AZ: New sex offender management board established
A recently passed law is funding Arizona’s first-ever Sex Offender Management Board, which is aimed at getting justice for victims and preventing cases in the future. The board will be made up of 25 people who are experts on sexual abuse and deviancy. It will include psychologists, law enforcement officials, and victims’ rights representatives. They will make legislative recommendations regarding sentencing and treatment of sexual offenders. It will work to develop statewide standards and procedures to assess and supervise both kids and adults who have committed sex crimes.
The board will also work to create mental health treatment plans for perpetrators, which has long been an issue in the state, according to Pinal County Attorney Brad Miller. “In some counties, there are zero treatment options,” he said. The board also looks to find out if offenders can be rehabilitated. Dr. Brecken Blades, a forensic psychologist, says yes. “This is not guesswork or wishful thinking. It is the direction of the best available science and the real-world experience,” she said.Potential rehabilitation is seemingly a big departure from previous state laws, including Proposition 313, which voters approved last year and mandates life imprisonment for child sex traffickers.
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On Nov. 19, 2021 , members of the Colorado Sex Offender Management Board (SOMB) took a critical first step in altering the language used to label those convicted of a sexual offense while in treatment towards a “person-first” perspective.
This effort was not without opposition.
The victim advocates and representatives from county prosecutors unsuccessfully attempted to table the vote and even accused members of the SOMB of not following protocols. Ultimately, the SOMB settled on the phrase, “adults who commit sexual offenses.”
This change does not go far enough.
In the words of one prosecutor who testified at the SOMB hearing, it was just a “longer way to say sex offender.” I agree. Furthermore, the phrase implies the SOMB clients are continuously committing offenses.
Victim advocates and prosecutors argued that replacing the term “sex offender” with different terminology “minimizes harm.” Victim advocates, including those currently on the SOMB, had argued they suffer lifelong consequences as victims and therefore those who have committed an offense should also suffer for life.
But this argument merely proves the intent of sex offense treatment schemes and post-conviction laws are to dehumanize and cause enduring harm to those who have committed offenses in the past.
The SOMB is “victim-centric,” and is heavily slanted in favor of those who want to use their position to cause harm to people convicted of sexual offenses.
Three of the 21 members of the SOMB are victim advocates and four others are members of various criminal justice agencies; not a single board member directly represents people convicted of sexual offenses.
And ultimately, it was those victim advocates and law enforcement agents that killed the push to humanize their clients.
So if we don’t have respresentation, and the board is full of cops & Lauren Books, then it is worthless.
LE shouldn’t be part of the board. They have no vested in their clients they process other than to process and impose the law as written (clear or not). Those who are part of the AZ sibling group to FAC should be part of the board though for sure. They need to take the USSC recommendations as well. This effort can be done well to start or become a Cluster quickly with vengeance and retribution taking over the thinking and actions from it.