Why is this taking so long?
One of the most frequent questions received by our legal department is “when will ___ happen?” or “why is it taking so long for ___?”
There is nobody that wants relief to come sooner than we do. We on the Board are all personally impacted by the registry as either ourselves or an immediate family member is on the list. We also feel the collective weight of all our members’ struggles.
There is a saying that “the wheels of justice turn slowly” and it’s the truth. The Miami-Dade SORR case was launched in 2014 and as we approach the 4 year mark we’ve still not gone to trial! Granted we made a trip to the 11th Circuit Court of appeals and back, so a lot has taken place, but four years is a painfully long time to wait when you are sleeping on a street corner in Miami during the summer.
Similarly, the hearing on the parties’ summary judgment motions in the Internet Identifier case took place on October 26, 2017 and we are still waiting on an order.to come down from the court. That’s 294 days. 9 months and three weeks exactly! For those foregoing employment opportunities in the mean time, that’s a lot of opportunities.
Unfortunately there is nothing we can do about it. There is no required timeline for a Federal District Court judge to render an opinion in a case and nothing we can do to compel a faster answer. I know… at least in prison you were counting time but knew the end date. Here the wait is torturous and checking my PACER (public access to court records) account 3 times a day instead of 2 has not sped things up.
In my impatience I searched for any study on how long, on average, judicial proceedings take. I found very little on the subject, but I did find a 2009 study from The Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System at the University of Denver (IAALS) which found that, “[f]or all summary judgment motions, the mean time to rule was 166 days, but the variation across courts was even more pronounced: from a low of 63 days on average in the fastest court to a high of 254 days on average in the slowest court.”
When you consider the courts are even more congested than they were 9 years ago and when you further consider that the Florida district courts are among the busiest in the country, you can assume we’re on the slow end of the spectrum. In that light, considering 254 days is average, we’re not that far out.
Just like that “wheels of justice” quote, there’s another that says, “justice delayed is justice denied”. For all of us, especially those whose ability to move back home with their families or whose livelihoods depend on the outcome of these cases, the delay is tantamount to losing. You can never make back the time.
So what can we do? We can keep the wheels turning. We can keep our public education campaigns going, we can keep reaching out to media and legislators and most importantly we can keep our pipeline filled will legal challenges.
We do expect our Ex Post Facto challenge to be filed this month (pending return of materials from the named plaintiffs) and we are 16% above average in our wait time for the court’s decision in the internet identifier challenge. Our “in person reporting challenge” is 51% funded (another factor that’s completely beyond our control). Our membership keeps growing, our voice becomes louder, our resources increase and with that goals become easier to accomplish.
Hang in there… good things are coming.
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I don’t mind a little waiting if the outcome goes our way. If some powerful fortune teller tells me – look, all of this will disappear in two years for good, SORNA, the registry, SORR, IML, etc. etc. but you just have to wait 2 years……great!, I can do those two years easy and go to sleep like a baby with pleasant dreams. That would be a tremendous motivation but, I’m realistic and practical. I think what blows really bad, is that we wait all that time, and it doesn’t go our away. It is like an emptiness of darkness inside me when that happens. It really sucks. Some times I wonder if they made their decision from the beginning, but they just wanted to prolong it for the hell of it.
Fac
forgive my ignorance, but which one is this one ?
” Our “in person reporting challenge” is 51% funded ”
this is because we report in person so many times right? For every little thing ? If I didn’t have to report in person to any agency that be great, of course, if I didn’t have to report anything at all ( The registry ) even better. lol
That is exactly what it is. In person reporting, SORR and Internet identifiers were all covered in the Doe V Snyder case in Michigan.
http://www.sado.org/Articles/Article/316
Sadly, things may get a lot worse and slower, given the leading gubernatorial candidates’ “tough-on-crime” stance, especially that of Putzman:
https://www.naplesnews.com/story/news/politics/2018/06/15/putnam-desantis-stick-tough-crime-campaign-promises/698587002/
Take the time to read this short article, it hits the nail on the head. Putzman’s election would be a de-facto Rick Snott third term. He sees nothing wrong with keeping the prisons full and the continual denial of rights restoration.
Yes, the wheels of justice turn slowly and getting the laws set against us reversed or overturned…. even slower.
Yet these laws were set on a fast track to be put against us…….. Is that fair? No.
But it is the way it is. We have hope on this suit; let it run its course
If I had taken so long to carry out my duties in the Navy I surely would have been out of a job and homeless. I once had a boss whose policy was that if he wanted something done tomorrow he would ask for it tomorrow. We got the message. Another one told us division officers that there were 24 hours in the day and 7 days in the week; we were authorized to use any or all of it to get our job done. How cases that are so critical to so many families be be allowed to languish is beyond me? What is so frustrating is that the “wheels of justice” seem to just grind along at a snail’s pace while the “wheels of injustice” move along at the speed of light. Every day that is lost is a day that cannot be replaced. We each need to evaluate our lives, find something productive we can do under the circumstances, and pray that God’s will is that freedom is restored. I pray everyday and wake up with projects that keep me busy. I have been that way ever since I was a kid and even though I end most days tired as all ‘get out’ I believe I have been blessed.
It is even more frustrating that we know perfectly well that we will wait all the time for those slow “wheels of justice” to turn and still there is no justice.
Justice is an illusion we are taught every citizen is entitled to but we all know (and especially use labelled as sex offenders) that justice is ONLY given to those who can afford it!
This is America and after being alive for 58 years I am well aware of how things really work in this country.
A thought for FAC
For those who are forbidden to be on the internet how do you teach them ?
Those on probation can get and send text messages
Do you have a way for them
To belong and communicate with you ?
There is probably a lot of them that would help out on these challenges with finaciL help
We have monthly member calls on the first Thursday of every month. There is a new member call on the second Thursday of every month. We also have a text service but there’s only so much you can send in a text, so it’s reserved for alerts and calls-to-action. Our regional and county coordinators try to schedule “meet and greets” in different parts of the state on a regular basis, but it’s still not enough.
We have a lot of members who rely on a family member to print the weekly updates for them (and a lot of our active members are actually parents or spouses of the registrant). Since those who don’t have internet are generally on probation and in treatment, perhaps someone reading this who is in a group can volunteer to print a copy to share with some others.
Unfortunately, even if 1/10 of our membership were in the disadvantaged situation of not having internet access, printing and snail-mailing our weekly updates to just them would cost a few thousand dollars a year in postage alone, never mind a volunteer to stuff the envelopes. It’s not feasible.
We would love a way to reach more, especially those who need it the most. Any suggestions are appreciated.
I know I need to get more involved some how some way I am one of the few that have been a success story in all avenues
Thank you for your reply
If everyone pitched in to the best extent they can, we’d be so much farther along!