The note in my inbox was straightforward, and suicidal: “I don’t have much time left and that brings me some comfort. I can’t even imagine a life of freedom and happiness anymore. I hope my story will at least help people understand the grey areas of this stigma.”
In 2013, Mikey tried to use a cell phone to take a picture of a woman’s butt in the bathroom of his home, during a party. He was old enough to know better. It was a stupid thing to do. He is paying dearly for his stupidity.
While the woman did not press charges, another guest who happened to be in law enforcement did. Mikey confessed to her and asked for mercy.
If he had done this deed early in the 2000s, he would have gotten it. Mikey was found guilty of invasion of privacy. That was considered a simple misdemeanor, because there was no physical contact, and no minors were involved. As such, it was punishable by a fine and up to two years in jail, period.
But Mikey attempted the picture after his state had adopted the Adam Walsh Act. The Act widened the number of crimes defined as sex offenses, and dramatically increased the penalties, public notification, and registration requirements for people convicted of them. Pennsylvania was not required to adopt the act, but it did. Any state that didn’t was at risk of losing a chunk of federal funding.
And so, Mikey stood accused of a crime that could brand him a sex offender. An independent psychological assessor met with Mikey, tested him, and testified that he had no mental abnormalities. Jennifer Hahn, a member of the Pennsylvania Sexual Offender Assessment Board who did not meet with Mikey and relied upon the charging allegations exclusively, testified the opposite.
The judge accepted the state assessor’s opinion and designated him a sexually violent predator. Now Mikey is on the sex offender registry, in the most dangerous category, for life.
What does that mean? I spoke with Mikey on the phone for a long time and made a list of some of the consequences.
- He lost his job (building code enforcement for his township), his pension, his home, and his car.
- Wherever he lives, the police are required to send a flyer about him, including his photo, to his 25 closest neighbors. So even though Mikey’s sister was willing to take him in, she has young kids, making his stay untenable.
- Registered sex offenders can’t live anywhere near a school, day care center, playground — any place kids might congregate. So for a while, Mikey ended up sleeping in a field.
- Every six months for the rest of his life, he has to take a polygraph test, which he pays for out of pocket ($300). The polygrapher usually asks Mikey if he was abused as a child, and if he was involved in other sex crimes he has not admitted to.
- Once a week for the rest of his life, Mikey must go to group therapy. The therapy is all about sex. “Every single time I go there we have to fill out a piece of paper about when was the last time we had sex, and what it was, and details pertaining to our sexual thoughts, our sexual lives. They want to know how many times you masturbate in a week and what your thoughts were during that.” The therapy is on Wednesdays and costs $25/week. It takes a little over two hours each way for Mikey to get there, and he has to have a job that doesn’t require him to work straight Monday-Friday.
Through this all, Mikey’s fiance has stuck by him. But now, as he wrote in a note to the Reform Sex Offender Laws (RSOL) website: “I have about one month left until I lose my house and car…. I can’t find better work even though I am educated and have a good resume. I can’t live every day like this, and ending it all would make my fiancée’s life go back to normal and happy again down the road, and my family won’t have to worry about me anymore… Even terminal cancer leaves a shred of hope; this does not.”
Actually, there is one shred. The Pennsylvania Post-Conviction Relief Act allows people who believe that their confession was obtained illegally or their sentence was unlawful or to pursue relief. But Mikey has heard that cases like this usually cost about $40,000 in legal fees, making it an impossible dream.
No one wants to see young people endangered by sexual violence. But I can’t see how Mikey’s living as a registered sex offender is making any children safer. If anything, it’s making me fear for my own children — young men — if they ever do anything stupid that could haunt them the rest of their lives.
I actually know someone who attended that party where it happened. While I think the sex offender registry isn’t always fair what happened is different than he says. For example he actually had a hidden camera taking pics/vids of people peeing and shitting. When he was caught he said this was a first time thing. Someone got the phone and looked and he had HUNDREDS of voyeuristic photos on his phone. I think people are sexual creatures and all that… but I want to take my shit without a hidden camera focussed on my ass while i’m taking it. Maybe i’m a prude, but i just want the choice that’s all.
https://www.change.org/p/donald-trump-reform-the-sex-offender-registry
Please, people… this madness has gone far enough. Our voices must be heard at the highest level, and maybe Donald Trump (an unregistered sex offender – and perhaps even a “child predator” according to recent allegations) will see the injustice and stupidity of this system and press for it’s drastic reform.
