How do we protect children?
 

I just had lunch at my grandmother's house. While I am there, she tells me the story of what happened earlier today.
A man offers to give a young girl (8-9?) a ride to where she was going. The girl gets freaked out and runs up to grandma's neighbor to get away from this guy. The neighbor asks the guy if there is anything he can help him with, the guy speeds off. Neighbor calls the police and gives description of guy and license plate number. Police pull guy over not too far away, run check, find out he is a pedofile from 1985. As it turns out, it is not illegal for him to offer a young girl a ride. The police regret to inform them there is nothing they can do.
I realize the police have to enforce the law, and I am not downing them in any way, but what is protecting the kids from people like this? Is it that they might get in real big trouble if they get caught with a dead kid in the trunk and can't get a good lawyer? Our system really needs to be fixed. My thought was 6-8 months of legal vigilante justice. What are your thoughts?

aint nothing a good ass whippin cant take care of if you encounter this situation for yourself. seriously...put a guy in the hospital for 6 months and he isnt coming back to your neighborhood looking for little girls. bet.

probably not. But you will also be eating prison food for the next 3 to 5 years too.

Why is it not illegal?

Is he a registered sex offender? What rights do they or don't they have?

But what scares me, that it the police have no ability to do anything it will turn ito vigilante justice.

the problem with vigilante justice is that its aim isnt so good.

In the town I went to university in, the local paper published the address of a paedophile that they said was living in the community.

Problem was, the guy didnt live there anymore, a young family with two kids had lived there for a year. Some vigilante burned the house down and the family was killed.

it's not illegal because he didn't actually take her anywhere.. kinda like if you scope out a place to steal something but don't actually steal anything then you're not doing anything illegal.

sex offenders have the same rights as everyone else (in the systems eyes) except for the fact that they have to register for 10 years( I think) and they have to inform the sheriff's department of where they live and have to get permission to leave the state.

vigilante justice can be an equal danger to society. for instance, the neighbors kick the guys ass and they end up in jail for trying "to protect" the child. there are loopholes in the system that need to be filled up but on the same note you can't get too drastic and end up on with a witch hunt.

Vigilante Justice. Has anyone seen the movie Mystic River? Right on target there.

Indiana’s sex and violent offender registration law initially required people convicted of specific sex offenses after June 30, 1994 and those convicted of certain violent offenses after June 30, 1998 to register with local law enforcement authorities in the communities where they intended to live, work, or study. Effective July 1, 2001, however, these dates were removed from Indiana’s sex and violent offender registration law.

Consequently, offenders who may now be required to register because specific registration dates have been removed from the law may previously have been told that they did not need to register.

Evidently he forgot to register.

The thing that gets me is that nothing can be done until someone's child is scarred for life. And only then if he doesn't get a good lawyer and get off with home detention or something. Meanwile, the kid is fucked up forever. That is my point.

That's my question, as well.

I would think that having a law, prohibiting a convicted sex offender from offering "rides" to 9 year old girls, would be more effective than forcing them to register for a database that rarely gets checked.

I am just guessing, but since it was from 1985 he is considered rehabilitated or something. That is also why he doesn't have to register anymore, 10 yrs+.

Unless you think the movie "Minority Report" is true, there's no way to charge someone with a crime they did not commit.

I find it equally frustrating the police really can't do anything until something bad has happened, but the alternative to locking people up we think *might* do something bad is far more frightening to me.

I really wouldn't say the child is fucked up for life..no harm came to her and she's still with family. It's unfortunate that it had to happen..but it could've been worse..

Send them all down to TEXAS.....

"BUBBA" is up at Huntsville and he keeps running out of girl friends...:D

How you can protect your children is exactly how she WAS protected. Raise her right to know that it's not OK to take rides with strangers.

Sure, it's a fucked up situation, but it really bothers me that the first thought is to look to outsiders for overzealous protection when good parenting is really the answer.

We need better fences to stop our kids from drowning... No, you need to watch your kids and teach them not to swim without supervision.

We need ritalin to help our kids pay attention... No, you need to lay down the law and take control of your kid's attitude (and accept that kids like to run around and make noise).

We need more money for schools so our kids can learn to read... No, you need to take time out of your schedule to read to your kid and be a part of his/her education.

