Also as a reminder, Enjoy_Slurm was answering a question from the OP. The OP asked specifically, since his father didn’t need to register for being bi-polar, why would a sex offender? Enjoy_Slurm’s answer was factually correct.
Comparing a bi-polar condition and being a sex offender is not very useful but it was the OP’s example.
I do know of a sex offender who befriended a close relative (let’s call him John) through their non-denominational temple/church, and began grooming John’s sons. Another observant relative got suspicious and googled the guy and found he was a convicted child molester on the registry. John was completely stunned. He’d consider this fellow a trusted friend.
Of course it’s true that most predators are close family or friends. But how do you find your friends? Proximity and connections.
The point would be that if only a few sex offenders re-offend, then the majority would be by definition first time offenders. So with or without a registry, one needs to be cautious and alert about anyone who seems overly familiar with your children (or others).
I think a lot of the problem that has come to light over the last few decades - whether child molestation, sexual harassment/assault like Weinstein, etc. - has been a social naivety coupled with a reluctance to even discuss the topic or admit being a victim or part of a group that missed the clues. Now that people feel more free to talk about it the details for half a century past have come out in the last two decades or so.
There are people who made a mistake, or did one stupid thing, or lost control one time in the moment - and there are those who are consciously, connivingly predatory. The registry gives no clue which are which.
(I remember a “Dear Abby” letter back in the 1980’s where a couple complained - they’d found out their daughters were being molested by a local teen boy who was babysitting them. When they tried to warn other parents who also hired this boy, they became shunned in the neighbourhood. That was the times - nobody wanted to think about or discuss the possibility this was happening to their own children, they’d rather shoot the messenger. ).
Q: How many kids did Jerry Sandusky molest before he was arrested for the first time?
A: All of them.
Only a small percentage of the population has a sex offense conviction & only a percentage of those people are for something related to a child. No, I don’t want a convicted child molester anywhere near my child but the amount of people being screened is akin to looking for a needle that may not even be in that haystack. It’s somehow wrong that we’re making organizations, or the volunteers themselves, pay for screening that doesn’t show that the screenee hasn’t molested a child(ren), only that they haven’t been arrested/convicted for molesting children. IOW, don’t feel all warm & fuzzy just because someone passed their background check, even if there were not any errors in the system.
Just wanted to point out that there is a specific designation for Sexually Violent Predators. From https://www.pameganslaw.state.pa.us/InformationalPages/FAQ:
|Q:|Who is a “Sexually Violent Predator” under Megan’s Law?
|A:|A Sexually Violent Predator is a sexual offender who has been determined by the Court, after evaluation by the Sexual Offenders Assessment Board (link on left navigation bar), to have a mental abnormality or personality disorder that makes the person likely to engage in predatory sexually violent offenses. The term includes an individual determined to be a Sexually Violent Predator where the determination occurred in the United States or one of its territories or possessions, another state, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, a foreign nation or by court martial.Not all sexual offenders are determined to be Sexually Violent Predators. A Sexually Violent Predator is subject to both the registration and community notification requirements of Megan’s Law.
A Sexually Violent Predator is required to register for Life.|Q:|Who is a “Sexually Violent Delinquent Child” under Megan’s Law?|
|A:|A child who has been found to be delinquent for an act of sexual violence which if committed by an adult would be a violation of 18 Pa.C.S. § 3121 (relating to rape), 3123 (relating to involuntary deviate sexual intercourse), 3124.1 (relating to sexual assault), 3125 (relating to aggravated indecent assault), 3126 (relating to indecent assault) or 4302 (relating to incest) and who has been determined by the Court to be in need of commitment for involuntary treatment.
A Sexually Violent Delinquent Child is required to register for Life.
Except for the ones that reallylike toads. And I’ve met way too many of them. And one of those was Jesse Timmendequas.
Many if not most states there is a tier system.
In my state the least likely to reoffend are designated as Tier 1.
Tier 1 offenders are not on any website or publicly accessible database. They have to register but only the police know they on any list. The majority of those on the Megan’s Law list are Teir 1.
Tier 2 offenders are deemed more likely to re-offend. They do show up on the database that can be accessed by the public. None of those on our list who were Tier 2 were there for minor crimes. Many had multiple victims and many preyed on the public not family members.
