Justice Louis Brandeis once remarked—“The greatest threat to liberty will come from government officials claiming to be acting for noble purposes.”

Children live everywhere and all these laws do is push this one type of offender to another legislators jurisdiction. In essence lawmakers are playing with minds of people in society.

Eventually offenders of all types must live somewhere. Pushing them from here to there actually is dumb, because, for each move they are not registered for a period of time legally.

Whose fault is that, the lawmakers that are pushing them from here to there. Forget the fact that many will eventually stop registering, think only of the simple logic of it takes time to move, and during that period (which the law must allow for) they are not where they were registered.

So if monitoring them is the goal, what is causing them to NOT BE monitored? NIBISM, yes, not in my back yard thinking.

Lawmakers want to look good to their constituents and that is their only purpose, stay in office. Clearly this is not an answer nor is it protecting children.

Remember, in Georgia, in the Barrios case, their NIMBISM laws pushed all those offenders into one small area, then in that area the child of a registered sex offender, was killed by a family of two registered sex offenders.

That is the result of these types of laws.
Rob

we know it’s you

To tell you the truth, I think Greg Ball sounded a little like Don Imus with his comments. That tape will be around for years to come, I am sure when Mr. Ball runs for Congress against John Hall that his actions in that video will haunt him.

Greg Ball is an egomanic and the people in his district will see the real Greg Ball soon enough.

Greg will self explode, he can not control himself, give him enough rope and lets watch the show.

By Matt.

I keep posting irrelevent links in a sad attempt to change the topic… boo hoo two

I spent 20+ hours a day on a computer and I have no social life… boo hoo three

so, the next time I post this video please, please, please…

Pitty Me…

1. Think out the practical implications of these laws. On the surface these laws seems to make sense. Some have described them as “no-brainers�, and lawmakers often pass them without really giving them much thought. You need to think about the practical implications of this law. If you pass this law, where in your community are former offenders going to live? I would imagine that the other residents who live in those areas outside of the buffer zones might be concerned about all the sex offenders who start moving into their neighborhoods. These laws also have a domino effect. if you pass this law, the surrounding communities are likely to do the same.

The state that has had the most experience with these laws is Iowa. They have a statewide residency law. It has been such a disaster that the Iowa association of county prosecutors has petitioned the legislature to repeal the law. Some former offenders are sleeping in their cars and under bridges. This makes no one safer. There was recently a story in the news about one former offender who kisses his wife and kids goodnight and leaves their home each night because it is in a buffer zone. He goes and sleeps in a motel outside a buffer zone. More former offenders are choosing not to register because they can’t find any place to live. Law enforcement now has no idea where they are. The Iowa prosecutors and sheriffs are telling the legislature that these laws make the community less safe, not more safe.
Studies have been done in Colorado and Minnesota which found that there is no relation between sex offender recidivism and proximity to school.

2. Look at the numbers. The common view is that the recidivism rate is high among sex offenders. It is not. Between 1985 and 2001 a total of 11,898 sex offenders were released from New York State prisons. Only 253 of these (2.1%) were returned to prison for new sex crimes within three years of their release. (2001 Releases: Three Year Post Release Follow-up, State of New York Department of Correctional Services, p. 18).

In 2003, The U.S. Department of Justice issued a report, Recidivism of Sex Offenders Released from Prison in 1994. Its findings: “In 1994, prisons in 15 States released 9,691 male sex offenders. The 9,691 men are two-thirds of all the male sex offenders released from State prisons in the United States in 1994. This report summarizes findings from a survey that tracked the 9,691 for 3 full years after their release… Within the first 3 years following their release from prison in 1994, 5.3% (517 of the 9,691) of released sex offenders were rearrested for a sex crime… Of the 9,691 released sex offenders, 3.5% (339 of the 9,691) were reconvicted for a sex crime within the 3-year followup period.

Approximately 95% of new sex crimes are committed by people other than registered sex offenders. Some of you may have seen the Dateline “To Catch a Predator� shows. Out of over 200 perpetrators who were caught in this sting, only 4 were registered sex offenders.

We are most concerned about the horrible crimes that have been committed by strangers against children. These are very rare. According to a report of the U.S. Department of Justice 93% of sex crimes against children are within the family or committed by adults whom the children know well. The proposed law will do nothing to prevent these crimes.

3. Reason it out. The logic of these laws is that we will make our children safer by preventing former sex offenders from sleeping at night near where children spend their days. Does this make sense? Consider too that children are well supervised and guarded in schools. Have you ever heard of a registered sex offender invading a school and victimizing a child? There was the recent horrible case of the man who went into the Amish school and murdered the children. He was not a registered sex offender. He lived more than 1,500 feet from the school. This law prevents no one from hopping in a car and driving to a school.

4. Think about families. All offenders are not single men living alone. Many committed their crimes ten or more years ago and have since rebuilt productive lives. Many have families. These laws also force wives and children to move or force the family to break up. As mentioned above, a good number of these crimes are committed within the family. Sometimes the family chooses to remain together. Often these laws re-victimize the victim. They force the victim to move from the community as well as the offender.

5. To sum it up. Consider these words of Carolyn Atwell-Davis, director of legislative affairs for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children: “Our concern is that these laws may give a false sense of security. We’re not aware of any evidence that residency restrictions have prevented a child from being victimized.”

I mentioned earlier that the Iowa prosecutors had petitioned the legislature to repeal their law. To be honest, the legislature has not yet voted to repeal this law. These are very difficult laws to vote against because legislators are afraid that they will be perceived as being soft on sex offenders or as not wanting to protect children. But listen to the Iowa prosecutors! A vote against these laws is a vote for safer communities.

More information and supporting documents may be found at http://www.theparson.net/so

the fact is that most sex crimes are committed by a relative, friend, or someone already known and trusted. “stranger danger” is primarily a myth.

politicians can blather on and on about protecting children with registries and exclusion zones, but consider that any member of the bloods, crips, ms 13, or any other criminal enterprise may in fact live next door to you now and can continue to do so regardless of their convictions, time served, or propensity for repeating their offense. should we list them on registries and have exclusion zones too? how far do we go with this silliness?

you want to protect the kids? fine. i agree. be a better, more involved parent. educate your kids. check their internet activity. monitor where they go and with whom. in short, get your head out of the sand and stop trying to use the SO registry and these inane and largely unenforceable laws as a bullet proof vest, because they arent and never will be.

It is outrageous that these people continue to put politics ahead of our children’s safety.

We already know that we can’t count on Andy Spano to protect us from violent criminals and sex offenders – it would be nice if the county board would step up and do it.

Ball has co-sponsored civil confienement, budget reform, ethics reform, and workers comp. ALL HAVE BEEN PASSED BY THE ASSEMBLY.

Next, Ball was the prime co sposnor on legislation to deport illegal alien inmates, and he fought hard for it’s passage. That TOO PASSED.

He also worked with concerned members in Putnam County to spearhead Child Safety Zones and that has passed in the legislature. He is now pushing for it’s passage in Westchester.

He has also doubled the amount of grant money to the district in one year, and served as a serious voice for reform on dozens of issues…

a voice that this state, and this district, has NEVER had.

Those are the facts.

Do not be fooled by Greg Ball.

Thank you for working hard. I apologize for posting that video above; it has nothing to do with this discussion and folks should not pay any attention to that.

Assemblymen Spano & Ball care about our kids and our families and I want to thank them for standing tall.

What kind of a leader would ask another man who he disagrees with; “Were you molested as a child�.

Listen to the video tape closely and you will hear the real Greg Ball.

Go to http://www.lohud.com/flash/ball/index.html to view the video.