Showing posts with label Treatment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Treatment. Show all posts
Saturday, May 18, 2013
Thursday, May 16, 2013
Proof that criminals can be rehabilitated
This goes to show you, even to most hardened criminals can be rehabilitated, when treated with respect and not like animals.
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
CO - Fixes to contentious Colorado sex offender treatment system pushed out
05/12/2013
By Ryan Handy and Megan Schrader
Eleven days before he was shot to death, Colorado Department of Corrections Director Tom Clements wrote a letter to the state Senate, pledging to transform the prison's highly contentious sex offender treatment program after an independent report declared it to be poorly run.
But after Clements died March 19, his plans to change the Sex Offender Treatment and Management Program were set aside, and further attempts to address issues with the program were stymied by a packed legislative agenda that put guns, civil unions, and marijuana at the forefront.
Since Clements' death, the department has not yet unveiled plans to address issues highlighted in the report. In the meantime, the legislature and the governor ordered two more evaluations of the treatment program, due to be completed next year.
Gov. John Hickenlooper asked the Commission on Criminal & Juvenile Justice (CCJJ) to create a sex offender task force to spend the next few months looking at the act and its requirements for sex offenders.
The Legislature's joint budget committee set aside $100,000 for a study of the Sex Offender Management Board, which oversees treatment programs throughout the state, due to be completed next year, according to budget documents. It is the second study of sex offender treatment ordered by lawmakers in the past year.
Now that the 2013 General Assembly has ended, the sex offender task force will look at how treatment can be improved. The move was inspired by a Republican push to transform Colorado's sex offender laws, and model them after the Florida system, known as Jessica's Law. The task force will examine how to restructure Colorado's sex offender sentencing and treatment system, and will weigh suggestions against the provisions of Jessica's law.
Nevertheless, sex offender sentencing and treatment remains a hot-button issue that many legislators are reluctant to touch. Finding a champion for legislation to improve sex offender treatment is difficult even when the Legislature is not busy, said Rep. Mark Waller, R-Colorado Springs.
'One of the things that is always difficult to deal with in these circumstances is nobody wants to appear that they are being soft on crime in anyway, ' Waller said Thursday. 'And it's unfortunate. '
Laurie Rose Kepros, director of sexual litigation at the Office of the Public Defender, hopes that the task force will relieve the political stalemate that has plagued sex offender issues.
'I think that's consistent with the function of CCJJ, and what everybody's been hoping they would tackle, ' she said.
The sex offender treatment program was created in 1998 as part of the Lifetime Supervision Act, a sentencing scheme for sex offenders engineered to treat them in prison or on probation, and release them into the community.
The aim of the act was to put sex offenders into therapy, and prevent them from reoffending once they got out of prison or off parole. But since then, a lack of funds and poor management of the program has ruined any chance the program had of working, experts say.
Experts quoted in a Gazette report in April suggested that the act was misconceived from the outset, with some lawmakers and lawyers fearing that the treatment guidelines were too broad and too expensive to be sustained.
The system, instead of treating and releasing offenders, has trapped many in prison long after they were due for release. Of nearly 2,000 sex offenders sentenced to prison under the act since 1998, only 168 have been paroled. Every year, sex offender treatment demands more money - last year the corrections department spent about $2.8 million on treatment. Correction officials say they don't have the money they need to run the program.
For sex offenders, their advocates and lawyers, this legislative session was expected to offer some relief. The much-anticipated independent report, ordered by the Senate's Joint Budget Committee in 2012 to examine the treatment program, was completed this February. It criticized the program's large treatment groups, which bunch offenders of varying crimes together, and the poorly trained therapists who run them. Fixing the program would require new staff as well as legislative changes to treatment protocol, according to the report.
Sunday, May 12, 2013
WV - New West Virginia law pairs youth sexting ban with education efforts, diversion
Labels: ChildPorn , Education , OffenderChild , Sexting , Treatment , WestVirginia
We see nothing wrong with trying to educate kids and keep them off the registry, that is a move in the right direction, for once.
05/12/2013
By Lois M. Collins
West Virginia has new rules that outlaw sexting by youths. But the state is also trying to pair the rules to education and diversion so that young people learn why it's a bad idea to sext and can fix their mistakes without having to register forever as sex offenders.
