# What happens when a convicted child molester has children?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [January 29, 2005, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261 "2005-01-29T08:26:22Z")
**Posts on this page:** 18
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@SpartanDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpartanDC)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/21 "2005-01-29T19:28:38Z")
> [@jester21](#):
>
> The media and police whould have you think that it’s near 100%.
Though to give credit where credit is due, that New York Times Magazine article alluded to earlier did say the recidivism rate was only 17 percent. Unfortunately, local newscasts love to do their semi-annual “How many people in YOUR zip code are on the SOR???” story, in which they gloss over such facts, nor do they bother to mention that some of the people on the list could have been a 20-year-old who got caught with a 17-year-old.
As for the OP… when the sentence is done, it’s done. Though there is an argument to be made that people who commit any crime against children, violent or sexual, might want to be watched for a bit even after serving time.
---
### Author:  [@Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harriet_the_Spry)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/22 "2005-01-29T19:53:07Z")
My husband was once responsible for developing the sexual harassment policy for our church. Nothing sordid had happened, but legally speaking pretty much any employer should have a sexual harassment policy and a recent local case (not involving children) at another church had brought the issue to the forefront.
Where this relates to the OP is that one question his committee had to addess was a question raised “How do we keep the person out of church after the incident?” Since I work in HR my husband asked my advice about a few things related to the policy. I explained this was a situation very different from an employer. It does not change the fact that a church is a “hospital for sinnners rather than a museum for saints.” My guidance for them was to make sure the congregation understood that, and that IF there were a problem of reoffense it should be handled by law enforcement, not church policy. While a criminal background check could be applied to any paid or volunteer positions, there really shouldn’t be a sin that keeps you out of the congregation.
Switching gears, I am skeptical of anybody’s statistics on recidivism. These are some of the least likely crimes to be reported or lead to a conviction. Also, if you are talking about hiring someone to work at a daycare center, is even a 17% recidivism rate for a convicted child molester acceptably LOW?
If someone has a link to a good discussion of the statistics, I’d be interested. I think most of us would NOT be interested in Googling the topic…
---
### Author:  [@KGS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KGS)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/23 "2005-01-29T20:23:44Z")
A schoolteacher gets arrested for molesting several of his students. After he’s released on bail, his lawyer informs him that his own children have been placed in protective custody.
“Why on earth are you taking my children away??” the teacher demands to know.
The lawyer explains, “Since you’ve been indicted on several counts of molesting other people’s children, it’s reasonable to believe you may be abusing your own kids as well.”
“No way! I would never do that!”
“Why not?”
“Because,” the teacher says, _“incest is immoral!”_
(ba-dum-bomp)
---
### Author:  [@Metacom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Metacom)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/24 "2005-01-29T21:19:43Z")
> [@threemae](#):
>
> Huh, that’s interesting. I was under the impression that the exact opposite was true. Could you please point me towards some statistics/research in this?
Sure. The following quotes are all from statistics compiled by the [Bureau of Justice Statistics](http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/) while under the direction of John Ashcroft, so they hopefully should be relatively free of “liberal bias.” 🙂 Also, I’m going to use “reconviction” rates rather then “rearrest” or “returned to prison” rates–I think that ex-felons are more likely to be arrested for a crime, which I think will skew re-arrest rates against them, and the “returned to prison” rates include parole violations, which generally result from doing things that wouldn’t be illegal if the person wasn’t under parole supervision. The reports themselves report both re-arrest and re-conviction, and include a discussion of differences between the two metrics (they prefer re-arrest rather then re-conviction, because it has a lower burden of proof).
