bay’s 10 News did some digging and found out that the park’s owner is traced back to Rooring Lake Gilbert, LLC. The owners did not return our phone calls.
Meanwhile, this predator colony, as some parents call it, is making money with rental charges. And, there’s 3 to 4 tenants per mobile home in some cases.
Carla Bowling worries every day about her 11-year-old daughter, Makayla, daughter who plays across the street. She calls the mere presence of these men near children, disgusting.
“I’m petrified. I’m scared, I’m really scared. It makes me mad. I don’t know how they can do it.”
Even her daughter says, “Sometimes they look at me. I’m worried about what to do if they come after me.”
A facility like this one already exists in St. Petersburg called the Palace Mobile Home Park. If parents in Palm River can help it, this new park in Tampa, only a month old, will be shut down as soon as possible. ..more.. by Melanie Brooks, Tampa Bay's 10 News
February 8, 2008
Offenders need not be damned
2-8-2008 National:
Few crimes create more fear among community members than sexual offenses.
Not surprisingly, this fear and the ability of politicians to take advantage of it has resulted in inconsistent and incomprehensible policies toward sex offenders.
Such policies often not only decrease the ability of offenders to reintegrate into society but also call into question some of the basic principles on which our judicial system is based.
Earlier this week, an Associated Press story detailed the situation of a group of sex offenders living under a bridge in Miami. The offenders said that the passing of local laws about where offenders could live — akin to other cities’ bans on living within 1,000 or more feet of a church, school or other community area — prevented them from getting housing elsewhere. Thus, 19 of the offenders created a communal living space under the bridge and registered the location with their probation officers as their place of residence. Before being told last week to move out, the men had lived under the bridge for an entire year.
Last March, spurred by Green Bay’s march toward implementing strict restrictions on where sex offenders could live, I wrote an opinion column decrying this practice of legislating segregation. Later, in September, fellow columnist Bassey Etim wrote an excellent column on the continuing spread of these restrictions throughout the nation. The situation in Florida is the exact kind of outcome that Mr. Etim and I warned about: Despite serving their sentences, these released offenders have little hope for reintegration into society after they are released.
Unfortunately, the restrictions on where sex offenders can live are not the only aspect unique to their situation. Even when a particular town or city allows an offender to settle down, he or she is often the subject of a neighborhood meeting that notifies everyone of the potential danger they may present.
In Wisconsin, the addresses of all the state’s sex offenders are readily available via a purpose-built website. One Wisconsin legislator even suggested making sex offenders put specially colored license plates on their cars.
If they aren’t becoming less dangerous in prison, then the ongoing efforts to isolate them from society once they are released certainly aren’t helping them further adjust to a different style of life outside of prison.
Honestly, I find these practices baffling. What is the point of releasing an offender if he or she won’t get a chance to normally reenter society? Won’t the isolation and contempt of their neighbors only increase the likelihood of re-offending?
Taken together, the laws that single out sex offenders have the effect of being another dividing line in our society. This type of law seeks to specifically discriminate against a defined group after they have already served what should be a substantial punishment. This type of law seems particularly foolish considering the fact that sex offenders are among the least likely of felons to ever commit another crime. Reports from Washington and Tennessee correctional systems hold up this fact, as well as a massive 1994 study by the United States Department of Justice.
In the future, absent a court decision striking down residency restrictions or a change in the trend toward enacting them, there doesn’t seem to be anything to stop communities from enacting restrictions on any felon. After all, they are far more likely to re-offend than a sex offender.
Unfortunately, the effect of this would be to create a batch of second-class citizens. Of course, in many states felons aren’t really even citizens because they are no longer allowed to vote. But that’s a topic for another day.
Now, I am open to compromise on this issue. Perhaps more freedom after a release for the first sex offense should be compromised with lifelong punishments for second-time offenders. This way, their fates are in their own hands. An offender can choose the path of reintegration after his or her first crime or face a life sentence, hard labor or a firing squad, for all I care.