We need the cops to arrest ex-cons who have committed no crime... No, you need to teach your kid how to avoid such dangerous situations. Because as you have seen, cops won't/can't do it. It's very hard for cops to preemtively fight crime. But her parents, on the other hand, had the opportunity to take a preemtive measure to help their daughter, and their good parenting probably saved her life.

And how do you propose we punish people for crimes they have not comitted yet? The judicial system IS an after-the-fact thing. It punishes criminals for acts they have already commited, and only after it has been proven in a court of law.

OMF Minority Report crazyness.

Common sense would tell us his intentions were evil, but nothing happened, and in the sometimes twisted eyes of the law, no harm no foul.... that sucks. Being a registered sex offender doesn't create immediate guilt either.

As far as a solution? I'm a fan of vigilante justice. I'm also a fan of castration in most cases where pedophilia is involved. Problem is no matter how many times or how long some of these animals are imprisoned for, they don't seem to get it... a little bit of violent retibution goes a long way.

I agree with everything you said, Coach. I am not a fan of parenting with drugs or government provided common sense. But my question is, what if noone was around for the girl to run to? What if the guy had the balls to get out and run her down? That takes the good parenting out of the equation.
I am not advocating beating the hell out of a guy who drives by and happens to look in the direction of children playing. I am saying that when a convicted pedophile stops to offer a young girl a ride, he probably isn't just doing it to be nice.

How do we protect children? Use lots of duct tape. I'm not going to say where to put it, but I'll note that if they don't exist, they won't get hurt. Otherwise, they'll get hurt.

I agree with Coach.

Education is the answer. The kid was trained well and ran. If the kid was allowed to put herself in a situation where there was no place to run, that is also bad parenting. Parents are ultimately responsible for their children until their children are capable of making informed, intelligent decisions on their own.

Over-reaction in favor of "protecting the children" is a classic example of how to take rights away from citizens.

Yep, if history is any indicator, the kid is likely to become a molester too, in which case we should just beat the shit out of him right after he is molested. 'Cause beating the shit out of molesters before they actually molest is what some of us here seem to be advocating.

sometimes vigilantism can go too far- it seems like the question here is whether sex offenders, specificly pedophiles, get better? do they deserve to live among the rest of us who do not jerk off to 10 year olds? I am not a parrent, but belive that with the commision of some crimes you forfiet certain rights- in this case, I know that I would not want the guy in my neighborhood, whether or not I had kids- of course that begs the question, what about his rights- has he not payed a debt to society- well in some cases maybe the debt has been payed, but this is one crime that it seems, is a symptom of someone that is permanently broken- so why waste taxpayer dollars trying to fix him- bullets are cheaper, and he will never create another victim, nor perpetuate the cycle that created him..............

I don't think we know enough about human brain function to claim that anyone is permanently broken, at least not to the point where we can say for certain that person A is more of a liability than an asset to society. Furthermore, by that logic, anyone who suffers from any kind of addictive of compulsive behavior could also be considered permanently broken.

true, but it all depends on what line they cross- I don't advocate the killing of people who are broken, and do not hurt anyone, rather, those who are broken, and have already hurt someone, in a horrible way, and are highly likely to repeat the process.

to interject some data into the discussion, I did a google search for recitivism rates (repeat offences) of child molesters- and was surprised at the rates- depending on where you get your stats from, the rate is between 13 and 45 percent - ie that percentage of child molesters repeat the same type of crime, and are caught and convicted- much lower than many people seem to think- I always heard much bigger numbers, and have seen them bantered about by politicians- one article (the only one I could find, anywhere, that lists a recitivism rate this high, with no support or citation) on the issue of chemical castration in california, quoted a number higher than 80%- so the question becomes do you want to take even a small chance that a pedo will reoffend, rather than the idea that most of them do- personally, this is a knee jerk issue for me, and I feel that many others feel the same way- it is natural to want to lash out at those that theaten your kids- and child molesters are SUCH a big threat- so in final analysis, my feelings pretty much stay the same, though I was suprised that the recidivism rate was so low- what do you guys think about the issue in light of the stats?

That's really sad and scary. I remember when I was just going into high school, I was walking home on one of my first days of school and some guy in a tinted-window black car pulled over and asked me if I wanted a ride. Talk about scary. I just ignored him and kept walking as quickly as possible.

Very simple:

Convicted Pedophiles get no jail time. Instead, we cut off their hands and their dicks.