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| Chip Limehouse |
04/16/2012
By Jody Barr
COLUMBIA (WIS) - Late last summer, a Charleston County judge awarded custody of a little girl to her father, a man investigators say had a sex assault conviction on his record.
The conviction happened in New Jersey and authorities say it involved one of the man's children. State Rep. Chip Limehouse found out about it, but it was too late.
"Clearly we have lapses in judgment in court and courts are human beings and they're imperfect and we see imperfect decisions everyday," Limehouse said.
Limehouse drafted a bill that would make it illegal for any child custody case or adoption to be awarded to a convicted sex offender.
- What if the ex-sex offenders crime didn't involve children?
Department of Social Services regulations prohibit that already, but Limehouse says his bill would go one step further by making it a crime.
"If judge and juries are going to be awarding custody of a child to an individual, there ought to be some level of standard," Limehouse said.
Limehouse wrote the state's sex offender registry law in the mid-90s. It allows the public to see every sex offender in the state -- their addresses, pictures, and up-to-date registry information.
The Charleston County case, according to Limehouse, exposed a dangerous loophole, one he says he never thought anyone in the judicial system would allow to happen.
"This will make it illegal, in fact, to award the custody of a child to an individual on the sex offender registry," Limehouse said.
"It will protect our children's safety directly, so, in my view, it is vitally important that we pass this into law this year."
In February, the bill passed the house 115 to 0. It's sitting in a Senate committee right now, but Limehouse says he's sure the Senate will pass it and the governor will sign it this year.
So if one parent is a drug user and the other a non contact, non violent sex offender then the drug user---who could end up selling the kid for drugs---should get custody?
ReplyDeleteJust goes to show that politicians are self serving ignorant slugs especially in an election year----oh yeah, it IS an election year.....guess that explains it.
Chip Limehouse.. you are clearly a hate-filled, 'one way', vote-grubbing jerk. Seriously.. how do you LIVE with yourself being fully aware that YOUR actions are going to cause untold MISERY for not only the parents wanting custody of their OWN kids, but the kids themselves whom YOU'VE made political pawns of? We can only hope that the hate-bill bill goes down in flames, as we hope the rest of your political career does as well.. No wonder the public has such mistrust of politicians and "law enforcement".
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