NY - Sex Offenders Housing Restrictions Are Pointless

Original Article

08/25/2014

By Jesse Singal

On Thursday, Joseph Goldstein of the New York Times reported that “Dozens of sex offenders who have satisfied their sentences in New York State are being held in prison beyond their release dates because of a new interpretation of a state law that governs where they can live.” In short, since 2005, sex offenders in the state can't live within 1,000 feet of a school, and a February ruling from the state's Department of Corrections and Community Supervision extended that restriction to homeless shelters.

Because the onus is on sex offenders to find approved housing before they’re released, Goldstein reported, they've been left with very few options, especially in densely-populated New York City, where there are schools everywhere. This has led to an uncomfortable legal limbo and sparked at least one lawsuit (so far) on behalf of an offender who is still in custody even though he was supposed to be out by now.

The unfortunate thing about this situation is that laws designed to restrict where sex offenders can live are really and truly useless, except as a means of politicians scoring easy political points by ratcheting up hysteria. There are many tricky social-scientific issues on which there are a range of opinions and some degree of debate among experts, but this isn't one of them. Among those whose job it is to figure out how to reduce the rate at which sex offenders commit crimes (as opposed to those whose job it is to get reelected, in part by hammering away at phantom threats), there is zero controversy: These laws don't work, and may actually increase sexual offenders’ recidivism rates.

Maia Christopher, head of the Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers, sent Science of Us a policy paper her organization has prepared on this issue (it’s not yet online, but should be later this week). ATSA’s views on housing restrictions for sex offenders are completely straightforward: The group “does not support the use of residence restrictions as a feasible strategy for sex offender management” because of a lack of evidence they do any good.

The paper notes that these laws have proliferated—“[a]t least 30 states and hundreds of cities” have them—because of some basic misunderstandings about how sex crimes are committed. There’s a collective American fixation on the creepy image of a sex offender salivating just beyond the playground fence, but that’s just not how things usually work.

Rather, these crimes are generally committed by someone known to the victim—93 percent of the time when it comes to child victims, according to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics—and the majority take place either in the victim’s home or the home of someone they know. “Therefore,” the authors write, “policies based on ‘stranger danger’ do not adequately address the reality of sexual abuse.”

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Treatment reduces recidivism among sex offenders

Original Article

04/30/2014

By MARY LOCHNER

Treatment for adult and juvenile sex offenders reduces the risk of recidivism, according to experts and research, but a lot of offenders’ success in the programs comes down to a major attitude adjustment.

A local who works with juvenile sex offenders said young offenders who begin treatment typically express attitudes supportive of sexual assault when they come in. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he had not been authorized to interview by his agency.

“What it comes down to, for all of them, is a lack of empathy,” he said, “and an overall mental justification on their part for their actions, and not taking responsibility for their actions.”

Those who offended against children, he said, will often say the victims were probably too young to remember what happened to them, or that they seemed fine afterward. Juveniles who offended against other teens will typically say she was asking for it.

“Most of them come in and say, ‘If I was put in a high-risk situation where I felt I wouldn’t ever get caught regardless of what I did, yeah, I would reoffend.’”

Treatment consist of helping sex offenders identify their own assault cycle – thoughts, behaviors, and high-risk situations that lead up to them committing sexual assault – and teaching them to be aware of it and alter it. They also learn strategies for identifying and challenging thinking errors; developing empathy for others; and taking responsibility for their own actions, he said.

Programs targeted at reducing recidivism among sex offenders are typically more successful with the juvenile than the adult population, he said.

Going to jail for a sex offense might seem like a steep consequence to a young person, he added, but not being held accountable is likely worse for that person in the long-term.

“It puts him at much higher risk for reoffending, because there’s no connection between what they did and how it affects the person they offended against. Especially when they’re younger, treatment is essential for drastically decreasing their chances of reoffending.”
- Men are not the only ones who commit sexual crimes!

A UAA Justice Center analysis on the impacts of treatment on adult sex offenders found that length of time in treatment was correlated with less risk of re-offense, and that “Those who completed all stages of treatment through the advanced stage had a zero re-offense rate for sexual re-offenses. This included Sexual Assault offenders (rapists) [sic], who generally tend to re-offend more quickly and at a higher frequency.”