Here we go:
For all prisoners, 46.9% were reconvicted of a new crime within 3 years of their release from prison. Of those, 25.4% went back to prison for that crime. If you divide categorize the released prisoners and enumerate their “reconviction”/“back to prison for new crime” statistics, you get (in decreasing order of decreasing recidivism):
```auto
Type of Crime Re-Conviction New Prison Sentence
Larceny/theft 55.70 32.60
Stolen property 57.20 31.80
Motor vehicle theft 54.30 31.30
Burglary 54.20 30.60
Other/unspecified 60.50 28.80
Other property crime 47.60 28.50
Kidnaping 37.80 25.10
Robbery 46.50 25.00
Drug trafficking 44.00 24.80
Other public-order 58.00 24.40
Weapons 46.60 24.30
Drug possession 46.60 23.90
Fraud 42.10 22.80
Assault 44.20 21.00
Other 48.00 20.70
Arson 41.00 20.10
DUI 31.70 16.60
Other violent crime 29.80 12.70
Rape 27.40 12.60
Homicide 20.50 10.80
Other sexual assault 22.30 10.50
```
Note that lewd acts with a child, etc. are gonna be under “Other sexual assault.” If we’re interested in sex offenses involving children specifically, the percentage of released child molesters re-convicted of a new sex crime within three years is **5.4%**.
Why do you hear the “nearly all sex-offenders re-offend” schtick so often? I’d guess it’s because:
[list=a]
[li]It makes sex offenders even more scary and dramatic, and makes for better TV.[/li][li]They often use it to describe out-of-the-blue man-in-a-van-looking-for-his-dog type molesters, who are a minority of child molesters. Most are friends and family of the victim; child molesters who molest unknown children are a minority.[/li][li]One “recidivism” statistic sex offenders do score high in is “likelyhood of commiting the same offense again.” However, this can be a very misleading statistic, because it only counts those who re-offend. If a child molester is released, AND that child molester commits another crime, that crime is more likely to be another child molestation then it is to be, saying, knocking over a 7/11. However, has we have seen, the percentage of child molesters who _do_ reoffend is rather small.[/li][li]The sensationalist statistics are often given as a multiple of another statistic, i.e., “sex offenders are 4 times more likely then other released criminals to commit another sex crime.” It sounds mighty impressive, but if the percentage of released criminals who commit a sex crime upon their release is rather small, then it’s 4 times a rather small number, which is likely to be a rather small number itself.[/li][/list]
These statistics are from the following two reports:
[Recidivism of Prisoners Released in 1994](http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/abstract/rpr94.htm)
[Recidivism of Sex Offenders Released from Prison in 1994](http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/abstract/rsorp94.htm)
---
### Author:  [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/25 "2005-01-29T21:23:25Z")
> [@KGS](#):
>
> A schoolteacher gets arrested for molesting several of his students. After he’s released on bail, his lawyer informs him that his own children have been placed in protective custody.
>
> “Why on earth are you taking my children away??” the teacher demands to know.
>
> The lawyer explains, “Since you’ve been indicted on several counts of molesting other people’s children, it’s reasonable to believe you may be abusing your own kids as well.”
>
> “No way! I would never do that!”
>
> “Why not?”
>
> “Because,” the teacher says, _“incest is immoral!”_
>
> (ba-dum-bomp)
Is that supposed to be funny? :dubious:
---
### Author:  [@xash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xash)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/26 "2005-01-29T22:33:04Z")
Moved to GD. Please keep it civil, or the thread will be locked.
Thank you.
- **xash**
General Questions Moderator
---
### Author:  [@Mathochist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mathochist)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/27 "2005-01-29T23:00:53Z")
> [@Metacom](#):
>
> Actually, sex offenders in general are the least-likely class of criminal to re-offend, going by recidivism rates.
>
> That one bit of common knowledge is very false…
Just to expand: my statement about “high rate” was not meant in comparison to other crimes, but in relation to the situation proposed. Say you’ve got kids and you’re considering marrying someone, knowing they’ve got about a one-in-five chance of repeating their actions. Less than for a burglar, but is it within your comfort zone?
Of course, if they were found guilty of statutory rape of a high-school senior outside their own household, that’s different than posing a threat to your little rugrats.
