These past few weeks I have attended several work sessions and listened to many others. The Justice Committee has been working on trying to bring Maine SORNA Registry into compliance with Maine's Constitution. In a recent case Maine's Supreme Court ruled that certain aspects of the SORNA Registry are unconstitutional, That it is in fact not a civil scheme but one that is punitive in nature and that people convicted between 1992 & 1999, who had to register as part of their sentence who then had time added to their registration requirements; when the laws were later changed, were in fact having their sentence added to. This is called ex post facto which means after the fact which both the State and our Nation's Constitution have said cannot be done to anyone for any reason. Also the Court ruled that the every 90 days in person registration at the local police station is punitive and must be changed. Janet Mills Maine's Attorney General gave the committee several options for dealing the these issues. The simplist one would be what they called a rolling registry which would mean that each person would have to comply with the laws in place at the time the offense was committed. Admittedly a logistical nightmare for the state but simplest and fairest solution of all. Bit it also would mean that many people would simply no longer have to register. Instead,what has evolved during their discussions with various experts is they plan expand the waiver program they implimented last year to include those from 1992 to 1999, previously the only people who could take advantage of this were people convicted between 1982 to 1992, those who had the registry imposed on them when they changed the laws in 2005 and made them retroactive to include people all the way back to 1082. This is a simple plan that only allows people who quailify to apply and it is either granted or denied with no room to apeal the decision. They would then add a second step that is more involved, you would get a hearing in front of a judge and could present evidence showing that you are no longer a risk to society. At this stage they are debating the wording and what would be exceptible to show your risk level. This will they hope get them off the hook with the Court and keep the most people on the registry. Never mind the fact that the people we are talking about have served their time and been living in society trying to live an offense free life for 10 to 20 years.
The thing that has come up that bothers me the most is they have decided to exclude anyone who has an out of state conviction. In other words if you are a current resident of Maine no matter how long you have lived here you could not take advantage of either oppurtunity they are considering. Why is this? How can they have two different classes of people? Does the State's Constitution only apply to people who committed their offense here in Maine but not to those who made a mistake outside of Maine but is now a resident? Well I think I can answer why they are trying to do this whether or not it is Constitutional or not. From the very first work session the state was made " We don't want Maine to become a "HAVEN STATE". They are fearful that if word gets out that Maine has easier registry requirements that hoards of former offenders will flock to Maine looking to get off the registry. If they are so fearful of this happeneing why not place some kind of residence rerequirement. Such as former offenders must live in Maine for a certain length of time, for instance say after living here for at least 5 years and if you are eligable according to all other requirements before you could apply. Instead they are trying to interpet the Constituion two different ways.
I wonder how many people are even concerned with this or are even bothered in any way? Does anyone realize that one the Constitution can be twisted to suit different agendas that their rights are in danger as well. There is a reason the statue outside courts are shown as blind, it is that justice should be blind it must apply to those we dislike as well as those we like, or we all stand to lose in the long run. What will it take to get people to notice? Once we have lost our rights it is too late to get them back again.
Showing posts with label civil rights. Show all posts
Showing posts with label civil rights. Show all posts
Friday, February 26, 2010
Thursday, September 10, 2009
CFC Maine mentioned in article
State law set to change city's sex offender ordinance
http://www.keepmecurrent.com/american_journal/news/article_e2946838-9e46-11de-8b21-001cc4c002e0.htmlPlease feel free to leave comments
Westbrook police Detective Dan Violette says there's a reason the number of sex offenders living and working in the city hasn't changed much in the past two years.
Since the City Council adopted one of the strictest ordinances in the state prohibiting registered sex offenders from living or working in most of the city, Violette has had to force people out of their new apartments and make them quit their jobs.
According to the detective, who said he spends about 25 percent of his work week keeping track of sex offenders in the city, about 37 registered sex offenders live in Westbrook and an additional 16 work there.
"The number hasn't fluctuated very much," Violette said.
But that could change when a new state law goes into effect Saturday, nullifying Westbrook's ordinance.
