Santa Rosa Sheriff has his own theory on recidivism rates
Wonder where the “frightening and high” or “it’s not a matter of “if”, but “when”” myths come from? Statements like the one from Santa Rosa Sheriff, Bob Johnson.
In this article (concerning a police sting) he was quoted as saying the following:
For parents, Johnson said this should scare you to death.
“You should monitor what websites they go to and stay on them,” Johnson said. “They don’t have privacy in your home, they belong to you and if you don’t keep track of what they’re doing, this is what’s coming for them. Scumbags like this. This is all they do. They are looking for little girls and little boys to have sex with and they will travel to do it.”
“You can incarcerate them forever, they can die, or you can cut off a certain appendage,” Johnson said. “That’s the only way it’s going to get fixed. These guys are predators, and they are coming for your children.”
Anyone want to bet he’s running for re-election?
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Remind the sheriff that just 25 years ago (and not even that much for Hawaii and Canada), Georgia, Hawaii, and Canada all had ages of consent of 14 years old, the same age as most of those “sting victims”. Forget about the ages of consent in places in Europe, etc. Boy, I guess folks were a lot more criminal and mentally sick back then, right? Ages of consent started back when young girls were getting pregnant and it was becoming more of a burden on the State, financially, than it was a concern for the personal welfare of individual teenagers.
Rayo
But, as a Father, I would not have wanted my 14 year old daughter to be dating some 31 year old man. Most of us wouldn’t want that. In fact, even the people who get caught doing it, would not want their own daughters to be dating someone twice their age.
Not sure if you have kids or grandkids but things seem to change when it is personal. Just saying.
What one would prefer to have happen, and what one has the right to use a criminal law to enforce, are two separate things.
If I don’t want my kid eating junk food or reading comic books (yeah, they don’t have those any more but it’s just an example) and he or she does anyway, my problem is my failure to control my kid. I can’t have the guy who sold them potato chips and comic books at the 7-11 arrested.
I doubt anyone here would be ok with rolling back the age of consent to where it used to be.
I would.
I wanted to comment on the news story and ask what ADULT dating website they did this sting from. I couldn’t find a comments section unfortunately. I’ve seriously considered creating a dating profile on some of those websites with the sole purpose of warning individuals that law enforcement uses them for stings. Wonder how quick I’d get shut down.
Typical corrupt Santa Rosa sheriff. Sadly I live in that county. His registration staff have been courteous and professional for all the years I’ve been registered but Johnson is obviously a fear monger who lies rather than speak from facts and scientific research. My family will be voting against him.
I live in SR County too, and I agree that the registration office personnel are very polite and understanding. This sheriff though has got to go!
hmmm…
These guys are all over the map demographically speaking. They are all ages, income levels and pretty geographically diverse (considering the circumstances – a local sting with a small group).
It also seems like the police were able to net quite a few perps in a pretty short amount of time. Seems like the problem is a pretty common one, as if there are a lot of men (and women) who secretly have these dirty little fantasies.
Well, well, what should we conclude? These facts speak volumes to me! If we all really commit to some critical, non-biased thinking, perhaps we could (at least intellectually) get past our taboos enough to speak the truth with each other.
Or perhaps not. (Sigh)
I hope someone, perhaps an attorney or psych will write a rebuttal with real facts about how unlikely MOST offenders are to repeat. This is a hard one because although this is a huge area in Ca, it is also a large number to be caught in a sting in just 3 days. I wonder about the true reporting in some of those arrests……….
Sarah,
I don’t think we need to even go that far as to write a rebuttal. Just make one simple statement, “Name me just ONE instance that the registry protected the public or prevented just ONE registered person from committing another sex crime.”
They won’t have an answer for that. All they would say is the registry protects the public, but that’s not a specific answer.
I’ve been saying it for years; the registry will NEVER prevent anyone hell bent on doing something stupid to reoffend.
The idea that registries prevent future crimes is about as stupid as making a registry of every crime in the world, listing the entire planet’s population on it, and saying, “Everyone is now safe because no more crimes will ever be committed.”
@ Disgusted in Michigan:
I have been saying exactly that (one instance…) for years. Further:
In the (few-and-far-between) instances of registrant re-offense (apart from registry violations), what did the registry provide to the investigation that wasn’t available from routine detective work?
What did the registry provide the prosecution that didn’t come from a routine criminal record check?
Besides funding for supposed maintenance*, how is the registry a “useful tool” for law enforcement?
*Note that only a fraction of the grants are actually used for registry maintenance.
Somebody should ask him questions about what the research shows. Here’s a good article for that:
Online dating applications and risk of youth victimization: A
lifestyle exposure perspective
Here’s a very interesting finding from that study:
“A perhaps surprising finding was that parental control was not associated with adolescents’ cybercrime victimization and sexual victimization by adults, and it was positively associated with more likely victimization to online sexual harassment and sexual victimization. This indicates that high parental monitoring may not be effective or could be even counterproductive in the case of some risks related to online behavior and peer relationships.”
It’s logical to conclude that this individual is clearly unfit for a position in law enforcement. Isn’t it his job to be educated about this stuff?
He very much sounds like one of the major players behind the “child predator” sting operations that are conducted on adult dating, hookup, and sex platforms, where no one expects to find minors, and obviously, no one even knows how to find minors in those places. Otherwise, law enforcement and those other fake heroes (vigilante groups) would be finding those minors on those adult hookup platforms and rescue or remove them from there. The evidence about the “child predator” sting operations overwhelmingly, and undoubtedly shows that it is nothing more than elaborate, huge money-making scam, with many people involved, who greatly benefit from the scam. Not all involved are aware that it’s a scam disguised as the work of trying to protect children from online predators, but all involved certainly benefit from the scam. Therefore, they are not likely to speak out about or against it. And also, of course, because they would be retaliated against. It’s the exact same behavior of all cults who have extreme control over their followers. They keep the followers controlled with fear.
What surprises me is that guys still fall for these online stings even though many sheriff departments go on TV to announce all their “big busts”. Its not like these guys are on sites intended for minors looking to hook up. These are ADULT sites where one would expect to find people age 18 and up, not a 13 or 14 year old girl.
The only way to shut down these stings is for people to wake up and refuse to talk to anyone on those sites who claim to be a minor, or the sites have to start verifying everyone’s ages. But even then there will be some that fall through the cracks and get on them, and there will always be idiots who won’t care about a girl’s age and fall for the bait anyway.