---
### Author:  [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/28 "2005-01-29T23:04:29Z")
> [@Metacom](#):
>
> Why do you hear the “nearly all sex-offenders re-offend” schtick so often? I’d guess it’s because:
> [list=a]
> [li]It makes sex offenders even more scary and dramatic, and makes for better TV.[/li][li]They often use it to describe out-of-the-blue man-in-a-van-looking-for-his-dog type molesters, who are a minority of child molesters. Most are friends and family of the victim; child molesters who molest unknown children are a minority.[/li][li]One “recidivism” statistic sex offenders do score high in is “likelyhood of commiting the same offense again.” However, this can be a very misleading statistic, because it only counts those who re-offend. If a child molester is released, AND that child molester commits another crime, that crime is more likely to be another child molestation then it is to be, saying, knocking over a 7/11. However, has we have seen, the percentage of child molesters who _do_ reoffend is rather small.[/li][li]The sensationalist statistics are often given as a multiple of another statistic, i.e., “sex offenders are 4 times more likely then other released criminals to commit another sex crime.” It sounds mighty impressive, but if the percentage of released criminals who commit a sex crime upon their release is rather small, then it’s 4 times a rather small number, which is likely to be a rather small number itself.[/li][/list]
But those statistics don’t and can’t account for a lot of situations that the average person would consider re-offending. For example, a pattern of say, a father molesting each of his three daughters in turn over a ten year time span would probably be re-offending in the average person’s eyes. But it wouldn’t be captured in those statistics if the youngest daughter was the first to report it. And it wouldn’t account for him molesting his grandaughter five years after he gets out of prison. It also wouldn’t account for the cases where a person is serving multiple sentences simultaneously for convictions involving different victims, which I believe most people would consider reoffending.
In my experience, it is rare to see a sex offender of any type returned to prison within three years for a new sex offfense. But it is also rare to see someone released from prison for a sex offense conviction that involved a single incident with a single victim, and I have never encountered someone released from prison with a conviction for a sex offense against a child which involved a single child and a single incident. The description of the crime nearly always alleges a course of conduct over a period of time, and the crimes of conviction fairly often involve two children, often with some connection to the offender.
> [@](#):
>
> Also, I’m going to use “reconviction” rates rather then “rearrest” or “returned to prison” rates–I think that ex-felons are more likely to be arrested for a crime, which I think will skew re-arrest rates against them, and the “returned to prison” rates include parole violations, which generally result from doing things that wouldn’t be illegal if the person wasn’t under parole supervision.
Parole violations often do result from doing things that wouldn’t be illegal if the person wasn’t on parole, but in the case of people convicted of sex offenses against children, they also include doing things that most other parolees are permitted to do , such as volunteering to work in a church’s nursery or otherwise having contact with children. I won’t say that I believe a convicted child molester volunteering in a church nursery _must_ have reoffended within days of beginning to volunteer- but the fact that he has put himself into such a position makes me think that he is almost certain to reoffend.
---
### Author:  [@Mathochist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mathochist)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/29 "2005-01-29T23:10:59Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#):
>
> Is that supposed to be funny? :dubious:
It’s got the meter, but none of the timing of a joke.
Seriously, though, there is (I think) a point to which he alludes: there are vast differences in actions and threats not covered by the single term “child molester”. Humbert Humbert had no interest in – and posed no threat to – any child but Dolores. In many jurisdictions a high school senior who got held back a year would technically be guilty of raping (statutorially) her freshman boyfriend who skipped a grade.
In this case, a teacher may (aberrantly) believe students to be appropriate objects, but also believe her children to be inappropriate. She is not about to molest her own children, though that doesn’t mean it’s not a wise idea to separate them just in case.
---
### Author:  [@Mathochist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mathochist)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/30 "2005-01-29T23:15:20Z")
There’s a lot of _I_ have never seen in that post. Care to tell us who “I” is?
Not to say I don’t believe you, but it might make a difference if you run a halfway house or if you’re just walking in off the street.
---
### Author:  [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/31 "2005-01-29T23:27:13Z")
IIRC, \*\*doreen \*\*is a social worker working primarily with abused children in a social services system. Which lends an interesting bias to her observations - but I can’t for the life of me figure out which way. Does her sample self-select to the bad, or is she just more aware of the bad that the rest of us don’t see? I guess that’s sort of the crux of the whole issue.
---
### Author:  [@threemae](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/threemae)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/32 "2005-01-29T23:35:56Z")
> [@Metacom](#):
>
> Sure. The following quotes are all from statistics compiled by the [Bureau of Justice Statistics](http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/) while under the direction of John Ashcroft, so they hopefully should be relatively free of “liberal bias.” 🙂
Okay, thanks. Really interesting. And I don’t mean the NY Times here, I’m talking places like _Westword_ and other _New Times_ papers that tend to be rather hysterical about anything. Still good papers, just good to take with a grain of salt.
