Court challenge to juvenile sex offender registration laws fails
Juveniles who are convicted of a sex crime in California and are sentenced to state custody can be required to register with police as sex offenders for life, a state appeals court ruled Wednesday.
The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the death penalty and mandatory life sentencing laws cannot be applied to juveniles because of their lesser mental and emotional development. But the Third District Court of Appeal in Sacramento said the same rationale does not apply to state sex offender registration laws, which are meant to protect the public rather than to punish the offender.
The laws are “intended to assist law enforcement to maintain surveillance of (repeat) sex offenders, and have no purpose to punish for past misconduct,” the court said, quoting a 2004 California Supreme Court decision in an adult registration case.
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And I’m not quite sure how ostracizing people and taking away all their rights somehow “makes the public safer”…. Since no other crime seems to have a registry I guess they are different somehow?
Whatever the intent, punishment is still punishment. Let some of these judges try it out for a while and they will surely change their minds. Living in a field with no job and no home sounds like punishment to me.
Just one more reason California’s state motto should be:
” THE LAND OF FRUITS AND NUTS”.
So only if said juvenile is a “repeat” offender….? That’s what I got out of it.