I decided to shed light on this issue once again because I think the situation that occurred in Florida is deplorable and should be avoided at all costs. The criminal justice system has enough problems with it already. In the future, it should not be used to hound and segregate offenders for their entire lives after they have paid an appropriate punishment for their actions. ..more.. by Andrew Wagner (awagner@badgerherald.com) is a junior majoring in computer science and political science.
February 5, 2008
Dade sex offender flees supervision
2-5-2008 Florida:
Fearing a return to prison amid a state push for him to find a new home, a sexual predator on probation allowed the battery on his ankle monitor to run down and fled a camp beneath the Julia Tuttle Causeway early Monday.
The Florida Department of Corrections confirmed Monday evening that Antonio Cannon, 30, fled the makeshift camp under the causeway after numerous visits by parole officers during the last week.
The officers were distributing forms to the residents, all registered sex offenders, indicating that living under the bridge may violate state or local ordinances.
The future of the remaining sex offenders under the causeway was no clearer Monday than it was last week, when they were first given notices by the state Department of Corrections that their living arrangements may put them in violation of their probation.
A 9 a.m. Monday target for clearing out the causeway's underside came and passed with little change. However, six of the 19 men who had been living there had moved on, said Gretl Plessinger, a state DOC spokeswoman.
''The others have been asked to report on what progress they've made in finding another place to live,'' she said. She said there was no firm deadline to vacate the camp, but the men were told to leave by Feb. 1 or begin trying to find new homes.
Any bridge squatters who refuse to make the effort could be found in violation of their probation, she said. ``But that would have to be an extreme case.''
''Unfortunately, a lot of these offenders are misinformed,'' Plessinger said. She added that although DOC is actively trying to move the offenders from under the bridge to more permanent residences, ``no one will be violated simply for being homeless.''
Cannon, whose criminal record dates to 1997 and includes cocaine distribution, marijuana possession, resisting arrest, grand theft auto and armed robbery, evidently feared otherwise. He was convicted on Dec. 10 of attempted sexual battery on a minor under 12. He served no time for the felony but was tagged as a sexual predator and given 10 years' probation.
Plessinger said a statewide law enforcement alert has been issued for him.
The causeway men were allowed to live beneath the bridge by the DOC as a response to Miami's 2005 ordinance banning sex offenders from residing within 2,500 feet of any school -- a law that left few options for housing for them. But DOC has since urged the men to sign forms acknowledging that they must make other living arrangements. For most of them, the only alternative housing is outside Miami-Dade County.
''I'll have to move out to where the crocodiles are in the Everglades,'' said causeway resident Alejandro Ruiz, 67. Ruiz said he was convicted of lewd and lascivious behavior in 2006. He readily admits his guilt today, saying, ``I touched the girl.''
The crackdown on convicted sex offenders' unusual living arrangement began last month in Broward County; a small group of offenders who were camping under the Oakland Park Bridge were given ''no trespassing affidavits'' by the Department of Transportation, which owns the bridge.
''We anticipated something like this could happen with the men under the Julia Tuttle, and we're trying to be proactive,'' Plessinger said.
DOT spokesman Brian Rick said Monday his agency had no plans to evict residents from the causeway.
He said the DOT will ``work closely with DOC as they assist offenders in relocating to a residence that complies with terms of their probation as well as state laws and local ordinances.''
. In contrast to the county, the state requires only that sex offenders live at least 1,000 feet from a school. ''We know there are few places left in Miami-Dade,'' Plessinger said.
In Florida, fewer than 50 convicted sex offenders on probation are listed as homeless, she said.
The American Civil Liberties Union issued a statement Monday afternoon saying it is sending a letter to Gov. Charlie Crist urging him to direct the state Department of Corrections to find suitable lodging for homeless convicted sex offenders.
''Living under a bridge is not suitable lodging and requiring people to live under a bridge is cruel and unusual punishment,'' Jeanne Baker, state board president for ACLU of Florida, said in a press release. The organization is also urging Miami-Dade and the cities of Miami and Miami Beach to reconsider their 2,500-foot residency ordinances.
