Doug, I emailed them actually.

Here is their email address:

letters@rollingstone.com

I encourage ALL PEOPLE commenting and seeing my comment to stop whatever they are doing and send these guys an email. They are bringing MUCH needed awareness to this issue.

i made a post on rolling stone but it not showing up

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/lauren-mccluskey-melvin-rowland-murder-sex-offender-registry-746497/

For one, the author wonders why the university police didn’t have the accused’s address. But why would they? He’s 37 years old; not likely a student or a campus resident, so he wouldn’t be in their jurisdiction. Any detective would then go to the registry to look up addresses and whatnot anyway as routine, but those are the sorts of details that chiefs/spokesmen wouldn’t reveal to the press.

Next, the author states the university police never contacted the Department of Corrections regarding the accused. Again, why would they? Their records would only indicate his conduct while incarcerated (apparently good enough to be paroled) and his parole conditions. What do they have to do with the crime under investigation? Absolutely nothing.

Then, the article points out that the accused was convicted of sex offenses in 2004, but didn’t state why he had “several stints behind bars” since. Were those stints because of other crimes of violence or mere status offenses like breaking curfew? Statistics and the absence of explanation suggest the latter.

And finally, to quote the author, “It seems that this is exactly the kind of case the registry could have assisted with — his address was right there on the publicly accessible list.” The author incorrectly concludes that the registry didn’t prevent this murder because it wasn’t “used properly” by law enforcement. How so? They already knew the accused’s name and address – what else was the registry supposed to do? What information does the registry provide that is not already immediately available from normal procedural detective work?

I have yet to see one single reporter ask that last question of any law enforcement official. On the subject, they’ll claim “it’s a good tool” or “there’s nowhere else to begin an investigation.” But there’s apparently an unspoken (or spoken behind closed doors) rule to never publicly point out how useless the registry is, even though many (if not all)

While the author’s overall conclusion is correct, I would go even further and say the registry actually caused this unfortunate murder. The list of hypothetical situations is unending and ultimately pointless, because one very significant fact remains unchanged: The chain of events that led to this crime began when the accused’s status was revealed. No one can say with any reasonable degree of certainty that this murder would have been prevented or have occurred anyway if his status were revealed earlier, or if at all.