MEMBER SUBMISSION: Experience during an address verification
I wanted to bring your attention to something new that I encountered last night after I did my bi annual check in.
I received a call from a deputy sheriff who asked me to step outside. Knowing that I had just done all my normal check in I stepped out side and met him. He was in an undercover vehicle and he told me that he needed to confirm some information. He told me that the US Marshalls are making them do a yearly check in on top of the Address verification checks. He then told me that he needed to make sure that something called Offender Watch was correct as well. He went over the things on my check in form that I did earlier that day.
He brought up some old account that I had never heard about. He told me that they use some program that they put our information into and it pulls things that close match what we give to them. Then it assigns a percentage to that information of how close of a possibility it is being yours. He then took a new photo of me in front of my house. Then told me that he would be back later this week to take a day time photo of my house for this Offender Watch and the US Marshalls service.
I asked if this information was for law enforcement only or if these photos would be posted online for people to see as I am worried about Vigilantism. I made him aware of some of the threats and murders that the registered citizens have received just in this year alone. And he made it sound like he understood. I told him I had never even heard of those accounts or even the websites he was saying. One being Gavatar.com he told me he also had never heard about it and that him and his supervisor looked into it as well and they didn’t even know what it was and thought it was for gaming. I shrugged my shoulders and said wasn’t me.
He then left but it has me shaken up a bit. I know that I have to deal with this for awhile more and I hate that my family is having to deal with this along side of me. But I am really worried about this Offender watch and it seemed like the officer who came out was sympathetic on the cases and told me to call them if we ever receive any threats about vigilantism or harassment as they don’t put up with it no matter who you are. I told him I appreciated it but as long as I am on this hit list then I will always have to look over my shoulder.
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If you do not know where you are going you must be careful because you might get there.
bwj:
Offenderwatch is making a boatload of money off of the registry and pushing predator panic to keep the money coming in. Offenderwatch doesn’t care about “public safety”. They only care about keeping the cash coming in.
What a HORRIBLE country to be living in. How do you guys even accept this? How is this even remotely MORALLY acceptable to harass people like this?
This country is arguably as oppressive as Communist China. Prove Me Wrong.
You are absolutely right Joe. The saddest part is that there over a million registrants and the laws are still getting tougher.
This war will not be won by playing nice. These registrants need to make the largest impact on the system as possible. They need to drag their feet all the way through.
Registrants should not accept jobs at anything below the market value of their labour had they not been convicted. If society wants to underpay sex offenders, let society be crushed under the burden of providing adequate welfare to those offenders. If they do not provide, take.
Any national event – protests, riots, etc. that have the potential for national social destabilization – registrants should be there, rocking the boat and lighting the flames. The sooner this nation of sanctimonious hypocrites crumbles and burns to ash, the sooner justice can be restored.
Finally, registrants with nothing to lose should not be meekly crawling into a corner and taking their own lives. This is only met with the jeers, cheers, and applause of the public. The public and prosecutors laugh, spit on the offenders grave, and mock the aggrieved family of the offender.
These registrants should be taking devastating and overwhelming vengeance on the fascists responsible for their state. The prosecutorial-carceral state has created a climate of fear. Trying to promote love and understanding in this climate, as evidenced by the failure of advocacy to create positive change, will only be met with failure. They need to fear registrants as much as registrants fear them. They need to suffer what registrants have suffered. They need to be crushed, broken, and laid low. Our lights should go out in nothing but a blaze of vengeance and vindictive justice. They will never believe registrants are not monsters, so might as well show them what real monsters are like.
This will be great material for Lauren Book and other registry advocates in the legislature, if they mine our forum.
If acted upon, great for the news media as well. I can just imagine the headline: “Sex Offenders Vow Revenge on Society that Misunderstands Them.” THAT will promote change, but perhaps not the type of change we’re looking for.
If this is what officers believe they will encounter during address verifications, then they will be well-armed.
Do you get that society fears registrants ALREADY, and that is what we’ve had to fight against.
This actually is a good post and I’m glad FAC posted this.
We need to get these stories out in the open. Any unusual “compliance check” needs to be brought out and discussed in an open forum. This is the best way to deal with this harassment. Also, many of us who read this aren’t on the registry and aren’t fully aware of what’s actually going on with the registry. Probably even many registrants aren’t aware of some of these tactics. By airing these tactics on this forum, it gives registrants the opportunity to think of what they would do in a particular situation so they can respond appropriately and without fear should they encounter a similar situation. Law enforcement has the element of surprise. When registrants share their individual experiences, this deprives law enforcement of the element of surprise.
The registrants who follow this forum, I believe, are better informed and better able to handle a situation that is outside of the norm.
These stories must be documented and brought to the various attorneys attention arguing these cases. The police derive their powers through the laws and the constitutions of their respective states. If this is a law enforcement officer and these facts are true, then this officer exceeded what the law requires him to do. What this “officer” did probably wasn’t “illegal” but it is clear he went beyond the scope of his duties. In this situation, the registrant should have stayed inside his house and if he cooperates, should only have cooperated to the extent required by law. In my opinion, I don’t believe any registrant not on probation or parole, should comply with these compliance checks. Essentially, the government has placed you on “probation” without a conviction. The Fifth Amendment states that you cannot be compelled to be a witness against yourself. Telling someone to sign a “registration form” or go to jail is patently coercive. And yet registrants don’t challenge this in court and allow these signed registration forms into evidence proving they know what the law requires of them.
The only logical explanation for this “officer’s” conduct is that this registrant is under criminal investigation and I believe that he will be regretting that he was so cooperative.
Is Offender Watch even part of law enforcement? They sound separate, so why would law enforcement be gathering information for them?
It’s a private company. Agencies license their technology.