''Now that they have seen the real impact of these hastily drafted and ineffective laws, the effect of which does not protect the children of our community but only creates homeless citizens,'' Baker said. ..more.. by DAVID QUINONES AND LUISA YANEZ
January 11, 2008
The House Where They Live
There are 45 sex offenders living in one small Long Island town, 17 on the same block, 7 in a single suburban ranch. Inside a sex-offender cluster
12-30-2007 New York
The house meeting begins promptly at 7 p.m. Mickey paces the living room with a clipboard in one hand, a cigarette in the other. His three newest housemates—Stephen, Hop, and Larry—sit before him. “When you all came to this house, you begged me to move you in,” he says. “Right or wrong?”
“Right,” the men mumble.
“I interviewed everybody, explained how we do things, the whole fucking works. The problem I got right now,” he continues, “I spent three hours cleaning the whole fucking house today. The kitchen was a fucking disaster. I don’t want to see that shit no more, because I will take the microwave, the dishes, the pots and pans, everything out of there, and I will lock it in the basement so we have nothing.”
The men slouch in their chairs and stare at the angelfish darting around a tank in the corner of the room. Mickey plunges ahead, railing against a litany of slovenly offenses. Only Hop offers a meek defense. “I’ve just been here a few days. I’ve always cleaned up after myself.”
At first glance, this could be a scene out of just about any place where strangers live together—a college dorm, a group home, an apartment full of roommates. But the ordinary feel of the meeting belies the strangeness of the situation; all of the men in the room are convicted sex offenders.
This house, in Coram, New York, sits at the center of the largest cluster of sex offenders on Long Island. As of mid-December, according to the state’s sex-offender registry, there were 45 high-risk sex offenders living in this hamlet, seventeen on a single block. And this house has the dubious distinction of holding the highest concentration of offenders in the neighborhood—seven of its nine residents have a sex offense on their rap sheet.
The men—all of whom asked to be referred to by their first names or nicknames for fear of harassment—don’t look particularly menacing, but their stories certainly are: Larry was convicted of raping a 4-year-old girl in 1983, Hop went to prison in 1982 for sodomizing a girl, and Stephen was convicted of rape in 1985. Mickey, 46, also did time for a sex offense. His rap sheet, which extends back to the early eighties, features mostly burglaries and DWIs, but in 2000, he was convicted of sexual assault for pushing a 16-year-old girl into the woods and trying to pull down her pants before she managed to escape.
These men live in this house because, for better or for worse, they have been cast out by society. The nature of their crimes guarantees that they will be identified as sex offenders—or, as they sometimes call themselves, “S.O.’s”—for the rest of their lives, their names, photos, and addresses, along with the particulars of what they’ve done, all available on the Internet. In Suffolk County, they are prohibited from living within a quarter-mile of a school or playground or day-care center. As long as they’re on parole, they can’t leave the county or move in with friends or family who have kids. And once they find a place to reside, the police start knocking on doors to inform neighbors that there is a sex offender in their midst, which often leads to their eviction.
Against this bleak landscape, Mickey’s house is something of a refuge—a place where sex offenders have banded together, trying to help themselves by helping each other. “We ain’t got nobody but ourselves,” says Mickey. “Nobody would help one bit. So we just did it on our own.”
This neighborhood of Coram has never had much to recommend it—just a dozen or so rooming houses that look like typical suburban ranches but for the smell of crack drifting from the windows. The area is better than it once was, but at night, especially when it’s warm, people still swarm the streets, hanging out, buying and selling drugs. “The first time I went out there, I thought I stepped into the movie Night of the Living Dead,” says a local law-enforcement officer. “I almost went for my weapon. People were coming out of the bushes with their arms extended, trying to make a drug deal.”
One thing the neighborhood did have was a landlady who would rent to almost anyone. Mary Dodson had moved to the area in the fifties, and over the years had accumulated so many houses—close to 35—in Coram and neighboring Gordon Heights that the area became known as Dodsonville. In a county with a shortage of low-income housing, her properties became magnets for welfare recipients, homeless people, anyone who needed a cheap place to stay. With these new residents, all sorts of social ills arrived, too—violence, mental illness, open-air drug dealing. Depending on whom you asked, Dodson was a good-hearted Christian taking in people who had nowhere else to go—or a slumlord who had run the neighborhood into the ground for her own financial gain. 