---
### Author:  [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)
#### Post date: [January 29, 2005, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/33 "2005-01-29T23:53:04Z")
> [@WhyNot](#):
>
> IIRC, \*\*doreen \*\*is a social worker working primarily with abused children in a social services system. Which lends an interesting bias to her observations - but I can’t for the life of me figure out which way. Does her sample self-select to the bad, or is she just more aware of the bad that the rest of us don’t see? I guess that’s sort of the crux of the whole issue.
Actually, that’s what I used to do. Then I was a parole officer, and I currently deal with parole violations (thought I mentioned that in the first post). It’s in those jobs that I’ve had access to the descriptions of the crimes of conviction, and in the case of those convicted of a sex offense against a child, I have never seen one that simply alleges that on a particular day the defendant performed a particular act on a particular child. They usually say that on numerous occasions between (range of dates) defendant performed various actions, sometimes there are multiple separate crimes of conviction involving courses of conduct against two or more children, and once there was one that alleged single acts on different dates with two different victims.
---
### Author:  [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2005, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/34 "2005-01-30T00:00:00Z")
Just want to not- I am in no way implying that the previous statistics are incorrect- only that I don’t think the average person is using that study’s definition of “re-offending”.
---
### Author:  [@Metacom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Metacom)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2005, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/35 "2005-01-30T00:54:39Z")
> [@doreen](#):
>
> Just want to not- I am in no way implying that the previous statistics are incorrect- only that I don’t think the average person is using that study’s definition of “re-offending”.
Of course those statistics don’t reflect cases where someone isn’t caught by the law enforcement community or when that person re-offends after 3 years have elapsed. Has to the latter point, if you look at recidivism rates they tend to get “flat” after 3 years–IOW, if someone’s gonna reoffend, it’s probabbly gonna be within 3 years.
As to the first point, no, there’s no way of knowing exactly how many such crimes occur. However, I think those statistics are the best we have, and until something comes along that’s reasonably objective and based on solid, quantifiable measures with a sane methodology I’ll stick with them. Give me statistics like these over anecdotes anyday.
**Mathochist** : If you’re going to compare a recidivism rates not to other recidivism rates but to some intangibly defined personal comfort level that likely can’t be quantified as a statistic, then discussing it is pointless.
Now that this has been moved to “Great” Debates, I’m outa here…
---
### Author:  [@Mathochist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mathochist)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2005, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/36 "2005-01-30T03:11:12Z")
> [@Metacom](#):
>
> **Mathochist** : If you’re going to compare a recidivism rates not to other recidivism rates but to some intangibly defined personal comfort level that likely can’t be quantified as a statistic, then discussing it is pointless.
Well, yes, if the point is to say that the rate is in some abstract sense “high”. If “high” is read situationally, however, it’s far from pointless.
Case in point: computers which crash once in every ten-thousand hours of use have a low craash rate as compared to computers overall. However, for flight-control systems this is still considered pretty high, IIRC.
---
### Author:  [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2005, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/37 "2005-01-30T04:35:43Z")
> [@doreen](#):
>
> Just want to not- I am in no way implying that the previous statistics are incorrect- only that I don’t think the average person is using that study’s definition of “re-offending”.
Then the “average person”, including some on this message board, should not refer to the supposedly high rates of recidivism as if it were a well known proven fact.
---
### Author:  [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2005, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261/38 "2005-01-30T14:42:16Z")
> [@Ludovic](#):
>
> Then the “average person”, including some on this message board, should not refer to the supposedly high rates of recidivism as if it were a well known proven fact.
Of course they shouldn’t. But neither should those referring to the study’s low rate of recidivism as compared to other crimes fail to mention the restricted definition that they are using, or wonder where the idea that nearly all sex offfenders re-offend comes from. In part, it comes from different definitions of “reoffend”.
[Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happens-when-a-convicted-child-molester-has-children/287261.md?page=1)