Slashdot Mirror
Online Sex Offender Database Leads To Murder?
nem75 writes "The LA Times reports on the story of Michael A. Dodele, a convicted rapist, found murdered in a Lakeport trailer park. He moved there after having been released from prison just 35 days before. A 29-year-old construction worker has been arrested in the attack, and explained that he killed Dodele to protect his son from child molestation. He found out on the internet about Dodele being a sex offender, via the 'Megan's Law' database. The public entry for Dodele in the database was wrong — though he was found guilty of committing crimes against adult women he was not a child molester. Dodele's entry in Megan's Law DB has been removed." Update: 12/11 15:51 GMT by Z : Moved link to non-reg article.
The whole point of these laws is to make you miserable for the rest of your life. If some whack-job kills you, all the better.
This is the purpose of creating a society of hate.
I'm conflicted. On the one hand I'm against these databases; once you've served your time you should be a free man in every way.
On the other hand, the responsiblity for the murder is solely on th eman who committed the murder. Ironically one of the victims of this murder is the very child the murderer was trying to protect, who will grow up without a father.
On the third hand*, maybe the kid's better off without a violent dumshit like that around.
-mcgrew
*The Mote in God's Eye, Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
This guy was going to kill someone, somewhere, somehow. The fact that he a rapist living near him means nothing. If he didn't have the database, he'd grab the yellowpages.
So basically, -1 troll/offtopic is really slashdots way of saying "I hate that you thought of something before me."
Another victory for hysterical knee-jerk legislation.
The media and the government have worked for the past few decades to make sure that everyone lives in fear of everything all the time. These sex offender databases are part of that. There have been sexual predators for as long as there have been people. Attacks have always been relatively rare, and most people will never be victimized. However, you put these lists and databases out there, people see that a sex offender lives near them, and they freak out.
We are constantly bombarded with reports of what we should be afraid of this week ("find out about the new threat that could kill your children, tonight on 9 news at 10!"). We have also been conditioned through the use of these databases and sensationalist segments like "To Catch a Predator" to believe that everyone ever convicted (or even accused) of a sex crime of any kind is out to get our children. Given all this, it's not at all surprising that someone would snap and do something like this.
Nobody deserves rape. You should be thankful that most of society does not share your sense of justice.
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Imagine the outrage and press if the database hadn't gotten the offender's entry wrong.
Oh, right. There wouldn't be any.
In my opinion, that's sick. Because of a government agency's screwup, it's suddenly not A-OK to murder a released convict? If the man actually HAD been a child molester, you would never have heard of this story. Everyone would have shrugged it off. Eh, the murderer was twisted, but at least he was protecting his kid. The murdered guy was a sick child molester, so he deserved it anyway, right?
The sex offender list isn't any more wrong because of this. The murder isn't any more wrong because of the list's screwup (and the victim isn't any less of a sick person because of it). All this is is just another example why a sex offender list is stupid and unconstitutional -- it's just that it wouldn't be noticed if somebody hadn't screwed up.
Its the old justice vs vengence conflict all over again. Theoretically after their time in the penal system a convict has paid their debt to society, and has been their slate wiped clean. The public tracking websites appeal to a mob-mentality, fear based culture that suggests criminals can't reform, that you're at risk at all times, and that someone is out to get you and your family. Yes a number of child molesters (and other criminals) re-offend upon being released from prison. The question should be whether public tracking databases reduce this likelihood.
My personal opinion is 'no', in fact they exacerbate the problem by limiting convicts' abilities to reintegrate into society. Once branded with the scarlet letter, they live out their Les Miserables' existence being pursued by law enforcement and vigilantes for the rest of their days.
Child molesters are the boogeymen of the 2000s, just like drug lords were of the 1980s and 90s, gangs of the 60s and 70s, and communists of the 1950s. They pose a societal threat, but not somuch that you need to legislate around their existence and vastly expand policing powers beyond what already exists.
John Maynard Keynes: "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do?"