By the time Mickey arrived in 2005, Dodson was near the end of her life (she died in 2007, at age 79), and her daughter Bernadette Parks, then 59, was running the family’s real-estate empire. When Mickey turned up at the house Parks shared with her mother, he was desperate for a place to sleep. Parks didn’t ask questions about his past; he looked okay to her. “I put him in his room—a shitty room,” Parks says. “Went back a couple days later. Mickey had it painted, cleaned, fixed nice.” Mickey stayed for a while, then moved to another of her houses. This one, too, they both agree, was a disaster. “A crack house,” Mickey says. “It was terrible. Robbing each other. Fighting. You wouldn’t believe the stuff that was going on.” When Mickey asked if he could take over the management of his house, Parks welcomed the help.
Mickey wanted to live in a house where nobody drank or used drugs. But how could he create a sober house in a drug-infested neighborhood? The answer, he decided, was to fill it with men on parole, who have to submit to regular urine tests. “I decided I’d make it a parole house and let them watch ’em.”
He didn’t set out to fill the house with sex offenders specifically. It just worked out that way because there were so many sex offenders who needed housing. “Parole didn’t know where to put them,” he says. (It’s so hard to find housing that county officials started putting homeless sex offenders in trailers; the plan was to move them from one undisclosed location to another, but since May, the main trailer has been relegated to a parking lot at the county jail.) Word about Mickey’s house spread quickly. It was the best of few options.
His sex-offender house is just down the street from where Parks lives, and though her grandchildren are frequent visitors, she seems undisturbed by its proximity. “Once a person does their time and makes amends, they deserve another chance,” she says. “We shouldn’t be afraid of the people we know who did this—we should be afraid of the people who didn’t get help yet, didn’t get caught yet.”
The fact is that Mickey has made Parks’s life much easier since filling the house with sex offenders. Nearly all of his tenants are on parole and closely monitored. It’s the drunks and drug addicts in her other homes who cause her grief. About her sex-offender house she says, “It’s the best house, because of Mickey. Because he puts down rules. I have some houses that are just the pits because nobody cares.”
Over the past two years, Mickey and Parks have become close friends, spending hours together in Parks’s backyard, sharing cigarettes and neighborhood gossip—which roommates aren’t getting along, who’s smoking crack again, who’s going back to prison. Other residents of her homes sometimes refer to him as “Bernadette’s son,” a line that often gets a double take, since Parks is African-American and Mickey is white. “I think she adopted me without my knowing,” he says.
Every man gets his own room in Mickey’s house—$330 a month if you pay with cash or check, $309 if welfare is paying the rent. The smallest room is not much larger than a prison cell, while the largest, Room 9, is known as the “king’s room.” Or at least that’s what Mickey calls it, and, of course, that’s where he sleeps.
Larry, Stephen, and Hop live at one end of the house. They’re all middle-aged, their sex crimes committed more than twenty years ago. Larry and Stephen are the only two African-American sex offenders in the house, and they’ve formed the beginnings of a friendship. Physically, neither one seems particularly threatening: Larry is a small man at five-foot-five and 110 pounds; Stephen’s most noticeable feature is the absence of his front teeth. “Me and the windshield and the steering wheel had a couple misunderstandings,” he explains. Larry, now 51, cannot read or write, and his illiteracy has made him sympathetic to some of his housemates—even though, as Stephen whispers to me, “he’s a child molester.” Stephen tries to keep tabs on Larry and make sure he meets his curfew, and when no one else is looking, Mickey reads Larry’s mail to him. The housemates know very little about his crime; Larry never talks about it.
Stephen, however, is more forthcoming about his past. His victim, he says, was an ex-girlfriend—he was angry with her because four years earlier she’d dumped him. “I was intoxicated,” he says. “I pushed myself on her, did what I wanted, and that was that. That was the only way, in my mind, y’know, to get even.” He hasn’t been convicted of a sex crime since, though the former heroin addict did make two more trips to prison—in the nineties for attempted robbery, and more recently for selling drugs. 
