Where should sex offenders live?

Sex offenders recently won a battle in Ohio regarding residency restrictions; however, the war rages on to incarcerate, supervise, restrict, and otherwise alienate sex offenders.

Ohio is one of 22 states that have imposed restrictions on where sex offenders reside. The 2003 Ohio law prohibits sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of a school. The law will be expanded as of July 1 by including areas around preschools and day-care centers as restricted zones for sex offenders.

In February, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled that residency restriction laws do not apply to sex offenders convicted prior to the law’s enactment. As a result, literally hundreds of sex offenders who were prohibited from remaining or returning to their homes are now free to live wherever they wish. The ruling is not as bad as it may first appear.

Alabama passed the first sex offender residency restriction law in 1996. In 2002, Iowa passed a similar law that applied to any person, “who committed a criminal offense against a minor, or an aggravated offense, sexually violent offense, or other relevant offense that involved a minor.” The law was challenged and found to be constitutional by the U.S. Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals. The court found that sex offenders do not have a constitutional right “to live where you (sex offenders) want.” The court ruled that Iowa had a legitimate right to promote the safety of children.

In spite of legislative efforts across the country to restrict the residency of sex offenders, the public may be more vulnerable than it was prior to those efforts. Residency restrictions simply do not work. Carolyn Atwell-Davis, director of legislative offices for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children told the Washington Post, “Our concern is that these laws may give a false sense of security.” Atwell-Davis continued, “We’re not aware of any evidence that residency restrictions have prevented a child from being victimized.”

Family members

According to the U.S. Department of Justice, 93 percent of child sex abuse victims know their abusers. They are assaulted within their own homes by family members or trusted family friends. Sex offenders do not reoffend at the same rate that other offenders do, only about one in 10 sex offenders will recommit a sex offense. Despite the public perception, the abduction and sexual assault of children by strangers is extremely rare. A recent Department of Justice investigation found that of 800,000 children reported missing in a one-year period, less than 100 were sexually assaulted by strangers.

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children is not the only entity concerned with victims who oppose residency restrictions. The Iowa district attorneys association and the state’s sheriffs association have publicly called for the repeal of residency restrictions. Since the Iowa law was enacted, the number of sex offenders unaccounted for has doubled. A report by the Des Moines Register found that as of January, 2006, 298 sex offenders were unaccounted for through the state’s sex offender registry, as compared to 142 in 2005.

Residency restrictions force sex offenders underground. Some sex offenders conceal their true address to avoid being forced to relocate. In Ohio, onerous local residency restriction ordinances, even broader than state law, have created “the new ghetto.” The Columbus Dispatch described “the new ghetto” as unrestricted communities that have become enclaves for sex offenders. The clustering of sex offenders is a consequence of sex offenders being forced out of their homes and neighborhoods by residency restrictions. As housing options shrink some sex offenders are left homeless. The idea of a transient sexually violent predator, without supervision, should be as unsettling for policymakers as it is for parents.

Political grandstanding

The hysteria surrounding sex offenders, particularly those who target children, has fueled the political grandstanding that has resulted in ineffectual legislation. Randall Wilson of the Iowa chapter of the ACLU told Stateline.com, “State lawmakers are wrestling with whether they’ve gone to far. But the difficulty is they’re afraid if they do anything to roll back (residency restrictions), they’ll get voted out of office.”

Sex offenders, particularly those who prey on children, are rightfully some of the most reviled members of society. Legislative efforts, often promoted more by politics than commonsense, have not addressed the real concern regarding sexually violent predators, and have made the work of tracking sex offenders more difficult, and children potentially more vulnerable.

X Matthew T. Mangino is the former district attorney of Lawrence County and a featured columnist for the Pennsylvania Law Weekly. He can be reached at matthewmangino