So the guy "protected" his son from molestation (even though the risk was pretty damned small), and in return gave his son an absentee father, visits to the penitentiary, almost certain divorce (assuming he was married), and a long span of whispers and looks.
Oh yeah, he made a GREAT choice - a real bargain.
"As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
Not to defend anyone, but just to pose a question.
If you are 18 and are going out with a 17 year old and you're a monster, what are you if you are 17 and going out with a 16 year old? What are you if you are 18 1/2 and dating someone who is 17 3/4? In three months, you'll both be "18". I guess we could ask if you are 18, just about to turn 19 and you are going out with someone who just turned 18, what are you then. And then why is it okay for a 45 year old man to marry a 35 year old woman? What is this thing that happens to a person's mind during that day just before his/her 18th birthday through the day of his/her birthday? And what if you're just going out for ice-cream?
I'm just trying to figure out what "The Right Way" is. It is my understanding that 18 is a rather arbitrary age since voting, consuming alcohol (legally), and driving (legally) all have different ages associated with be able to perform said actions.
The "sex offender" registry hasn't prevented one crime against children, and has in fact caused more problems than it has solved.
From the US Department of Justice: 96% of female rape victims younger than 12 years old, knew their attackers. 20% were victimized by their fathers or step-fathers. 60% were victimized by another family member.
Sex crimes are the only crimes we continue to punish people after they've "paid their debt to society". We restrict their movement, restrict where they can live, and in many cases ensure through force of law that they never lead a normal life again.
If we, as a society, are convinced that child molesters are incurable, let's just keep them locked up. This idiotic list serves no purpose: if they are, indeed, almost certain to commit the crime again, why are we releasing them from institutionalization? If these people are "sick", let's transfer them from the penal system to the mental health system where they probably belong.
Well, why don't you tell me what is the benefit (to the public) of having a PUBLIC registry of convicted sex offenders (statutory rape anyone)?
The only reason for such registries, is to enact continuing lifelong punishment on the convicted criminal, even after the release, by virtue of harrassment by the members of the public who somehow have the free time to go browsing these databases (instead of taking care of their children).
What are you going to do if a sex offender moves next door to you? Have him evicted on a technicality? Torch his house? Stab him? Don't you think that whatever little chance there is of having this man re-integrate into society, will likely be ruined by this behavior? If you don't want to re-integrate this man into the society, then go ahead and lobby for life-sentences for any sex offense (18 sleeping with 17?)... or better yet - the death penalty. But if you take up the view that people can change, and can pay their debt to society, you have to accept your own conclusions.
But back to the main question - how is publicly-viewable registration going to increase public safety? Is it going to prevent a habitual rapist from raping? If not registering is a little crime, do you think that matters to someone who is pathologically going to commit far more severe offenses?
People may well be prejudiced. However stupid, that is their right except where limited by law. A bigger problem is differential privacy, where some people can hide things and others cannot. A boss might be less inclined to go after a gay employee if his own divorces and DUIs were equally public. Likewise for the cop.
If the guy who murdered him gets released in ten, twenty years he can move anywhere without ending up on a list or being forced to tell his neighbors of his past.
Barely escaped being labelled a sex offender because he pissed in a park near a school. He was really drunk and it was 2 am but he was going to be charged with (I forget exactly) "Exposing himself within fifty feet of a school." He got a good lawyer and got a lesser charge but his life was nearly ruined for a mistake he didn't even remember making.
It's hard to have sympathy for molesters and rapists but when you hear of people released from prison whose only option is to live under an overpass because that's the only place not near a child I do feel some sympathy. I mean, shouldn't the government designate an area childfree in each state that these guys can live? If not, just put them back in prison for the rest of their lives. It's more humane than under an overpass.
Seems to me a minor party hack published that it was okay to exterminate folks with a particular ancestry in Europe about 70 years ago, and that Milosovic basically published that it was okay to kill bad folks in Croatia and Bosnia about ten years ago. For those US folks that think "it can't happen here", a governor of a US Midwestern state published in the 1830's that it was ok to exterminate an entire group of people just for what they believed. That order wasn't officially rescinded until 1976.
