Convicted sex offender facing 10 years in prison for failure to register
Holy COW!!! 10 years for failing to register. That’s a lot of time for a violation of a “Civil”, “Non-Punitive” law, isn’t it?
So I dug a bit deeper to see exactly what his offense was, how long ago it happened and how much time he got for the underlying crime to see how the time he’s facing for this violation relates to the offense of conviction.
It turns out the offense happened in 1997. That’s 18 years ago! For that crime he was sentenced to less than a year, “ADJUDGED GUILTY SENTENCED TO 11 MONTHS 29 DAYS COUNTY JAIL WITH CREDIT FOR TIME SERVED FOLLOWED BY 3 YEARS SEX OFFENDER PROBATION PURSUANT TO F.S. 948.03(5A) &(B CONDITION 5B2”
Subsequently, he had a probation violation (which is why the news story below says 2000, but the offense was actually 1997) and failure to register, but his sole sex offense was 18 years ago. His case history can be found here: http://www.manateeclerk.org/PublicRecords/CourtRecordsSearch/tabid/57/ctl/detail/mid/484/Default.aspx?enc=NzY4MTQz-CuDDOOLiqV4%3d
Below is the story that came out in the Daytona Beach News Journal:
A convicted sex offender from Palm Coast is facing up to 10 years in federal prison after failing to register as a sex offender, an official said.
Stephen Paul Cotton, 43, traveled between July 2012 and December 2014 to North Carolina, where he did not register as a convicted sex offender as required by law, U.S. Attorney spokesman William Daniels said. Cotton was arrested April 11 in Georgia.
Cotton was found guilty of principal to lewd assault/sexual battery on a victim younger than 16 in Manatee County in 2000, Florida Department of Law Enforcement records show. He also was found guilty of failing to comply with registration as a sex offender in 2009 in Volusia County.
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