Hop is the only one in the house who loudly insists he didn’t commit the crime for which he was convicted. “I’m an innocent man,” he says. “I no longer care if anyone believes me, to tell you the truth. My mother believed me. My family believes me.” He was arrested at age 17 for sodomizing a young girl and he spent most of his adult life locked up. He served seventeen years in state prison, did five years on parole, got sent back to prison after he stopped taking his psychiatric meds, and then wound up confined in the Manhattan Psychiatric Center for two years. More than most of the men here, he struggles with basic living skills, like remembering to take his pills; bottles of Lipitor sit atop the bureau in his bedroom, untouched. Some days he spends hours at a time alone in his room with the door closed.
This part of the house is rounded out by one other sex offender—a 40-year-old man who was arrested after an instant-message exchange with someone he thought was a 15-year-old boy but who turned out to be a cop—and two housemates who are not sex offenders: a security guard and a cook at Checkers. When asked what he thinks of his roommates, the Checkers cook has no complaints. “They don’t make no noise; they keep quiet,” he says.
Mickey shares his end of the house with John and Bill. John, 58, has been here since 2004, longer than any other sex offender. A former alcoholic and cocaine addict, he was convicted of sodomy in 1996 and spent eight years in prison. Now he’s the house success story, with a full-time job, a relationship with his kids, a shot at a normal life. He works as a forklift operator and sends $200 a week, or 40 percent of his take-home pay, to his daughter in college. A photo of her and his two high-school-age sons sits atop the microwave in his room. “If I didn’t have my kids, I’d be living in a garden apartment,” he says. “The only reason I’m here is because it economically works for me.”
The youngest person in the house is 39-year-old Bill. Before his arrest, he was married, earned $45,000 a year at a technology company, and belonged to an Evangelical church. Then, in 1999, his wife accused him of molesting their 2-year-old daughter. According to Bill’s therapist, Bill was angry at his wife, and the abuse was driven by a desire to get back at her. He spent six years in prison. The crime is a topic Bill doesn’t talk about much; when pressed, he discusses it in oblique terms. “You look back in your past, and there’s always 100 different things you could’ve done differently or better,” he says. “I was very passive-aggressive.”
With wire glasses, salt-and-pepper hair, and a slight paunch, Bill has the look of a computer nerd. And, indeed, there’s enough secondhand computer equipment in his room to power a small company: nineteen PCs, two Macs, and three printers. Though Bill’s crime did not involve the Internet, his parole officer forbade his having Internet access, something Bill finds frustrating. Even so, he spends hours in front of the computer, playing video games.
Though he left prison in early 2006, Bill has yet to find a full-time job. He interviewed for a manager position at Wal-Mart (dressing up in a suit for the occasion) and his prospects had seemed promising—until someone ran a background check. More recently, he secured a part-time gig at a store selling cell phones, but when he learned he’d have access to customers’ Social Security numbers, he had to quit.
“He got into a real slump over the job situation,” Mickey says. “When I’d come home, he’d just sit in his room and wouldn’t talk.” To pull Bill out of his depression, Mickey appointed him his deputy, giving him the title “house manager.” Without a full-time job, Bill has plenty of time on his hands, and he’s embraced his role. Evidence of his excess energy is all over the house. Every week or two, he rewrites the lists of rules that are posted everywhere. Each bedroom door features an elaborate color sign with the room number, tenant’s name, and, in most cases, a cartoon character. For Mickey’s door, he made a poster that reads DO NOT DISTURB MICKEY—HE’S DISTURBED ENOUGH ALREADY.
When the two men first met, Bill was at Parks’s house, waiting to see if he could get a room. “He was just sitting there, shaking like a leaf, because he’s never been in an area like this, and he didn’t know what was going on,” Mickey says. Bill didn’t look like a troublemaker, so Mickey told Parks, “I’ll take him.” Every night, Mickey cooks dinner for Bill and confides in him about his day; Bill, in turn, helps keep Mickey calm and sober. On the weekends, they run errands together—visiting the laundromat, shopping at the discount store with food stamps. Though they make an unlikely pair, Mickey refers to Bill as his best friend. 
wo years ago, Bill and another roommate launched a countywide search for a therapist who would accept them as clients. They had little choice in the matter: Parole officers insist that all sex offenders participate in a treatment program—or else risk being sent back to prison. But when you’re a sex offender, it can be difficult to find a therapist willing to take you on. For weeks, the two men scoured the Yellow Pages and made calls. Eventually, they found a social worker named Bill O’Leary who agreed to treat them. His office is only a fifteen-minute drive from the house, but few of the men have cars. “It would take the guys three or four hours to get here for a one- or two-hour session,” O’Leary says. “As the winter came, I felt bad.”
