The Lies About Sex Offenders

The more the evidence shows otherwise, the more places pop up wanting sex offender residency restrictions and "child-safe zones."

Almost every day brings another town or another county proposing some sort of restriction limiting where those on the registry can legally live, go, or work, or placing some special conditions on their being there.

The concept of a "child-safe" area, just like all areas of restrictions to those on the registry, is flawed at the core. It makes assumptions that are untrue. One is that those who abuse children are strangers seeking out places where children congregate. This is true of the tiniest fraction, less than 1% most data shows. Virtually all child sexual abuse is committed by those close to the children in their lives, specifically their family members, their peers, and their authority figures.

Using what empirical evidence tells us then, a true "child-safe zone," one that would separate children from those most likely to do them sexual harm, would separate children from their family members and closest friends and associates.

This flawed concept also assumes that registered offenders frequently re-offend, and that too is false. The majority of registrants, whether on the registry for a youthful, foolish act or for a serious crime, will not sexually re-offend and are seeking only to rebuild their lives, support their families, and live law-abiding lives.

An additional falsehood is that any registrant seeking employment in a place such as a children's hospital is there for nefarious reasons. The public registry makes registrants getting any job very difficult. If they have the opportunity for a job, no matter where it is, they are highly unlikely to turn it down.

These false assumptions, these lies, result in ludicrous situations, such as registrants being banned from entering a public library or scanning paraphernalia being installed in public schools, paraphernalia that is programmed to sync with only one thing--the sex offender registry.

Some schools disallow the presence of a sex offender altogether regardless of the circumstances. A few allow a visiting parent who is a registrant in the building--so long as he has a school personnel escort with him. In addition to the fact that schools probably have more surveillance cameras per square foot than banks do, registrants are considered so dangerous that they need special supervision. Imagine the humiliation to the child or teenager when he is quizzed by his peers about why his dad had an assistant principal walking around with him. That isn't just ludicrous; it is cruel.

I beg any who are considering implementing any of these restrictions or procedures to spend some time looking at the empirical evidence and following it. We have enough laws based on foolish whims, false assumptions, and deliberate lies. We don't need more.