The well known Megan”s Law had been named several years ago after Megan Kanka, a New Jersey seven-year-old girl was raped and killed. The culprit was a convicted child molester who had discreetly settled in the family’s neighborhood. The parents of the martyred child started a movement to have local communities warned when known sex offenders were relocating to their areas and eventually, Megan’s law was born. Anybody can now go to an official website and check by zip code or address if any of such a potential predator is your gentle neighbor. In California, the website is http://www.meganslaw.ca.gov
We are all happy, I am sure, to have such a tool and a quick search of my own town showed “only” 18 offenders, none “high risk” and none in my direct neighborhood, thank you.
So, let us take a look to the John Doe family now! Today, John is glued to the computer monitor, speechless because he has just discovered that a high risk sexual offender lives next door, a living example that the legal and law enforcement institutions have given up their responsibility to protect his children (the risk rating goes all the way to Serious and High Risk!). What happened to the old principle that a convict is only released when he has paid its debt to society and is not a threat anymore? What does John do with the information? Do you think he is happy?
Legally, the only thing one can do with the information is to pass it around (asking the neighbors to check the website) and try peacefully to get the person to move out. For high risk offenders, the local government can also organize a campaign of information via flyers notifying you that your children might be at risk. Taking the matter in your own hands his of course totally excluded. Again, what is one supposed to do when the local government says that your children might be at risk to be hurt (or worse) by a known dangerous person (high risk) that is entitled to live next door?
Today we actually have a system that releases convicted sex offenders , child molesters or other perverts in our neighborhoods, some still categorized as “high risk”, while providing citizens with a free Internet tool to figure out if their families are in any danger, a tool one must check basically every day… and we are supposed to be happy? I am not and my mood changed even more when I learned that a loophole in the law allows some of them to avoid being exposed through the public database and that the only way to get the full picture is to actually go to the local Police department, fill up a disclaimer, and be presented with the real and full database of the about 500.000 known sexual offenders nationwide.
I was “happy” with the 18 I found in my town….none in my street! But I just discovered that 44 registered sexual offenders actually live and lurk around, and today, I will have to go to the Police to check my street!
How safe do you feel now, knowing that the public website is mostly worthless ?
Leave a Reply