The City Council will vote Monday on whether to adopt the state's new maximum allowable restrictions on where sex offenders can live. If passed, the 2,500-foot buffer zones around all places children frequent will be replaced with 750-foot restricted areas just around schools. And that only covers residency. The state law says that towns and cities cannot restrict where sex offenders can work.
In a gesture showing their disapproval of the state law, Gorham town councilors last week refused to change the town's restrictive ordinance in order to comply. However, it's still in question what the town's police department will be able to enforce once the law goes into effect.
Though Violette said he'll still spend the same amount of time monitoring sex offenders in the city and notifying neighbors and employers of their whereabouts, the state law takes away some of his authority over sex offenders and a safeguard for Westbrook children.
"It's given me more tools to help make sure sex offenders were in compliance," he said about the old law.
DRAWN TO WESTBROOK
There are no demographics that encompass all sex offenders, Violette said, but because a lot of employers don't want to hire registered sex offenders, many, regardless of their backgrounds and skills, don't have steady sources of income.
"You're a convicted felon. That makes you ineligible to work in a lot of places," Violette said.
Because of that, he believes the amount of low-income housing in Westbrook draws more sex offenders. Though Portland is probably the most attractive city in the area for jobless sex offenders because of its shelters and support services, he said, "we're ripe for the picking as far as increasing our numbers."
However, some say that keeping people out of jobs and homes because of their sex offender status is unconstitutional.
Jane Cantral, who runs Maine Citizens for Change - a local affiliate of the national group Reform Sex Offender Laws - said she and her boyfriend Calvin Shelton, a registered sex offender, didn't have an easy time finding a home in this area of the state.
"We're trying to buy a house and we're looking at maps," said Cantral, a Bridgton resident who was herself the victim of a sex offender.
"It sounds good as a knee-jerk reaction, but if you really thought about it, how much sense does it make?" Cantral said.
She pointed to the fact that students are not in school at night, when most sex offenders are in their homes. She also noted that kids are better looked after in schools and day cares than they are the rest of the day.
"I don't think residency restrictions are needed at all," she said.
Cantral hopes that more efforts will be made on educating parents and children and treating sex offenders rather than on making local or state laws that she believes are ineffective.
IS LESS MORE?
But success is measured in different ways when it comes to sex offender laws.
Violette said he scans the state's sex offender registry about once a week to see if there are any new registered sex offenders living or working in Westbrook. During the past two years, he said, he's had to ask about a dozen people to leave their jobs, usually because of their proximity to day cares. Though he's gotten mixed reactions from employers - some thank Violette for making them aware of the charges, others would rather to keep the workers regardless of them - the sex offenders themselves tend to comply quickly.
"Almost every time, they quit right way," he said.
Other than the case of one registered sex offender Violette had to repeatedly chase out of a Spring Street apartment, he said the same willingness to obey the ordinance was true of sex offenders trying to move to the city. He said he's had to turn down about five or six sex offenders who tried to move into restricted areas of the city from out of town and another half-dozen who wanted to move within Westbrook.
Overall, Violette estimated that about 20 additional sex offenders would be living or working in the city today if it weren't for the ordinance.
"It was working," he said.
PEACE OF MIND
One woman who was an outspoken advocate of the Westbrook ordinance when it was adopted said she plans to speak up again at the council meeting Monday.
Jen Wescott, who has two family members that were sex crime victims, said even with the ordinance in place, as a mother and a day care owner, she's on constant alert, keeping an eye on who's around. The city's law offered extra protection.
"It gives you a little more sense of security," Wescott said.
But creating a false sense of security is one of the arguments opponents have against residency restrictions.
"They have a tendency to drive offenders underground," Sen. Anne Haskell, D-Portland, who sponsored the bill, said in June, when the law was passed. "Then you don't know where they are, which is a more dangerous situation."
Those who support less-stringent residency resrictions say the vast majority of sex crimes are committed by people known to the victims - which was the case with Wescott's family members and with Cantral, as well.
