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Originally Posted by JinnKai
I empathasize with your post and I certainly understand why that is so heart wrenching. Just like murderers, sex offenders can do horrible things to people and any discussion of their court case of their offenses is traumatizing. However, if they are a VIOLENT sex offender with a high liklihood to repeat their offense, they should STAY IN JAIL. I've said it before and I've said it again, if they've been RELEASED from jail, they should be treated like every other felon. No right to vote, no right to a gun, but you're still a CITIZEN of the United States of America. Until you re-offend, we won't be pulling a Minority Report and assuming that you're going to offend again. That would be like creating a registry for everyone who's ever been convicted of a crime, and posting it on the web. If you've been convicted of theft > $500 (a felony, in most states) you aren't allowed to go into a store unescorted. If you've committed Grand Theft Auto, you're no longer allowed to enter a parking garage. These all sound ridiculous, because they assume rehabilititaiton is not possible. There's only one thing missing from the list:
If you've committed a sexual offense, you are no longer allowed to have children.
I'm certainly not defending Mr. WolfHawk, but the fact that sex offenders can have their children, lives, or other things removed because they MIGHT be tempted by a child, I leave you with this:
Is 8-18% really worth taking the civil rights of the 82 - 92% of the convicted sex offenders who don't reoffend?
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Actually, the recividism rates for sex offenders vary greatly from state to state. I even found some data on recidivism rates for sex offenders in Canada, and those rates are alarming as well. Even though the stats you quote in New Jersey appear low, and in my opinion questionable, it appears as though there is less than a 1 in 5 chance that a sex offender will re-offend in New Jersey. My question to you is this: How confidant would you feel if your neice or nephew or grandchild were one of those 5? Would you want to risk that child by allowing unlimited, uncontrolled, and unsupervised contact with a man who had a 1 in 5 chance of commiting another sexual offense? I sure wouldn't.
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Recidivism numbers
"Recidivism" is the technical term for repeat offenders, and the rate of reporting for recidivism is also very low. One study set up a system where a victim could report to the authorities, and/or report to an informal network of friends. At the end of the study, the informal network had two-and-a-half times the number of reports than the official system. Clearly, victims do not trust the official system.
Another study performed polygraph ("lie detector") tests on imprisoned sex offenders who had fewer than two known victims. The study showed that these offenders actually had an average of one hundred and ten victims and three hundred and eighteen offenses! If a sex offender victimizes 110 people, but few report it, and only one or two of the reports ends in a conviction, nothing will improve until this problem is fixed.
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According to the reading I have done, a major problem in assessing recidivism rates for sex offenders in most states is poor reporting system, and poor tracking of sex offenders. Another huge problem lies with the nature of the sexual offenses as well, in that an alarming number are never reported. The sex offender I talked about in my last post claimed 9 incidences of sexual molestation of children alone, of which only 3 were ever reported, and all three of those resulted in convictions. Simply stated, nobody knows how many times a sex offender actually, re-offends. The only stats we have are for those that re-offend and
get caught, and those stats are flawed at best.
The laws having to do with sexual acts commited against minors haven't been around all that long. The general public is only now becoming educated as to the high rate of incidence of those types of crimes. I think you will find that in time, laws will become even tougher, and the rates for recividism actually go up as reporting rates for those crimes go up. Also, as states begin to do a better job of tracking sex offenders through improved registration and enforcement of registration, you will also see the rate of recividism go up as well. I know in my personal experience, and in Texas, I have seen a huge increase in sex offenders incarcerated since I began my career in Corrections in 1998. We are only scratching the surface on this issue, and I believe that in 5-10 years you will see the numbers increase dramatically.
Here's a small sampling of sources I found online. I encourage you to read up on it. But, don't just look at the sources I have here. Fire up your browser and google sex offender recidivism.....you will be alarmed.
http://www.csc-scc.gc.ca/text/pblct/.../e082g_e.shtml
http://www.cjpc.state.tx.us/stattabs...essection6.pdf
http://www.sexoffender.com/sorecidivism_review.html
http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/csot/csot_teffective.shtm
http://incestabuse.about.com/od/inth...xoffenders.htm
http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/csot/csot_trecidivism.shtm
In short, and to answer your question.....
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Is 8-18% really worth taking the civil rights of the 82 - 92% of the convicted sex offenders who don't reoffend?
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Yes, yes, yes..... because our data is flawed, and due to the nature of the crimes and high number of crimes never reported. And the American citizens you talk about, that happen to be ex-convicts... it is only right that they not be allowed to own a gun or vote. And, if there is any justice, in the future if a sex offender is deemed likely at all to re-offend, then his right to be near children, or be parent, should be terminated.