Sex offenders: They live among us
11.11.2009, 19:23
When they leave prison, convicted sex offenders are supposed to tell the state where they're living. It's called community notification and it's meant to protect the public.
Szállodák Prága, szállás London, szálloda Bécs, szálláshelyek Róma
But last year more than 1,000 of Alabama's roughly 6,000 registered sex offenders didn't say a word about their whereabouts, and local law enforcement officials don't have the funds or manpower to track them down.
Alabama tried to help last fall by toughening the law on offenders who don't register, according to the head of the state's sex registry, but many sex offenders either don't know about the changes or just don't care.
The difficulties in tracking sex offenders came to the forefront last week when Chilton County officials found none of the six sex offenders registered to a Verbena address actually lived in the small home. One has been arrested; the others are being sought.
It was Brandie Sansom, a Chilton County resident who drives past the house every day, who informed authorities there might be a problem.
"Are we monitoring these sexual offenders on (a) periodic (basis) to ensure they are continuing to reside at the registered address?" Sansom asked in a letter to Attorney General Troy King.
King understands Sansom's concern. He pushed for strengthening the law but points out the law itself is based "on an honor system for the most dishonorable people among us."
More and more states are getting tough on sex offenders, so tough that in some communities sex offenders have nowhere to live in compliance with their local laws, according to the Center for Sex Offender Management, a nonprofit organization funded by the Justice Department.
"If individuals have nowhere to live, how do you locate them?" said Charles Onley, a research associate with the center. "It probably will become a bigger problem as residency restrictions become tougher."
Tougher rules
Changes to the Alabama law went into effect in October. Now, all sex offenders verify their address every six months instead of once a year and they must notify officials in a jurisdiction not only when they move in but also when they move out.
Those who don't comply can be charged with a felony, which carries a prison sentence of up to 10 years, rather than with a misdemeanor, which calls for a $500 fine and up to a year in a county jail.
Also, convicted pedophiles must wear ankle bracelets for 10 years after their release so they can be tracked with a global positioning system. The system costs $8 to $10 a day for each offender, who has to pay as much as he or she can afford, King said. It costs about $28 a day to house a prisoner, he said.
Many sex offenders, though, are unaware of the change, said Sandra Johnson, who supervises the Alabama Department of Public Safety's sex registry and tracks compliance.
"I think as you see some of them convicted on felony charges, then you're going to see a difference," she said. "I think they'll start to take this law more serious."
Still, it's ultimately up to local authorities to track sex offenders, and they're struggling to enforce the law because of the costs involved.
It takes money to pay for deputies to check up on offenders and to mail out the notification fliers required by state law, said Autauga County Sheriff Herbie Johnson.
Autauga County is home to 48 registered sex offenders, according to the state registry. Elmore County is home to 67, and Montgomery County is home to 198. There are 503 sex offenders statewide whose addresses are unknown.
"I don't have the manpower to go to every address of every registered sex offender in the county and make sure they still live there," Johnson said. "When we get a complaint or we have reason to believe something is going on, then I'll send a deputy out to check on things. We have a real good relationship with landlords in the county. If they rent to a sex offender and that person is no longer in the house, usually they will call us and we will check it out."
Autauga County has 25 deputies and Elmore County has 31. These smaller departments have only four to six deputies per shift. Their duties include patrol work, transferring prisoners for court appearances, serving court papers and providing court security.
"We're a medium-sized department, and it's hard on us," said Montgomery County Sheriff D.T. Marshal, who has 118 deputies. "I don't know how the smaller departments handle it."
Loopholes
It may become more difficult for sex offenders to slip off the radar screen now that they also have to tell officials when they move out of the community.
"They might have registered with a sheriff in another county after a move, but they didn't have to tell us," said Elmore County Sheriff Bill Franklin. "As a consequence, we had names in our book, and we didn't know where they had gone."
Growth in Autauga and Elmore counties also creates situations where new residents aren't told that a sex offender lives near them.
"We could have sent out letters three years ago on a man that might have had 10 houses in the 2,000-square-feet notification area," Franklin said. "Well, now there's a 75-house subdivision going in across the road from the sex offender. We only send out notification when the sex offender sets up residence. Those 75 houses don't know what's across the street."
Brittany Dixon of Wetumpka wonders why the law is on the books if it's so easily foiled.
"What good does it do?" she asked.
The decade-old system may not be perfect, Johnson says, but it does create awareness.
"Now you can go to (the Alabama Bureau of Investigation) and look up who is in your area. You can come to my office, or the police department, and look through our books," he said. "A lot of schools and city halls have the notification letters on bulletin boards where the public can see them. Even with the potential problems, things are a lot better now than 10 years ago."
During the next budget year, Franklin and Johnson are going to seek additional manpower to handle sex offender issues.
"Sex offenders have become big business," Franklin said. "I can have one man whose duties only include handling sex offenders. He can keep up with the changes in the law and all the forms. That will also give us a chance to go out and audit some of these addresses, so we can make sure the sex offenders are staying where they are supposed to stay."