California moving to “evidenced based” policies for Sex Offenders
California, which has the largest sex offender registry in the US, has been taking steps in the right direction over the past couple of years.
The State recently migrated towards a “tiered” system that would allow some registrants (those deemed “lower” risk to re-offend) to be removed from the registry eventually. While the plan wasn’t perfect, because it tiered people based on offenses rather than actual risk, California is now seeking to enact a new bill to help them introduce empirical evidence into their practices.
Senate Bill 1198 will establish a mandate for sponsoring research that will become the foundation for evidence-based laws.In addition the California Sex Offender Management Board would be expanded by two members with expertise in juvenile sex offending in order to review and recommend best practices and policies in the management of juveniles who sexually offend.
The migration will probably be a slow process, but at least things are moving in the right direction in California (and several other states).
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I live in Texas and had a moderate risk level on the DPS (Department of Public Safety) website. I’m also a member of Texas Voices and recently learned of a department within the Texas Department of Criminal Justice that would reassess anyone on the registry that was convicted of a state level, no federal, sex offense and place on the registry and has remained offense free in the community, (any type of offense — not even a misdemeanor0 — for at least five years.
I called the number and the lady asked me several questions and said that I qualified for the reassessment and that I should get a letter with the results withing two weeks. Heck, the next day I learned that my risk level had been reduced to low — and this showed up on the Texas registry website. I must say that I was a bit surprised — but pleasantly so. I view this as a small victory of sorts.
So, I would say that progress is being made albeit slowly. I do know that Texas Voices — Mary Sue Molnar as our seemingly tireless leader — has made a huge difference as far as advocacy here in Texas. The Texas legislature, which meets officially every two years, is gearing up for the 2019 session and so is Mary Sue. She is a warrior and our cause needs more people like her. She is at the Capitol a lot meeting with the various politicians and building rapport with them, and especially so with their staff members who, in fact, do most of the research and such.
http://www.deregistertexas.com
Dr. Ferarra wrote the deregistration program for the state and his personal website shares some very positive messages.
Unfortunately, as with most legislation related to “sex offenders,” the devil is in the details. As with virtually all recent “empirical” and “evidence-based” research that arise out of California, this bill is simply a ticket for Karl Hanson (as well has his bogus cohorts from a “Carleton University” from Canada) to further infect the United States with the Static-99R and other Static schemes.
For those of you who aren’t familiar, California’s new tiered registry law relies largely on the Static-99R to classify people as “high” risk. However, the drafers of California’s tiered registry veiled the Static-99R under a generic term: “SARATSO tool.” Theoretically, when the Static-99R is discredited — presumably in many years (after much damage has already been been done) — the generic term leaves open the opportunity for CA’s Sex Offender Management Board (“CASOMB”) bureaucrats to peddle an “improved actuarial instrument.”
Like someone said, this is literally Minority Report come to life. It’s just the same s***; but packaged in a different form.
You can’t predict human behavior. ” Anyone ” at any given time can react depending on their circumstances/situation and the heightened level of their emotions at that present time…and even then many times nothing really happens(emotions or impulses can be controlled at any given time ). These are the same words of many 30+ years experienced and retired high ranking law enforcement officers. Many would tell you the same thing. Good people turning bad within seconds and bad people turning good with the same.
Now we will be surprised at how flawed the “evidenced based” sciences are. CA’s system relies on the STATIC-99R. It’s literally Minority Report come to real life
The static-99 is a joke, the weather man uses more than ten data points to make his forecast and how often do they get THAT right?
The Static 99 isn’t a reasonable assessment of anything as much as it’s a random number generator feeding entropy into the due process machine.
Usually whatever California does, Texas, then Florida follows. We’ll see. We need a democratic governor to get elected. These republican govs won’t give us a chance. And Bobby’s right. It’s that simple indeed.
It is usually Texas and Florida that are in cahoots with each other. Even some of their law makers have said it. But California is too liberal for both TX and FL .
Indeed. This was cemented when the Bush brothers governed both Texas and Florida. George W. for Texas and Jeb Bush for Florida. Both conservative driven states follow each other and exchange ideas. The AWA has its roots in FL….no thanks to John Walsh and Foley, signed by Bush (big brother) while little brother Jeb was governing Florida. They can all rot in hell.
I haven’t seen anything or any movement from Florida that leads me to believe that they will follow any step from California or Texas….is the other way around, while those two states are are moving their needle, albeit slowly but surely, towards a reform of their SO Registry, Florida ramped up the efforts to make our lives far more miserable that could ever be.
This comes from the state that is also putting forward petitions to break into at least two more if not three different states or potential legislation to secede from the United States. So, I’m very skeptical.
Well, if one of those “new” states doesn’t have a registry, then I’ll move there in a second LOL.
South Florida has been forever trying to break away from Tallahassee to become its own state – with about 4 to 5 counties comprising the new state. The recent California attempt to break up into states is not their first time in attempting to do so. Texas at some point wanted to do the same – entertaining the idea.
Unfortunately I do not see Florida implementing this type of system, so long as the Book’s hold so much power, and the state is paid for every one that is put and kept on the registry.