Tier 3 is the “How the hell is this monster not in prison for life” list. There are very few Tier 3s because as you may have guessed, most are in prison. Thankfully I never had to deal with one directly because there is a lot involved.
Each offender has to reregister every 30, 90 or 365 days. It usually corresponds to their Tier but doesn’t have to.
Does the public need to know every minor offender? Probably not. And in my state they don’t. Should you be informed if a Tier 3 is in your neighborhood? Damn right.
And yes I have put people away for reoffending. It is not nearly rare enough.
Also, according to our legal technicalities guide, Law & Order, it seems that one of the plea bargain chips is now whether to put the offender on the register, or for how long. So it has simple devolved for some into a pressure tool for DA’s to help leverage a guilty plea.
Not the main question being asked but probably germane and a point in the OP:
Not sure which records you mean. You mentioned a case, but not what kind of case. If he was arrested or convicted of a crime, there would be a public record of that, open for all to see. But you didn’t mention anything about a crime. If you are talking about his medical records, nobody gets to see that unless he gives permission under HIPAA.
L&O the original did a decent job of using the law properly. The did specifically use NY law. The later iterations seemed to get further from reality. At this point if L&O SVU said murder was illegal I would have to consult a lawyer before I believed it.
In my state that certainly wouldn’t work that way.
The could plea to a lesser charge that doesn’t carry a sex offender list requirement. Being on the list is not considered part of a punishment it’s a statutory requirement. If convicted of certain offenses you are on the list. Also a trial judge does not set how long they are on the list. The list is for life. In reality they are able to petition to be taken off the list after a few years. Most Tier 1s have no trouble being removed if they kept clean.
As I recall, that was how it worked - plead to simple assault instead of sexual assault, etc.
Side question: when we say “has to register”, it sounds like some sort of action the offender must take to register, rather than something that happens to the offender, by someone else registering them.
So is it an action the offender must take or something that happens to them without their involvement?
Yes, it is an action that the sex offender must take. Failure to register is yet another crime they have committed if they don’t. Jurisdictions in the US can vary but usually they must register with the sheriffs office in any jurisdiction that they will be living or working in longer than something like 10 days. And again whenever they move somewhere else.
So is the OP question “why does a person have to register rather than automatically being registered nationwide?” or is it “why does the register exist in the first place”.
I am seeking clarification since all the responses I have read are addressing the second interpretation, rather than the first interpretation, which is how I initially interpreted it.
IIRC all major felony convictions are, nominally, entered into a consolidated database that can be looked up by LEAs in a background check. But people in the sex offender registry are given the additional burden to themselves, proactively notify local authorities of it whenever they change domicile.
[End straight answer, begin opinion: ]
As to why so, it’s so the people at DOJ who run the national criminal records database don’t have to be the ones keeping track of you. And, as an added bonus:
It’s an additional cudgel to use against them. LEAs and courts are quite happy to take you down for non-compliance with a term or condition to keep you under their watch beyond when you were supposed to be “let go”, especially if they believe your crime should not be “let go”.
(This goes over into the debate of “if you want X criminals to never be free again, why don’t you legislate that X crime requires a life sentence with a minimum 30 years, and be done with it?” To which the answer is, “well, no, we don’t want to have to house and feed them for 30-to-life, but we do want them watching every step forever”)
Each state is different so I can only answer definitively for mine as someone who dealt with Megan’s Law offenders extensively for 5 years.
It’s not just a matter of registering. Having a name on a list without verifying is pretty meaningless. The offenders are required to register in the town where they live. Then depending on what Tier they are put in they have to come back in periodically to verify their residency and other information. Being registered nationwide is problematic because these are state laws and each one is different. The other issue is if they are registered automatically who is verifying the information?
That’s not true. Criminal histories are put in a database. For anyone who is under parole supervision the burden is always on them to notify the proper authority when their information changes. That’s for anyone under any kind of supervision.
Thank you for the clarification. But now I am left wondering: does the registry requirement go away at some point?
Again, greatly depends on the state. In my state it technically doesn’t go away but in practice the offender is able to go back to court and petition to be removed after a certain amount of time. It does happen. I have seen people removed from the list or dropped to a lower Tier after petitioning the court.