Posted on 04/18/2008 8:41:56 PM PDT by Clint Williams
Kimberly Coulter remembers riding her bike all over St. Paul’s east side as a kid, not a worry on her mind.
These days she’s a Cottage Grove mother of two, and though she says she feels safe raising her kids in their quiet neighborhood near Grey Cloud Elementary School, Coulter said the knowledge a convicted sex offender lives nearby leaves her wary of letting her 10- and 12-year-old even go around the block.
“It’s scary,†she said after last week’s public forum on sexual predators hosted by the Cottage Grove Police Department at Cottage Grove Junior High.
Coulter said she “was shocked†to learn 45 convicted sex offenders reside in her hometown, but officials Thursday night told the 40-or-so residents gathered it wasn’t the predators the state knows about that are most worrisome. The state of Minnesota has “built a wall†to protect citizens from convicted predatory offenders, said Bill Donnay of the Minnesota Department of Corrections.
“Unfortunately, most of the threat to the state of Minnesota is not from known sex offenders,†he said. “We built the wall; the wall is working. But the threat is inside the wall.â€
Representatives from the department of corrections, the Jacob Wetterling Foundation and Human Services, Inc., worked Thursday to make parents more aware of what they can do to help prevent sexual abuse — whether through monitoring their kids on Internet chat rooms, knowing the adults they spend their time around or recognizing the signs of abusers or the abused.
Karen Hogendorf, a victim intervention and recovery program supervisor with Human Services, Inc., said cell phones, chat rooms and Internet pornography are all relatively new problems for parents to deal with — and with technology-savvy youngsters it can be hard to know kids are safe.
But oftentimes, Donnay said, it’s not strangers — over the World Wide Web or in the flesh — perpetrating the sexual abuse. Department of Corrections statistics show 90 percent of sex offense victims know the offender, whether it’s family, a friend or an acquaintance.
And while worried adults wondered why predatory offenders can live near schools, Donnay said 90 percent of sex offenses are committed by first-time offenders.
“It’s social proximity, not geographic proximity,†he said, “that leads to sexual abuse.â€
So, though it’s important to know what threats are out there, said Alison Feigh, a child safety specialist with the Jacob Wetterling foundation, knowing what to look for and how to talk to your children is critical.
Some red-flags to watch for in adults spending time near your children, Feigh said, are: adults who are overly interested in the sexual development of a child, an adult who is always offering to baby-sit many different children or one who spends most of their time with children and has little interest in spending time with peers.
Parents should screen all caregivers, make unannounced visits to their child’s activities, pay attention to behavioral changes and mood swings, and — most important of all, she said — trust their instincts.
Be aware, Feigh said, of “the uh-oh feeling.â€
Linda Fliss, a Cottage Grove mother of two, said she agreed parents need to take on responsibility for keeping their kids safe from predators. Fliss said she wasn’t surprised to learn of the number of offenders living in Cottage Grove.
“I used to work with offenders, so I’ve always known they’re out there,†she said.
What parents need to do, she said, is help spread the word about suspicious activity in their neighborhoods.
“We need to keep each other informed, help each other out,†Fliss said.
Fliss mentioned an e-mail circulated among parents about an offender living near Grey Cloud Elementary, saying it was the community “bonding, coming together.â€
Officials stressed, though, it’s important to allow convicted sex offenders the opportunity to re-integrate into society. Harassing a convicted offender now out of prison isn’t constructive, public safety officials said Thursday.
Predatory offenders may have been guilty, but “sex offenders have rights, too,†said officer Gwen Martin of the Cottage Grove Police Department. “We can’t vote them off the island, we can’t put them into exile.â€
But Coulter was shocked residents weren’t made aware of every offender living in the city — the public is notified only of predatory offenders assessed to be of the highest risk to re-offend.
“I’m surprised you’re not made aware,†she said. “I understand they have a right to move on, but it’s scary.â€
He's selling off your safety for his re-election.
I think there is a misleading spin on this. A lot of sex offenses are committed by Mommy’s live-in boyfriend. Also, a lot of “sex offenses” are committed by drunken college girl’s drunken boyfriend. Two married people with a young daughter probably SHOULD focus their concerns on the level-3 sex offenders who live in their neighborhood. Those strangers probably ARE the biggest threats.
I agree, especially on the drunken college kids bit... there must be dozens, if not hundreds, of “sex offenses” committed on a given campus every weekend night by drunk partygoers alone. Also, I have a feeling that lots of “sex offenses” also are things like 18-year-old boys with 16-year-old girlfriends, or vice versa, when there’s no Romeo and Juliet clause in the state sex laws... then let’s not forget the small children who are labelled as “sex offenders” because they did something like smack a classmate on the butt...
how can anyone be sure that a sex crime is a "first offense"?...who would really admit that they molested someone or raped someone before they actually got caught...????....nobody would admit to earlier crimes....
btw....the law doesn't differentiate between raping someone when you or they are drunk or not drunk....just like the law doesn't differentiate or excuse you plowing into someone in an intersection just because you are "plowed" yourself....
it is harder to prove rape if the victim is willingly drinking, but that is simply a legal point.....it doesn't change the facts in many cases....
Isn’t this axiomatic? Since each sex offender had a first victim, and some lesser number had a second victim, and some still lesser number had a third victim, etc.
It’s like the statistc that most car accidents happen within five miles from the house. Well, yeah, since every car trip starting from home - which is nearly all of them - includes the range within one mile from the home. Then some lesser number of trips extends to two miles, then three miles, etc.
Fathers and mothers used to self-police their own kids....they used to teach manners and politeness....
but we still have some who defend harrasment in school...
I wonder about the “most offenses by first time offenders” line. Could most offenses be by first timers because we’ve finally been locking away offenders so long that those who’ve been jailed aren’t out to commit enough repeat offenses to skew the data?
I’m not talking about crude remarks or anything really sexual, but more along the lines of the very small children who get in trouble for things that they don’t comprehend as being wrong unless they’re told because they have no concept of sexuality as of yet (hopefully) - I’m thinking along the lines of that kindergarten kid who got disciplined because he told his teacher a classmate liked to look at the teacher’s butt, not a middle-schooler who’s just discovered that his female classmates’ bra straps are snappable or that slapping a girls’ butt is seen as ‘manly’ (and if I had a child, which thankfully I do not, I would do everything in my power to ensure that he/she did not behave in such a manner). Admittedly, such cases make up a very small percentage of the total, but they’re still classified as ‘first-time sex offenders’.
I hesitate when reading articles like this anymore, because there is sometimes a distortion not mentioned.
Lots of the people on the “sex offender” registry are *not* there for offenses against children and rape. Many are registered for things like public urination and groping strippers. Registration is for life, so numbers get twisted.
By lumping them in with dangerous sexual offenders that pray on children, it both exaggerates the real problem and makes parents unnecessarily fearful. A previously drunk frat boy is most likely nowhere near the risk of a serial child molester, even if they are both “sex offenders.”
Okay, is it just me or everyone thinks that ALL of the sex offenders SHOULD be first time offenders? They shouldn’t be given any second changes to re-offend in the first place.
When they say “first time offender”, I think they mean that they have never been prosecuted before.
I don’t think they mean that they’ve never done it before, because what I’ve seen consistently is that the average offender offends X number of times before they get caught.
I would like a statistician to look at this. Could there be another way to look at it? Such as most people convicted are convicted with no prior? Doesn’t mean they haven’t been busy for perhaps decades, just that they were finally caught, after managing to go undetected for a while.
GREAT post.
Google (or Dogpile) "U.S. Department of Judicial Statistics". You'll find LOTS of material by statisticians.
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