The Florida Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers submitted a report to the Florida Legislatures Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability (OPPAGA) making several evidence-based recommendations for Florida’s Sex Offender Registry System. Among the recommendations are:
1. Juveniles should be removed from Florida’s registry
2. Durations of registration should be reduced for some offenders
3. Discretion about placement on registry at sentencing should involve risk assessment
4. A mechanism for relief from registration duties and removal from the registry should exist for some offenders
5. Local residence restrictions ordinances should be abolished
My older brother got his probation terminated early about over a year and a half ago and has been offense free since his conviction 5 years ago. ( he has no priors / only conviction ) He had finished treatment successfully and the courts felt like he didn’t need to finish the rest of his probation because he just isn’t a threat..Just a regular and very social citizen. These policies that are recommended would be great for him and others alike. A lifetime of registration and restrictions is just plain ridiculous.
Absolutely! Would it surprise you to learn that your brother represents the overwhelming majority of those on the registry? With an overall 5.3% re-offense rate, MOST registrants – 95%!!! – are not a threat, just regular people.
Appreciate you sticking up for your brother! We encourage you to join the fight.
The entire sex offender registry industry needs to come down…..If your not a member of Florida Action Committee PLEASE join now. WE need your help to change these laws!!!
This provides hope. My crime was computer images only. The DA and judge both agreed that I wasn’t a danger. I am not on GPS, I live within 1000′ of a school (per DA request and Judge’s orders), and all counts were adjudicated. I have 3 years left of a 5 year probation, yet the state wants to punish me for 25 years to life. And regardless of what some people think, being on the registry is a punishment, border-lining on cruel and unusual.
I’m put this in terms that are plain and concise . What a load of Shit
after reading the first paragraph I was so pissed off that I had a hard time getting through the rest of the document . Just reading through the boldface paragraph headings made me mad . This whole thing is based on the assumption that people on the registry are going to reoffend. And then they have the balls to cite documentation from people who have a fiduciary interest in keeping the registry running . If they want to start citing documentation than one thing that they should not say is that juveniles have a lower risk of reoffending , because the studies have shown in comparison to people who are 50 and older are being released from prison, and people who are in their teens and 20s that the younger ones are more likely to reoffend than the older ones. And that’s just logical because of the biological needs at those ages.
as for risk assessments, which ones are they going to use none of them have been proven to be even 60% accurate. All the current ones are 50% or less accurate . from my point of view this was written by somebody that is attempting to get their loved ones off of the registry and sacrificing everyone else. in reality, as a whole, that is the entire registry. There is not high enough, re-offense rate to justify the existence of any of it where is the study that looks at the re-offense rate per year of the entire registry. There is not one for a simple reason the numbers would be so low that it would make it impossible to justify the existence of the registry and thereby closed down the entire sex offender registry industry.
remember most of these people that do these studies are part of the same group of people that in the late 80s and early 90s made statements that sex offenders were untreatable and would always reoffend. Only once they realize that they could make money off of treating sex offenders. Did they change their tune , and even then, the programs that they have come up with have not. And I repeat, have not proven to reduce recidivism over people that have no treatment if their programs were so wonderful. Why are there people still locked up in state treatment facilities who have been in treatment. For over 10 years , and why are there studies out there showing that people without treatment have lower re-offense rates than the people that have gone through treatment.
to give you an idea how these researchers twist the numbers let’s take a look at this statement
sexually motivated stranger abductions– though they’ve fueled SORN policy development – are exceedingly rare (115 per year of children and 332 per year total; 2% of total missing child cases) (Kessler, 2015) and that about 15% of perpetrators were registered as sex offenders at the time of the crime
notice that there are two numbers used here. 115 and 332 , and that is a total of 2%, which one is the total of 2%? secondly they come up with a total of 15% were on the registry at the time of the new crime . That is not 15% of the people on the registry that is 15% of 115 , or in plain terms. 17 people So of the 849,000 , and yes that is the correct number, not 800,000 17 people who were on the registry in a given year were involved in a child abduction case for sexual reasons, and charged (notice it doesn’t say that they were convicted) you want a percentage. Here’s one for you 00.0002% or 2/10,000 of 1% of the people on the Registry were involved in a new crime involving a abducted child . So let’s punish the other 99.9998% who were not involved in a crime because of what 17 people in this country did you get a pass laws and punish 848,983 people and there family members and friends.
now you tell me what sounds worse? 15% were predators or the fact that 17 people. Out of 850,000 committed a new crime.
it’s time these organizations stop running around and being politically correct or meeting their personal agenda to get family members off of the registry. It’s time that they grew up and stood up for every one that’s on the registry and the registrant’s family members . Most people that are on the registry have come to not trust all the different advocacy groups out there, simply because of these reasons you can’t cherry pick the people on the registry that you want to be off if you do , don’t whine, because you’re not getting financial support when you choose to throw the rest of the people under the bus . You either stand up for everyone because the entire registry is unconstitutional and cruel to the registrants and their families because if you cherry pick the people you want to save from the registry. You’re never going to get the support, emotional or financial from the rest of the people on the registry and their families.
As I said this entire thing just me Pissed me off.
This is good and it gives us options. It is a proposal of reason in the right direction. Some states have registration only for the duration of probation and others have them at only 5 to 10 years max. Some States don’t even have residency restrictions and is working for them well. Risk assessments and mechanisms for relief from registration duties on a case by case basis would be great.
They sound pretty good. I was actually a little scared to open this article thinking the worst. lol . sorry. Duration of registry should be reduced to only probation. I can understand if you’re on a probation sentence but once you’re off probation then you are free from restrictions just like other convicted citizens with other charges !…Kids should never be on any registry at all. Residency restrictions are just plain dumb and should be abolished. They do nothing but create homelessness.
I believe Hansen has a study that says that even the worst offenders, if offense free for 17 years, are no more likely to commit another sexual offense than someone who has no prior offense.
Empirical Evidence is what we should use to formulate Sex Offender management programs, not politically motivated feel-good BS