Posted on 07/20/2005 5:06:58 AM PDT by DogByte6RER
Reign in sex offenders
By: Rick Reiss - For the North County Times
Recent child abduction-murders have riveted national attention again on the problem of convicted sex offenders. In Florida, Jessica Lunsford was kidnapped, abused and buried alive by a repeat sex offender. An Idaho girl was recently freed from a serial sex offender. This pedophile now stands accused of kidnapping, sexual abuse and the murder of the girl's Idaho family.
Closer to home, outraged San Diegans protested the planned release of sex offender Douglas Badger to their community. The District Attorney's Office successfully prevented the release of Badger, for now. Badger's psychologist filed a favorable recommendation to the court but was compromised by a personal relationship with another convicted sex offender.
In Riverside County, residents in Mead Valley have been staging protests against a nearby halfway house that is home to an assortment of convicted sex offenders. Fuelling these protests was news that David Allyn Dokich resides at this home for deviants. Dokich was convicted of forceably assaulting two teenage girls yet spent only half of his 35-year sentence in prison.
It's frequently said that the government that responds best to the people is local government. There is much truth in this, as San Diego County and Riverside County officials responded quickly by challenging the release of criminal perverts to our communities. It is our government at the state level that has broken down.
It's apparent that many California state legislators simply prefer catch-and-release programs for rapists and pedophiles. A few months ago, state Senate Democrats buried Senate Bill 722 requiring lifetime monitoring of convicted sex offenders with Global Positioning Systems. This bill mirrors the recently enacted Florida law named after murdered Jessica Lunsford.
Other failed bills in the Legislature include SB 43 which would require posting offenders convicted of child pornography on the Megan's Law Web site and SB 277, which would prohibit paroled sex offenders from living within 1 1/2 miles of a park, playground or school.
These seem like pretty common sense measures. But not to recalcitrant Democrats who seem more interested in doing the bidding of the ACLU.
Many California legislators have to be dragged kicking and screaming by outraged parents and citizens to enact tougher laws against criminal sexual predators. After years of lobbying, Sacramento grudgingly approved a Megan's Law database on the Internet. Public outrage that 137 sex offenders received Viagra prescriptions through Medi-Cal quickly terminated that program.
What is missing from Sacramento is the vision and innovation to enact tough criminal statutes dealing with these predators. Instead of setting the tone for the rest of the nation, California now simply drags its feet and enacts weakened versions of sex offender laws pioneered elsewhere. Sacramento hug-a-thug politicians only endanger our society.
In the meantime, an abandoned prison sits out at Eagle Mountain. Why not relocate the Mead Valley halfway house to this site?
Like hitting two jailbirds with one stone, Mead Valley residents could sleep at night while Riverside County could assess utilizing this dormant prison for county inmates. It's a start.
Rick Reiss of Temecula is a regular columnist for The Californian. E-mail: RickReiss6@netscape.net.
Terrific.
Is it too much to ask headline writers (yes, I checked: it's on the source) to find the correct spelling of the word they mean to use? As it's written, it means "rule in sex offenders". I believe they wanted "Rein in sex offenders", which would mean to control or restrain them.
A small thing? Not when English is already at risk in this country.
Of course, the ACLU, who almost certainly has a NAMBLA member on its board of directors, would scream bloody murder.
Petition to the Governor, anyone?
Mediots.
You will note that this category of "sex offenders" includes mere gropers of adult women and not just pedophiles and rapists. Do they deserve lifetime monitoring too, or shouldn't we be simply throwing away the key on the real monsters?
My preference is to make the psychologists who say that sexual predators are safe to release criminally liable if they are wrong. There is a whole industry of these "criminal therapists" subsisting off the damage these thugs do. It's time to make that professional option wildly unpopular.
Guess this shoots down the theory that with a spell-checker anyone can be an editor! At least they're not (yet) "raining" sex offenders in California.
Kill them.
Fine, if YOU pay for it.
HERE'S an idea:
Been to Santa Cruz lately?
Yes.
When I was a young newly married man I was on the receiving end of obscene phone calls from a woman. As far as I am concerned she was a "sex offender". Not violent, just annoying when it went on for months and usually in the middle of the night.
After the first few times, when the novelty wore off I begin to think she should get the death penalty for waking me up.
I was blessed with an English teacher for a mother, which cursed me to be constantly irritated by the grammar of others.
If only their dead innocent victims (or loved ones) were able to at the time of the attack.
Compassion for the guilty is treason to the innocent.
That would work. (I think they mean "rein in.")
Throw in the irresponsible judges that release the bastards and I'm with you 100%.
Therefore the question is how do we deal with them after the fact. Incarceration and death will not stop the new weed crop each year.
Society will not allow expedient death to the sick killer in Idaho. His death would not deter one pervert but it would at the very least save society a lot of money and we would be assured he would never do it again.
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