Near the end of 2006, O’Leary started making house calls, running group-therapy sessions every Sunday morning in the living room. The turnout ranges from five to eight and usually includes Mickey, Bill, several sex offenders who live elsewhere, plus a former resident who comes back each week even though he’s no longer on parole. Mickey and Bill always put out a candy bowl and make a pot of coffee.
Some of the men in the house may have tried to forget their crimes, but part of O’Leary’s job is to ensure that those who come to group therapy aren’t able to rewrite their histories. When a new person joins the group, everyone has to tell the story of his crime—no making excuses or skipping over crucial parts. A central tenet of sex-offender-treatment programs is that sex offenders can’t make any progress if they don’t address their actions, motives, patterns of behavior. It’s not enough just to say that they’ll never do it again. “The problem is that you probably never thought you were capable of this in the first place,” John explains. “So if you say you’ll never be capable of doing it again, you’re wrong.”
“You probably never thought you were capable of this in the first place. So if you say you’ll never be capable of doing it again, you’re wrong.”
John doesn’t take part in group, but he participated in a six-month sex-offender-treatment program in prison, then worked as a peer counselor for another eighteen months. Of all the men in the house, he is the most candid about his crime. His victim was the wife of a co-worker. “I assaulted her, tied her up, and forced her to perform oral sex on me,” he says, repeating a sentence he’s said countless times before. The facts of his crime may be no more horrendous than those of his housemates, but discussing it so frankly with him—and realizing I was about the same age as his victim—made the conversation especially chilling. Yet the more we spoke, the more I realized that his willingness to discuss his crime so openly seemed to suggest a different sort of future.
Usually, the conversation in group is about the day-to-day problems of life as a registered sex offender. Some topics come up again and again: Mickey’s struggle to control his temper, Bill’s passive-aggressive tendencies, the frustrations of job-hunting, the challenge of finding a girlfriend, the difficulties of living by parole rules. Avoiding contact with minors, for instance, is not always as easy as it sounds. What happens when you go to McDonald’s and the person behind the register looks like she might be 16? What do you do if you’re exiting the bus and the woman in front of you asks for help with her stroller?
On a recent Sunday morning, O’Leary, 36, reclines in a chair in the living room, hands clasped in his lap, wearing jeans, sneakers, and a white thermal underneath a green T-shirt. Group is supposed to last just one hour, but often the men have so much they want to talk about that it stretches on for nearly three. On this morning, the conversation turns to a favorite subject: the lowly status of sex offenders.
“As far as I’m concerned, the worst criminal that should be watched is the drug dealers,” Mickey says. “They’re the ones who are turning the 16- and 17-year-olds into prostitutes.”
“Does a crime define a person?” O’Leary asks. “You know drug dealers that you met in prison that you felt good about—and there were others you felt were dirtbags.”
“I don’t like none of them,” Mickey insists.
Of course, they know that they are liked even less. “You ask the question to an average Joe: ‘How do they feel about sex offenders?’ And: ‘Oh, I hate ’em. Kill ’em, kill ’em,’ ” says another sex offender.
“I always said this is going to get a lot worse before it gets better,” Mickey says.
The topic of how sex offenders are perceived by the public provides fodder for debate all week, continuing long after the therapy session ends. The residents, especially John, monitor the news closely for any mention of sex offenders. “I can’t blame society for wanting to register sex offenders. C’mon,” he says. “But I think they should also register drug dealers, guys who do drive-by shootings, arsonists. Let’s be honest. There are a lot of things that are dangerous to children. But what scares people is that they feel vulnerable to us. They really feel like they can’t have their kids go out on the street because one of these guys might grab them. Because what do they see? They don’t meet me, Mickey, guys who are living fairly normal lives. All they see is the news: This guy tried to pull a kid into a car, this guy murdered a little girl. This is all they see.”