BOTTOM LINE: The sex offender registry does far more harm than good. This poor man is only one of many thousands of AMERICAN TAX-PAYING MEMBERS OF SOCIETY in a very similar (and sometimes even worse) situation. I doubt that suicide, isolation, depression, drug abuse, homelessness, and separation from society were the intended goals of this registry 20 years ago.
As one of the more fortunate registered sex offenders that was able to find good work and afford a small condominium just far enough away from any schools or playgrounds, I have seriously beaten the odds, for now. But every year these restrictions get worse and worse. I fear it is only a matter of time before some new restriction on registered sex offenders tears the ground out from under me again.
By the way, the worst part of this sex offender BS for me is being regarded by society (particularly by most women) as a dangerous, perverted, creepy guy simply because our ‘trusty’ government has put me on this registry (they would only do that if I was actually a serious threat to others, right?). And I’m actually the complete opposite of that type of guy. I’m 5’11, Caucasian, healthy and fit, a successful engineer, a homeowner, talented in many ways, a great sense of humor, generous and romantic, outdoorsy, resourceful, quite handsome (or so I’ve been told!), and I have never had a hard time in my life getting a date, even with women that other might think would be way out of my league (humor and chivalry go a long way, guys!).
But almost without fail, when I finally am comfortable enough to tell a woman that I am a registered sex offender (which she kind of needs to know if we are to have a relationship), she suddenly wants nothing to do with me. She may be able to completely forgive my past mistakes and have absolute faith in my rehabilitation, and even look the other way with regard to my felony criminal background (which doesn’t really affect my life much), but the impact to her life by having a serious relationship with a RSO is just far too great. Why would she settle for a guy with that social stigma hanging over his head when she can easily go find another guy that isn’t a “sex offender”?
It’s so ironic. The sex offender registry was created to save lives, particularly children, but instead all it does is ruin lives, and in many cases, the lives of children, too. Good job, American law-makers. You did the COMPLETE OPPOSITE of what you set out to do. ARE YOU GOING TO FIX IT, OR WHAT?????????????
I have actually been friends with this guy for a long time. I read over his transcripts recently and there was nothing in there about pictures like that on his phone. He had visited some sites with content like that on it, but otherwise he would have been hit with felonies and gone to prison. What he did was dumb and I know he knows that, but a multiple life sentence for a misdemeanor of the lowest degree? He has suffered more than anyone I have ever known and lost more than anyone I have ever known. He will never have a decent job again or be able to live in a decent area. He attempted suicide once already and I am scared he may try again. I also know about the lies his cousins stated in court that I know for a fact were lies. I still can’t believe his own family turned him in. Oddly enough, his hell led him to save someones life, so I suppose that could be a silver lining.
A senator from my state had an assistant deputy that was convicted of child pornography. This young man, with a great career ahead of him, committed suicide rather than face CP charges, prison and the registry.
I wrote to the senator, not only expressing my condolences for the life lost, but also asking for his support to help change the registry laws in our state, so that no other young men view suicide as an the only option when faced with the registry..
The senator’s response was no response.
While the SOR may be a difficult topic for some to discuss, the fact that the senator, a government employee, who is supposed to be working for the public, chose to ignore my letter completely, just shows how close minded many of our lawmakers are. Rather than acknowleging a constituent’s letter and politely agreeing or disagreeing, too many government officials think it’s OK to close their eyes and hope that advocates of registry change will simply go away.
I’ve got news for the senator, I’m not going anywhere and I hope Mikey realizes that suicide isn’t the answer. Stand up for yourself, focus your energy on helping to make change. If 850,000 registrants write to Washington, they are bound to hear us sooer or later.
I feel for this guy.
I agree Gail – Why? I wish I had the resources and/or a law degree to help this man but what I wish more is that there was no need to help him or anyone else in this situation. Even in China when a person completes a sentence they are done! They truly get a second chance at life. No one can live this way forever ….
How sad to think this person feels his best option to provide a future for those he loves is his death?
We as a whole have become a nation of vengeance seeking haters. Why is it ok to look at a person who has made a bad decision and use that to forever define them going forward?
Why is it we allow law makers to create policies based solely on public emotion without the empirical evidence to support it? Why is it we don’t hold legislators accountable to explain what information and where it came from to support their bills before they go to vote?
Why is it we allow the media to continue to use fear mongering to gain viewership without holding them accountable to its viewers to provide real information which is factual.?
When do we learn the best way to protect our children and our families and friends families is by factual education, use of resources to promote diversion programs which create
stability in our communities as well as safe Reentry for former offenders to have a productive future? This my friends is called true prevention.
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