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Experts: Sex offenders likely to be re-arrested but not for sex crimes

Original Article

02/23/2014

By Jo Ciavaglia

Most registered sex offenders in the U.S. follow Megan’s Law requirements. After all, they want to avoid felony charges and additional prison time associated with noncompliance, according to legal and criminal experts.

But a high compliance rate does not automatically mean they are following the rules, said one sex offender behavior expert. Research suggests sex offenders, who often face difficulty re-entering the community, are at a high risk for re-arrest, though rarely for another sex offense.

Administrative backlogs with the state Megan’s Law registries, which track most sex offenders, are “very common,” experts said. Mostly the backlog is related to policies lawmakers put in place without providing adequate resources or input from law enforcement, they said.

Adding to the challenge of monitoring sex offenders is often the offenders are part of a mobile population.

The transient nature of sex offenders has been linked to increased absconding and recidivism, and thus decreased community safety, according to Andrew Harris, an associate professor in the School of Criminology and Justice Studies at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell and a leading authority on sex offender policy.

Transience also can compromise the ability of law enforcement agents to closely supervise sex offenders without a permanent address.

Pennsylvania is among the states with a high compliance rate among registered sex offenders who appear on its Megan’s Law registry. Compliance rates in the state are typically 96 to 97 percent meaning about only 3 to 4 percent of the more than 15,000 offenders aren’t following monitoring rules. In New Jersey 2.5 percent of the 3,970 registered sex offenders are fugitives, according to police and state statistics.

But among the more than 500 non-compliant sex offenders on Pennsylvania’s registry, fewer than one quarter have active arrest warrants for Megan’s Law violations.

How states determine Megan’s Law compliance varies, but the only accurate measurement is through spot checks and audits, Harris said. A high compliance rate for a state’s sex offender registry doesn’t mean the information is accurate since it’s not unheard of for offenders to provide false addresses, Harris said.

“It’s not uncommon for people to flip out of compliance,” he said. “Just because you show up at a police station and verify your address, doesn't mean you aren't up to something.”

Most non-compliant sex offenders are not willfully avoiding registration, said Harris and Cynthia Calkins, an associate professor of psychology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York. More often it is problems within the system that oversees offenders and a lack of knowledge about the rules.

“(Offenders) simply don’t know. Their lives are unstable. They have to find jobs, housing, they may or may not be able to live with family,” Calkins said. “They don’t always have a stable address and frequent moves may be part and parcel of living in the community.”

Local municipalities had tried to restrict where convicted sex offenders could live, but the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in 2011 struck down as unconstitutional such local laws.

Available research on sex offenders who fail to follow registration requirements suggests they are no greater risk for committing another sex crime than the offenders who are compliant, Calkins said. Harris added that studies show only a “very small” number of noncompliant offenders are attempting to evade detection to commit sex crimes.

But among a “relatively large group” of noncompliant sex offenders are the so-called chronic rule breakers whom Harris said research shows have a relatively high risk of recidivism involving other crimes.

Available research on sex offender recidivism rates is mixed but does show it’s typically low for additional sex crimes.

National data suggests that between 12 and 24 percent — or between one and three of every 10 sex offenders — are known to have repeated crimes, according to The Center for Sex Offender Management, a national project supporting state and local jurisdictions in the effective management of sex offenders. But the center points out the rates are commonly underestimated because the crimes often go unreported.

A report released last year by the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections shows a little more than half of paroled sex offenders end up re-arrested or back in prison, but rarely for a sex crime.

According to the report, nearly half of state inmates released in 2008 who were convicted of forcible rape were either re-arrested or sent back to prison within three years, compared to nearly 60 percent of all inmates. Among state inmates convicted of statutory rape and “other” sexual offenses, the recidivism rate was 50 percent and 60 percent, respectively, for the same three years.

Those recidivism rates are lower than most other inmates convicted originally of robbery (63 percent), murder or manslaughter (52 percent), drug offenses (57 percent) and burglary (72 percent), according to the 2013 report.