In fact, the “stranger danger” notion is mostly a myth (in about 90 percent of child-sexual-abuse cases, the perpetrator is someone the child already knows, like a family member or friend), as is the idea that those who commit sex crimes are typically repeat offenders (only one in seven violent sex offenders in state prison had a prior conviction for a violent sex crime). It’s also not true that all sex offenders are child molesters—or even that all child molesters are pedophiles. Experts have identified two types of child molesters: “situational” and “fixated.” Situational molesters are those who may have romantic relationships with adults but who, under certain circumstances, will commit a sex crime against a child. (Bill, for instance, would fall into this category.) In contrast, fixated molesters are those who meet the definition of an exclusive pedophile, a person who is sexually attracted only to children.
Even in this house full of sex offenders, there is a hierarchy of criminals, with pedophiles at the very bottom. Mickey doesn’t use the terminology of psychiatry, but he does grill prospective tenants about their sex crime and whether they were high or drunk when they committed it. “I want to know what was really in their heads when they did this. Whether somebody is drunk, high, or sober, it’s inexcusable what they did. But you look at the chances of somebody doing it again—the way I look at it is, the one that did it with a clear conscience is the one I got to watch out for the most, and a lot of them I won’t let in the house.”
Mickey started interviewing potential housemates about their crimes after he discovered that one of his tenants had three different criminal cases and at least seven victims, all under the age of 10. “I’m really hoping I don’t do it again,” he said. Mickey’s response: “I’m hoping you don’t do it either, but you’re taking your shit and getting out of my house right now.” Part of his dislike of pedophiles stems from the same sense of revulsion the rest of us feel. But there is another, more personal reason, too: “Those are the people who make the whole S.O. thing as crazy as it is.”
The ever-growing list of rules dictating where sex offenders cannot live has led, not surprisingly, to their clustering in those few places where they can find housing. Near St. Petersburg, Florida, 94 sex offenders live together in a mobile-home park, two and three to a trailer. In Miami, twenty sex offenders are living beneath a bridge, where a probation officer visits them nearly every morning. And as of mid-December, there were 82 sex offenders living in the 30th Street Men’s Shelter in Manhattan, according to the New York State registry.
Over the months I spent visiting this house in Coram, I found myself ricocheting between a sense of revulsion and concern. It was impossible to meet these men and hear their stories and not find myself awake at 3 or 4 a.m., wondering which of them had truly reformed themselves and which were merely trying to convince me of this. But it also seemed obvious that turning these men into modern-day untouchables and relegating them to the fringes of society is not the best idea, either for the men themselves or as a strategy for improving public safety.
A 2007 report by Human Rights Watch found no evidence that residency restrictions reduce crimes against children, and further noted that the sex offenders who are most likely to stay out of jail and not reoffend are those who are not segregated but have “positive, informed support systems—including stable housing and social networks.” This is one of John’s concerns about relegating sex offenders to one particular area. “Isolation is not a good thing,” he says. “One of the things that creates a lot of sex-offender behavior is isolation.”
Mickey has tried to foster a sense of community among the sex offenders in his home, but it’s not always easy. Mickey and Bill rely on each other’s support and friendship, but John, who leaves the house at 5:30 a.m. and goes to bed early, doesn’t have much time for conversation. As for the newer tenants—Larry, Stephen, and Hop—Mickey has tried to befriend them, but Bill keeps more distance, not knowing how long they’ll be around.
Close friendships or not, the men in the house are linked by a shared sense of vigilance. One of the fears about sex offenders living in such close proximity is that they’ll encourage each other’s worst tendencies. But nobody in this house has to be reminded that just one tenant’s committing another sex crime could bring so much negative publicity to their residence that they’d all be homeless once again. The recidivism rate for sex offenders is lower than one might imagine—less than the odds that a car thief or drug dealer or burglar will reoffend. (A 2003 Department of Justice study found that 5.3 percent of sex offenders were arrested for a new sex crime within three years of leaving prison.) And although plenty of tenants have been taken back to jail for violating parole rules, nobody can remember anyone here getting arrested for a new sex crime. Still, the roommates keep an eye on each other. 