While Cantral argues that over-reaching restrictions violate the rights of former criminals who have paid their debts to society, Wescott and Violette both believe that additional protection against sex offenders can only help to keep kids safer.
"Any buffer you put between a sex offender and our vulnerable children, I think that's a good thing," Violette said.
Monday, June 22, 2009
BBC Does Show About the Florida RFSOs
Wow! imagine this that scandal of the residents living under the Julia Tuttle Causeway Bridge has drawn the attention of the BBC. You'd think that Florida would get the message that what they are doing is violating these peoples human and civil rights. There is a long list of politicians, lobbyists and officals that all share the blame for this terrible situation.
Rough justice
21 June 2009
article here
A Miami law is forcing many of the city’s sex offenders to sleep rough under a bridge, reports Emilio San Pedro for the BBC’s Americana programme.
Tents set up by released sex offenders under a road bridge in Miami
The area under the Julia Tuttle Causeway in downtown Miami has in recent years become the unlikely home for a growing community of about 70 convicted sex offenders.
They have ended up living in a makeshift tent city under one of the causeway’s bridges because of a local law which prohibits those who have sexually abused minors from living within 2,500 ft (760m) of anywhere where children congregate, such as schools, libraries and parks.
After the local laws were enacted, Florida’s correctional authorities found there was virtually nowhere else for these people to live and began dropping them off at the bridge.
Some of them have even been issued driving licences with the bridge listed as their home address.
Angry
“Welcome to American justice,” said Dr Pedro Jose Greer, the Dean of Florida International University’s Department of Humanities, Health and Society, as he met me under the bridge to discuss the squalid conditions at the camp.
“We have people living together with mental and physical illnesses in an environment where people can’t possibly sleep because of the cars going by overhead - where you can smell the urine and see the trash mounting all around us.”
“This is the stupidest damn law I have ever seen and it’s purely mandated by revenge without any consideration for the well-being of these people“
Dr Pedro Greer
Campaigner
Dr Pedro Greer
Dr Greer has for decades been a leading advocate in Miami for homeless people and their right to receive adequate medical and social services.
He told me that he has become increasingly angry over the last few years at the existence of this camp and the lack of an alternative way to reintegrate these convicted sex offenders into society.
“What we’re doing is we’re saying ‘let’s take the people that we most despise, that did some of the most egregious things in society and let them all get together and not supervise them and let them wander around the community’,” he tells me with a clear sense of frustration in his voice.
“This is the stupidest damn law I have ever seen and it’s purely mandated by revenge without any consideration for the well-being of these people - who deserve better despite the severity of their crimes,” he says.
No money
As we walk around the camp, with its tents and makeshift huts, lack of running water, electricity or any form of sewage, I meet Isaias, a 35-year-old Latino and former US Marine, who has been living at the camp for over two years.
He tells me how the state authorities simply drop former offenders like him under the bridge and - as he puts it - let them fend for themselves.
“They don’t give us no water, no food, no portable toilets, no money - nothing,” he tells me.
“ I’ve only been here five days but I can’t believe these criminal conditions we live in“
Julio
Julio
Isaias - who served five years in prison for having sexual relations with a 16-year-old girl and is now out on parole - says that all that he and many of his neighbours under the bridge want is to be able to attempt to lead a normal life and move beyond their criminal past.
“I can’t live with my wife and my daughter. I would like to have a normal life and be able to become a productive member of society again, but society is not giving us that chance,” he tells me.
I then ask him if - as a father himself - if he can understand why society harbours such anger for people who have committed these sorts of crimes.
“I would understand it - yes - as a father but at the same time I cannot expect that a person who committed this kind of crime against my own child should then come out of jail and be forced to live like an animal - as we’re doing here,” he says.
A few metres away I meet Julio - a 62-year-old Cuban immigrant, who served 10 years in prison for abusing of a 12-year-old girl. He is a recent arrival at the camp and is finding it very difficult to adjust.
