Miami-Herald: FAC Opinion Published
An opinion piece in response to a recent article in the Miami Herald was published today.
The text of the response and an image of the article as it appeared are below.
Your December 31, 2018 article, “Report: Number of sex offenders living in Florida is growing.” correctly points out that the Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability (OPPAGA) does not include any explanation for the rise in the number of sex offenders in our State. However, the reason is obvious. Florida is one of only a small handful of states that requires people to register for the duration of their life.
When you combine new sex offenders being continuously added to the registry with zero attrition, it’s no wonder the numbers have grown (and will continue to grow) at such a fast pace.
Florida has also increased the number of offenses that require registration. Since it was enacted on October 1, 1997, the number of offenses that will land you on our State’s sex offender registry has more than tripled. The 1997 version of Fla. Stat. 943.0435 had eight qualifying offenses, the 2018 version has twenty qualifying offenses!
It is time Florida followed in the footsteps of states such as California and Missouri, who recently enacted a tiered registry. We need to stop wasting millions of taxpayer dollars on something that research has consistently demonstrated is ineffective. If not, the registry will only become more bloated and untenable than it already is.
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Yeah, I wondering my crime and sentencing was before the FL registry was enacted, before OCt 1, 1997. No mention of having to register and nothing mentioned during my plea agreement. Also Adjudication withheld was proposed and it turns out that it means nothing, literally fooling me into thinking I was going to do my 1 year Comm Control and 6 years probation. Now Im told I need to wait 20 years til after released from supervision or from date of crime ? It seems Im eligible for this relief.
Even though FLA keeps dead registrants on the registry for one year post-mortum to inform any and everyone they are a deceased person on the registry, is there really a need to do so? It merely inflates the state’s number as well.
If the state pays for this one year registry, then does this show the state is truly into the registry for financial gain since no one pays for a deceased person’s registration renewal and the person who does the post-mortum registry work is already paid to work in the LE office?
I don’t get your newspaper and with my eyesight I am having a hard time reading the newsprint. Would you reprint or rewrite what was in the article here on your site please
It was rewritten above
(a bit off topic) Could someone who is actually a resident of Florida please forward this link below to Any Florida based politicians?
https://narsol.org/2019/01/whats-up-with-the-florida-sex-offender-registry/
They can educate themselves and then provide a response to the blog. Many people would love to know what they think.
Thank you, Gail!
As for implementing a tiered system, it would depend upon which method is used as to who it would benefit most. In cases where only possession of child pornography was the reason for being on the registry, a conviction-based tier structure, as per AWA, would render these folks a justifiable low risk.
However, using a risk tool, a child pornographer could be considered an above average risk offender due to prosecutorial bloating of the counts of the same offense and how “victim” is defined.
Great job!!!
May I give just a slight bit of constructive criticism though? I don’t think anyone should ever say “$EX offender”. It is nothing but calling people names and it is a weapon of war. It is also inaccurate to call people listed on the Registries that.
I do realize that when a person has just committed a $EX offense, that it is appropriate to call that person an “offender” or a “$EX offender” for some amount of time. But the term “$EX offender” itself has just been so weaponized that I think it should always be avoided. Perhaps your sentences could’ve been something like?:
“… the rise in the number of Registered People in our State.”
“When you combine newly convicted people …”
Also, I don’t think “tiering” should ever be done. That is nothing but trying to polish a huge pile of excrement. Further, it is nothing but sacrificing some people so that others may be free. I don’t think it’s moral.
I do expect tiering will continue though. It does give some people an illusion that they are actually doing something useful, moral, and American. But it’s the opposite.
I agree, I just say a person with a sexual offense. I don’t recall ever using the term, willingly, of “sex offender”. Putting damn unwarranted labels on people isn’t what I believe Adults should be doing in the ‘Land of the Free’, or whatever the phrase is these days.