Several months ago, when a sex offender here stopped taking his psychiatric meds and started acting bizarrely, talking to himself and wandering outside in the middle of the night, Mickey convinced the man’s brother to take him to a nearby hospital so that he could be committed. And one afternoon, when a new housemate who goes by the nickname T jokingly suggested that he and I go out to dinner together, Mickey went ballistic. After I left, Mickey and Bill chastised him for an hour about the inappropriateness of his comment. That night, Mickey called me, then passed the phone to T. A sheepish voice came on the line: “I’m sorry if I offended you.”
At the moment, the tenant Mickey is watching most closely is Larry. Twice he’d caught him sneaking a prostitute into his room in the middle of the night. One night, after he heard the house’s alarm go off, Mickey ran outside with a flashlight and spied a pair of legs sticking out of Larry’s window. One more time, Mickey warned, and Larry would be evicted.
Mickey has a habit of feeding his tenants, especially the new ones. On a weekday evening this fall, he puts his shirt on—he doesn’t usually wear one around the house—and gets ready to pedal off to his drug program. Before he leaves, he leans into the bedroom of his deputy. “Take out the roast beef,” he tells Bill. “You’re going to have to mash the potatoes, drain the carrots.” And he should also look out for Hop: “Check if he ate. I think he’s been starving. If he didn’t, hook him up with a plate.”
Not long afterward, Hop is sitting in the narrow kitchen, hunched over a plate heaping with meat and mashed potatoes.
“It’s good,” he says, shoveling food into his mouth.
“You’re sure? Not too dry?” Bill asks.
“Not with gravy. And they’re real potatoes, too.”
Just then Stephen ventures in and surveys the scene: “I see you guys cooked a wonderful dinner.”
The hint does not go unnoticed. “You can eat some if you want,” Bill says.
Stephen joins Hop at the table and the two men talk about their days (Hop visited his brother, while Stephen went to get a state identification card), about people they knew in prison, about the house. “If you’re doing the right thing in this house,” Stephen says, “nobody will ever let you go hungry. This is paradise.”
But that’s not a bargain all of the roommates are prepared to keep. Larry wasn’t home that night for dinner because he hadn’t made it back from the parole office. On Wednesdays, most of the men in the house make the three-bus trip to Farmingdale to check in with their parole officers. Larry had flunked his drug test that week and been carted back to jail.
His roommates weren’t surprised. He’d been missing his 7 p.m. curfew and hanging out in the neighborhood. It was one of the housemates who’d tipped off the parole officer to give him a drug test.
Inside the house, opinion about Larry was mixed.
Bill: “Larry was bugged. He had something missing upstairs.”
Stephen: “He needed help. He had a good heart.”
Mickey: “He’s what you call a serious crackhead. That’s the only way to put it.”
That night, Mickey searched Larry’s room for drugs, but he didn’t find anything. Then he started sorting through his possessions—underwear, socks, flannel shirts, cassette tapes, CDs—getting them ready for Larry’s relatives to pick up. As he worked, he made a point of closing the door—partly to ensure that no one tried to snatch any of Larry’s belongings, partly so that nobody would see him cry. Nearly every time he cleans out another man’s room he gets emotional. He’d grown attached to Larry over all those hours spent helping him decipher his mail; he thought he’d be able to help him. But there wasn’t much time for tears or regrets. He had to get the room cleaned out. Another sex offender would be arriving soon. ..more.. by Jennifer Gonnerman
==================================
Jennifer Gonnerman is the author of Life on the Outside: The Prison Odyssey of Elaine Bartlett, which was a finalist for the 2004 National Book Award. Her work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, New York, Mother Jones, The Nation, Newsday, and many other publications. For seven years, she was a staff writer at The Village Voice, where she covered the criminal justice system. Her article on which this book is based won the Livingston Award for Young Journalists and the Meyer Berger Award from the Columbia University School of Journalism. To read some of her stories, click here. Jennifer studied at Cambridge University and received a B.A. from Columbia University in 1994. She lives in Brooklyn.