“The conditions here are terrible. I’ve only been here five days but I can’t believe these criminal conditions we live in. I have absolutely nothing and no-one to give me any form of assistance at all. I wonder if I’ll ever get out of here,” he concludes.
Too sensitive
The problem for people like Julio is that the serious nature of the crimes they committed makes it very difficult for them to get much sympathy from the local community or from local politicians - who for the most part have found the issue too sensitive and downright controversial to become involved.
However, earlier this month, one city of Miami commissioner, Marc Sarnoff, did just that.
With the backing of the city government, he wrote a letter to the state governor, Charlie Crist, asking him to shut the camp down.
He based that request on the fact that there is a small island that serves as a weekend park for boaters and their children that lies within the existing local boundaries.
“I’m not here to support or endorse anything with regard to sexual offenders… However, they are living in squalor“
Marc Sarnoff
City Commissioner
I met Mr Sarnoff on a recent sunny morning at a local park, where a group of boys were playing baseball with their coach.
He told me that his top priority remained protecting these children from sex offenders like the ones who lived at the camp.
“Let me be absolutely clear. I’m not here to support or endorse anything with regard to sexual offenders. They are my least bit of concern,” he tells me.
“However, they are living in squalor. I don’t think human beings will stay in that condition. They’re going to start leaving and what we thought was a good law of 2,500 ft to keep them away from our children will eventually push them back into the population.”
Mr Sarnoff hopes that the letter to Governor Crist will force the state either to find some alternative place to house the sex offenders or force some form of legal action that will get the state’s courts, which are not beholden to the desires of the electorate, involved.
For the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and others like Dr Greer - who believe the offenders have already served their time in prison and deserve the right to attempt to get on with their lives - the camp’s existence and the desperate conditions there serve as a troubling reflection of the values of modern-day Miami.
“The question is - have we become a society that doesn’t let you die but let’s you suffer Do we just say we’re living in the Middle Ages - an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth” Dr Greer told me after we had finished touring the camp.
“I think we’ve gone beyond that.”
This article is an adaptation of a feature that was originally broadcast on BBC Radio 4’s Americana programme. Americana is broadcast at 1915 BST every Sunday on BBC Radio 4 FM.
Rough justice
21 June 2009
article here
A Miami law is forcing many of the city’s sex offenders to sleep rough under a bridge, reports Emilio San Pedro for the BBC’s Americana programme.
Tents set up by released sex offenders under a road bridge in Miami
The area under the Julia Tuttle Causeway in downtown Miami has in recent years become the unlikely home for a growing community of about 70 convicted sex offenders.
They have ended up living in a makeshift tent city under one of the causeway’s bridges because of a local law which prohibits those who have sexually abused minors from living within 2,500 ft (760m) of anywhere where children congregate, such as schools, libraries and parks.
After the local laws were enacted, Florida’s correctional authorities found there was virtually nowhere else for these people to live and began dropping them off at the bridge.
Some of them have even been issued driving licences with the bridge listed as their home address.
Angry
“Welcome to American justice,” said Dr Pedro Jose Greer, the Dean of Florida International University’s Department of Humanities, Health and Society, as he met me under the bridge to discuss the squalid conditions at the camp.
“We have people living together with mental and physical illnesses in an environment where people can’t possibly sleep because of the cars going by overhead - where you can smell the urine and see the trash mounting all around us.”
“This is the stupidest damn law I have ever seen and it’s purely mandated by revenge without any consideration for the well-being of these people“
Dr Pedro Greer
Campaigner
Dr Pedro Greer
Dr Greer has for decades been a leading advocate in Miami for homeless people and their right to receive adequate medical and social services.
He told me that he has become increasingly angry over the last few years at the existence of this camp and the lack of an alternative way to reintegrate these convicted sex offenders into society.
“What we’re doing is we’re saying ‘let’s take the people that we most despise, that did some of the most egregious things in society and let them all get together and not supervise them and let them wander around the community’,” he tells me with a clear sense of frustration in his voice.
“This is the stupidest damn law I have ever seen and it’s purely mandated by revenge without any consideration for the well-being of these people - who deserve better despite the severity of their crimes,” he says.