Now then, I won't argue whether the convicted man was good or bad -- because most child molestors do not reform -- nor will I argue that folks don't have the right to protect their kids from unreformed molestors. What I will argue is that publishing a list in a manner as easily accessible as the Internet may be the wrong way to go about protecting the neighborhood. Because otherwise mob and/or vigilant justice takes control and can very easily get out of hand. Leading to murder and/or genocide.
...Open Source isn't the only answer -- but it's almost always a better value than the alternatives...
Please cite a source for high recidivism in sexual crimes. This is frequently stated, but only common knowledge is used as a source. If you can't cite a source for this, we have to throw that argument out.
Furthermore, my point of view is that the lists are not making children safer. Rather, they seem to be aimed to exact punishment far after the criminal has paid his or her dues.
Finally, if there is a risk of recidivism, then we need to keep the person in jail and therapy. Releasing them and placing them on a "harass this person" list just encourages criminal behavior. After all, we are releasing people who are still dangerous (after all, high recidivism, right?) and then promptly removing any chance for them to integrate with normal society and develop a support network.
We're letting out dangerous people and encouraging them to recommit!
I'm not saying rape is a good thing, or that it's not horrible to endure, but claiming that "It's worse than death because some women will kill themselves because of it." leads to a terrible precedent. The bottom line is that some people WILL kill themselves if they get depressed. Putting anything that causes that depression on the same level as murder is just idiotic.
And no, I've never been raped. By your logic, I guess that makes me unqualified to speak on the subject. Of course, given that we can't ask ANYBODY whose been murdered, we're going to have to start accepting testimony from people who didn't experience all these things.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
The way it works here in Illinois, as far as I know, is that you have to register with the police. Residents can go to the police station and ask them who the registered sex offenders are in their area.
Which is where my problem with this law comes in. Being able to sidle into my den with a cup of coffee, turn on the computer, and find out who in my neighborhood is registered is a very different level of commitment than going to the police station. And it makes it possible for a whack job like this guy to find out that information without alerting police. No leads, then, when he kills the guy.
But that's not the full extent of my issue with it. My main problem is that you can't add things to someone's sentence after the fact. If you want to tell every sex offender from now on that they'll be on this list, that's fine. But to add someone who was convicted in, say, 1975 and spent ten years in prison is ethically wrong and quite possibly unconstitutional (under the 5th and/or the 14th amendments, perhaps). From a practical standpoint, it adds punishment after time served and could be argued to deny the convict of life (in this case), liberty, and even property (given that it's probably pretty much impossible to get a job if you're on the website).
There are a lot of dirtbags out there who are listed on the websites, and I do worry about them not only in general for society but for the safety of my own daughter. But dirtbags or not, you can't just tack more on to a sentence after they get out (sometimes years after they get out) because their crime is more repellent than most.
And I know, there is a higher chance of recidivism among sex offenders. So again, make it part of the sentence now. Eventually, all sex offenders will be on the website. Not a perfect solution if you're scared that you live near an offender, but if we start making exceptions to the law for hot-button issues, the entire concept of liberty is sunk anyway (for all of us, not just the sex offenders).
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
In some states, public indecency will get you on the sex offender list (I think West Virginia is one)*. So, for merely getting caught peeing behind a tree at a bar after drinking a lot, you can get labeled a sex offender for life. The only victim of that crime is the person convicted, as they will have problems getting jobs, homes, even credit for the rest of their lives, and get put on wonderful lists like these. These sites are an invasion of privacy, frequently contain bad/wrong information, and rely on the offenders themselves to keep their addresses current. There are so many problems with this idea I can't even count them.
* I know this information because for a few weeks I worked as a developer for a major national sex offender search website until my morals caught up to me and I realized what a colossally bad idea the sites are.
today is spelling optional day.