No money
As we walk around the camp, with its tents and makeshift huts, lack of running water, electricity or any form of sewage, I meet Isaias, a 35-year-old Latino and former US Marine, who has been living at the camp for over two years.
He tells me how the state authorities simply drop former offenders like him under the bridge and - as he puts it - let them fend for themselves.
“They don’t give us no water, no food, no portable toilets, no money - nothing,” he tells me.
“ I’ve only been here five days but I can’t believe these criminal conditions we live in“
Julio
Julio
Isaias - who served five years in prison for having sexual relations with a 16-year-old girl and is now out on parole - says that all that he and many of his neighbours under the bridge want is to be able to attempt to lead a normal life and move beyond their criminal past.
“I can’t live with my wife and my daughter. I would like to have a normal life and be able to become a productive member of society again, but society is not giving us that chance,” he tells me.
I then ask him if - as a father himself - if he can understand why society harbours such anger for people who have committed these sorts of crimes.
“I would understand it - yes - as a father but at the same time I cannot expect that a person who committed this kind of crime against my own child should then come out of jail and be forced to live like an animal - as we’re doing here,” he says.
A few metres away I meet Julio - a 62-year-old Cuban immigrant, who served 10 years in prison for abusing of a 12-year-old girl. He is a recent arrival at the camp and is finding it very difficult to adjust.
“The conditions here are terrible. I’ve only been here five days but I can’t believe these criminal conditions we live in. I have absolutely nothing and no-one to give me any form of assistance at all. I wonder if I’ll ever get out of here,” he concludes.
Too sensitive
The problem for people like Julio is that the serious nature of the crimes they committed makes it very difficult for them to get much sympathy from the local community or from local politicians - who for the most part have found the issue too sensitive and downright controversial to become involved.
However, earlier this month, one city of Miami commissioner, Marc Sarnoff, did just that.
With the backing of the city government, he wrote a letter to the state governor, Charlie Crist, asking him to shut the camp down.
He based that request on the fact that there is a small island that serves as a weekend park for boaters and their children that lies within the existing local boundaries.
“I’m not here to support or endorse anything with regard to sexual offenders… However, they are living in squalor“
Marc Sarnoff
City Commissioner
I met Mr Sarnoff on a recent sunny morning at a local park, where a group of boys were playing baseball with their coach.
He told me that his top priority remained protecting these children from sex offenders like the ones who lived at the camp.
“Let me be absolutely clear. I’m not here to support or endorse anything with regard to sexual offenders. They are my least bit of concern,” he tells me.
“However, they are living in squalor. I don’t think human beings will stay in that condition. They’re going to start leaving and what we thought was a good law of 2,500 ft to keep them away from our children will eventually push them back into the population.”
Mr Sarnoff hopes that the letter to Governor Crist will force the state either to find some alternative place to house the sex offenders or force some form of legal action that will get the state’s courts, which are not beholden to the desires of the electorate, involved.
For the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and others like Dr Greer - who believe the offenders have already served their time in prison and deserve the right to attempt to get on with their lives - the camp’s existence and the desperate conditions there serve as a troubling reflection of the values of modern-day Miami.
“The question is - have we become a society that doesn’t let you die but let’s you suffer Do we just say we’re living in the Middle Ages - an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth” Dr Greer told me after we had finished touring the camp.
“I think we’ve gone beyond that.”
This article is an adaptation of a feature that was originally broadcast on BBC Radio 4’s Americana programme. Americana is broadcast at 1915 BST every Sunday on BBC Radio 4 FM.
ACLU Speaks Out In Florida, Threatens Legal Action
It's about time that the ACLU and other Human Rights Organizations spoke out in defense of the homeless RFSOs living under the Julia Tuttle Causeway Bridge, in Miami, Florida. Friends of mine spent several days down there interviewing the residents and filming them, last week. There is a documentary coming soon.
http://www.aclufl.org/news_events/?action=viewRelease&emailAlertID=3748
Homeless Sex Offenders Under Julia Tuttle Bridge Continue to Be Targeted by State, Local Law Enforcement
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
June 2, 2009
CONTACT:
ACLU of Florida Media Office: 786.363.2737 or media@aclufl.org
The following statement can be attributed to Jeanne Baker, ACLU of Florida Board President:
"State and local communities, including Miami and Miami Dade County and other local communities have enacted residency restrictions that impermissibly exceed state law. Governor Crist and the Florida Legislature have repeatedly ignored requests from the ACLU and others to address this growing crisis. Instead, the Governor and Legislature have turned a blind eye to the impact of this public health and safety threat to our community.
"Now, the State and local communities point their fingers at each other in an attempt to shift blame. This is a statewide problem, and the Julia Tuttle Causeway is only the most graphic example. We need a state-wide solution, and sadly, the Governor remains AWOL.
"While the best solution would be intervention by the Governor, the ACLU and other advocacy groups are prepared to seek a solution through the courts."
2009 Press Releases
http://www.aclufl.org/news_events/?action=viewRelease&emailAlertID=3748
Homeless Sex Offenders Under Julia Tuttle Bridge Continue to Be Targeted by State, Local Law Enforcement
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
June 2, 2009
CONTACT:
ACLU of Florida Media Office: 786.363.2737 or media@aclufl.org
The following statement can be attributed to Jeanne Baker, ACLU of Florida Board President:
"State and local communities, including Miami and Miami Dade County and other local communities have enacted residency restrictions that impermissibly exceed state law. Governor Crist and the Florida Legislature have repeatedly ignored requests from the ACLU and others to address this growing crisis. Instead, the Governor and Legislature have turned a blind eye to the impact of this public health and safety threat to our community.
"Now, the State and local communities point their fingers at each other in an attempt to shift blame. This is a statewide problem, and the Julia Tuttle Causeway is only the most graphic example. We need a state-wide solution, and sadly, the Governor remains AWOL.
"While the best solution would be intervention by the Governor, the ACLU and other advocacy groups are prepared to seek a solution through the courts."
2009 Press Releases
Monday, May 25, 2009
Registered Former Sex Offenders
One thing that it is important to do is to emphasize that while at one time a Sex Offense was committed that it is in the past. So when talking or writing about the Registry and other Sex Offender Issues it is vital that we use the word Former. These laws punish people for something that was done in the past not something that is happening now. It calls attention to the fact that a change has happened. Every time you say Registered Sex Offender it tells the listeners mind that it is on going. A horrible image is projected and the listener already has made up their mind to not empathize with our cause. But insert the word Former and it changes the perception of the listener. It's a small change granted but it will make a big impact in the long run.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Pink Triangles and Swastikas
Pink Triangles and Swastikas
R. L. Gregory
“Those who would sacrifice liberty in the name of safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
Benjamin Franklin 1759
When Adolph Hitler came to power in 1933, one of his earliest acts was to see amended and enforced certain existing provisions of the German penal code. Between 1933 and 1936, the Nazi regime mandated that Paragraphs 173 through 188 be expanded, modified, or added, criminalizing homosexuality as well as all other “unnatural” and “sexually deviant” behaviors. enforce
When read today, those paragraphs bear an eerie similarity to “Megan’s Law”, the initial mandate establishing Sexual Offender Registries. The law implemented by the Third Reich instituted the first sexual offender registry. It mandated that convicted offenders wear pink triangles to alert their communities, and established severe penalties for conviction which included disenfranchisement, lengthy prison sentences, confinement in concentration camps, or execution. From a contemporary perspective, perhaps the most disturbing aspect of the German code was the reasoning behind it: to protect children and the community. “The state must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the people,” Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf. “As long as the government is perceived as working for the benefit of the children, the people will happily endure almost any curtailment of liberty and almost any deprivation.” i
The sexual offender registries of the computer era are enormously more effective and global than those of the Third Reich. A few mouse clicks, and an individual in Sidney, Australia can determine the name, home address and workplace of every sexual offender in Indianapolis, without (most terrifyingly) ever revealing his or her own identity or even the reason for seeking such information. It was just this ease of access and global availability of the offender registries that two years ago permitted a young Canadian citizen to randomly download the information on 34 offenders in Maine and murder two of them before committing suicide. Government’s failure to even include such vigilantism within the text of hate-crime laws sends a clear message that these murders are of minimal importance. Worse, the accruing collateral damage in the deaths of innocent spouses and family members at the hands of vigilantes has resulted in the destruction of the very innocent lives that the registries were intended to protect.
Primarily responsible for this 21st century witch hunt are politicians and the media. Recycling outdated statistics and inciting public hysteria about sex offenders galvanizes voters and attracts viewers and readers. Unfortunately, just as the rare serial killer focuses public attention toward murderers in general, the rare violent pedophile skews public perception of the actual behaviors, chances of recidivism, and treatment potential of sexual offenders. U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics found that all sex offender rearrrest rate for new sex crimes against a child was only 2.2%.ii Treatment of non-violent sexual offenders demonstrates a 90 to 93% overall success rate.iii Ninety-six percent of all child sexual offenses are perpetrated not by strangers, but by a member of the victim’s own family.iv And in the 12 years since the initiation of the first Megan’s Law, no empirical data has been demonstrated showing a slowing in the rate of sexual offenses nationwide.
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) devotes 45 pages to psycho-sexual behaviors.v Many of these behaviors carry criminal liability. Yet for no other classification of psychosis is the patient’s right to medical privacy abrogated by publication on a global registry. Citizens who would sue for HIPAA violations if an employer questioned their medical appointments do not scruple to Web-cast the bitter details of mental illness to which a offender’s behavior may be ascribed. The saddest part of this debacle is that many of these psycho-sexual disorders are attributable to the offender having been him or herself victimized during childhood. Because society failed in protecting them, they become as they are. Before sinning, they were first sinned against.
But rational response is lost in the socially-acceptable demonizing of an entire segment of the human population. At least one locality is already considering a “sexual offenders only” zone, a restricted area which would be the only residential option for released offenders. Sadly, it will not be difficult to find a name for such a zone; the names already exist, branded by shame into the pages of history: The Warsaw Ghetto. Manzanar. Auschwitz. Tule Lake. Dachau. The public parks of Plainfield could, perhaps, locate some antique signs, much like those illustrated in the Anne Frank section of the Children’s Museum: “Nein Juden”. It will only be necessary to cross out one word.
Louder voices have begun calling for the establishment of other registries for every type of crime, violent or otherwise. No longer need the public be burdened by the notion that those who have paid their debt to society by imprisonment and fines, or begun to recover sanity through therapy and medication, dare walk among us again as though human, or entitled to the same governmental protections as other citizens. Marked by the pink triangle of the registries, they will be separated from society in residency requirements, job opportunities and civil rights: separate, and in all ways unequal.
It is doubtful that Hitler could have persuaded the German people to conspire in the wholesale extermination of Jews, gypsies, and the mentally ill had he not first paved the way by disenfranchising and demonizing an entire class of human beings. Just as constant exposure to violence desensitizes an individual to brutality, vilifying a complete segment of humanity in the name of safety promises that the public will not long protest harsher measures directed to ever-increasing groups.
By following Hitler’s example, state, federal and local governments and the media have set their feet firmly onto the path ground to dust beneath the heels of Nazi boots. Or, to paraphrase Franklin, we the people who choose safety over the civil rights of the full populace will likely soon have neither.
i Houghton Miflin, New York: Hutchinson Publ. Ltd., London, 1943 Page 403
ii National Center on Institutions and Alternatives, Inc. Blatimore, Maryland 21244 January, 2006 “Sex Offenses: Facts, Fictions and Policy Implications”
iii“Sex Offender Treatment Works” February 20, 2005 Crime Policy
iv Child Sexual Abuse I: An Overview [url=http://www.advocates]http://www.advocates[/url] for youth.org/PUBLICATIONS/factsheet/fsabuse2.htm
v American Pyschiatric Association: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Washington, DC American Psychiatric Association, 1994, Pages 493 -538
Monday, May 18, 2009
Fight???
This was posted in response to a question posted on a forum I belong to. The question asked was what one question would you ask the people living under the Julia Tuttle Bridge in Miami, Florida. Residency restrictions have forced many to move under the bridge because they have no place left they can live. While I might not have used some of these words it does raise some of what I have been thinking. Sometimes when I am talking to people both former offenders and families I get the response that we're just trying to keep a low profile. My concern is if we don't stand up and speak out that we all will find ourselves either homeless or living in internment camps. So as you read this ask yourself these questions, what will YOU answer?
"I'm sure I'm going to piss a few people off this this, but my question would simply be "Why do you choose to live here in these conditions?" I would then further elaborate that they have the choice to fight, and I mean fight. If you are ran out of your home then fight. If you are persecuted then fight. If you are ripped from your family, then fight. Either fight for yourself or fight for your family or fight out of principal. I hear more and more people being exiled under the bridge, yet I hear only a vague few voices ever saying anything. This is what the hell is wrong with sex offenders...th ey take it, roll over and let the man stomp their testicles some more. For shits sake, back in the day people fought, they protested, they did what it took to ensure their freedoms were there, what happened since then. If old Paul Revere hadn't said, "You know, screw them Brits, I'm in the fight" and cowered somewhere, how different or war for independence could have turned out. What if Jefferson had bowed out of writing the constitution because he was afraid of the crown? We'd still be a English colony today. So those men, persecuted, punished, beaten, stood up and fought for independence and freedom, why can't sex offenders?!?
And this is the question I ask Florida Government: "Who the hell are you to extinguish the freedoms of American men and women and spit on the blood my family split on foreign lands to protect that freedom?"
If these fascist pigs want a fight, we should be ready to give them one. What does that say about us when we allow these travesties to occur in the first place. How unpatriotic are we that we would sit and cower because we refuse to stand in fight, to refuse to rock the boat. Are we that weak, that much of cowards that we would prefer to allow our freedoms, our liberties to be taken away than to fight?
Ask yourself that question, see what the answer really is. No bullshit cognitive distorting, no victimizing, be honest with yourself and see what answer lies there!"
written by Blackrouge, used with permission
"I'm sure I'm going to piss a few people off this this, but my question would simply be "Why do you choose to live here in these conditions?" I would then further elaborate that they have the choice to fight, and I mean fight. If you are ran out of your home then fight. If you are persecuted then fight. If you are ripped from your family, then fight. Either fight for yourself or fight for your family or fight out of principal. I hear more and more people being exiled under the bridge, yet I hear only a vague few voices ever saying anything. This is what the hell is wrong with sex offenders...th ey take it, roll over and let the man stomp their testicles some more. For shits sake, back in the day people fought, they protested, they did what it took to ensure their freedoms were there, what happened since then. If old Paul Revere hadn't said, "You know, screw them Brits, I'm in the fight" and cowered somewhere, how different or war for independence could have turned out. What if Jefferson had bowed out of writing the constitution because he was afraid of the crown? We'd still be a English colony today. So those men, persecuted, punished, beaten, stood up and fought for independence and freedom, why can't sex offenders?!?
And this is the question I ask Florida Government: "Who the hell are you to extinguish the freedoms of American men and women and spit on the blood my family split on foreign lands to protect that freedom?"
If these fascist pigs want a fight, we should be ready to give them one. What does that say about us when we allow these travesties to occur in the first place. How unpatriotic are we that we would sit and cower because we refuse to stand in fight, to refuse to rock the boat. Are we that weak, that much of cowards that we would prefer to allow our freedoms, our liberties to be taken away than to fight?
Ask yourself that question, see what the answer really is. No bullshit cognitive distorting, no victimizing, be honest with yourself and see what answer lies there!"
written by Blackrouge, used with permission
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