The Associated Press reported that the law, signed Monday by Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin, makes it illegal for youths to make, possess or distribute photos, videos or other media that show a minor in an inappropriate sexual manner.
- Not all sexting is about sending / taking underage photos of kids, so this law is geared toward a specific issue, not sexting in general, at least that is how we read this.
The charge would be delinquency, but the law directs the state's Supreme Court to create an educational diversion program that, once completed, could lead to having the delinquency charge dropped.
"That program would show offenders the consequences of sexting, including the potential long-term harm on relationships and school and job opportunities," the AP story said.
Unlike some states, youths caught sexting would not be required to register as sex offenders.
That's important to Maureen Kanka, whose 7-year-old daughter Megan was abducted, assaulted and murdered by a neighbor who had previously been convicted of assaulting young girls. Her efforts helped lead to the crafting and passage of New Jersey's Megan's Law in 1994. It forces sex offenders to register when they move into a community. It was never meant to target juveniles who sext, she said, but it does and that's one of the changes she's pushing for in amendments, including providing more support for parole officers.
“We wanted to make sure that wouldn’t happen under any circumstances,” Kanka told the New Jersey Independent Press, referring to making teens register for sexting.
A state senator sponsoring amendments agreed. “No one is trying to defend sexting, but the intention here is to not have them live with the lifelong designation of ‘sex offender,’” said Sen. Linda Greenstein (D-Plainsboro). “With younger people, you still have the concept of rehabilitation. You don’t want them to make a mistake and live with it for the rest of their lives.”
- We are so sick and tired of hearing this! Adults can also be rehabilitated, if you give them a chance. Not all want to be, but most can. So stop pretending that all adults are beyond repair.
Sexting charges vary from state to state. The Washington Post carried a story about one case this week from nearby Virginia, where three local teens took videos "of drunken sex acts with fellow teens" and shared them with each other. They each will be tried on charges of child pornography.
"In Virginia, Maryland and many other states, the law has not caught up with the combustible mix of teens, technology and sex that has made sexting an issue. Prosecutors must rely on a patchwork of laws created before the rise of smartphones to handle such cases," wrote the Post's Justin Jouvenal.
"Some parents and rights groups are calling for a new law that would distinguish sexting from child pornography, create lesser punishments and focus on educating teenagers, not punishing them. But they also acknowledge that young victims can be devastated when embarrassing photos or videos are spread among their peers," the article said.
Thursday, May 9, 2013
OR - Portland's NIMBY Elite
Labels: CrimeVigilante , MassHysteria , MobMentality , Oregon , Treatment , Video
05/08/2013
By Pamela Fitzsimmons
When registered sex offender Thomas Henry Madison of Gresham, Ore., turned up six months ago at a neighborhood meeting protesting a sex offender clinic, he was tossed out.
- He was tossed out because people don't want to hear anything except their opinions.
That protest was in the Inner Southeast Portland enclave of Sellwood/Moreland, and those neighbors succeeded in shutting down the clinic.
Last week, Madison was back at a different neighborhood protest – this one fighting the new location of that same clinic, Whole Systems Counseling. It’s now open in Outer Southeast Portland in a working-class neighborhood. These residents let Madison have his say.
They also made it clear that while they don’t like inheriting Sellwood/Moreland’s problem, they also don’t want to dump it on some other neighborhood. They would like to find a solution.
- Like we've said many times, no matter where they place the treatment facility, someone will start a mob.
Inner and Outer Southeast Portland are flip sides of the same city.
Inner Southeast Portland attracts New York Times restaurant critics. The neighborhoods found in the Inner Southeast, such as Sellwood/Moreland, merit their own walking maps. Sellwood/Moreland is home to antique shops, galleries, pubs, restaurants, a movie theater, a farmer’s market. Reed College nestles along its border.
Outer Southeast Portland attracts snubs and ubiquitous, strip-commercial development found in any American city. The specific neighborhood where Whole Systems Counseling opened includes a trailer court, mobile home park and apartments. The clinic is in Plaza 125, which looks like the typical small-office complex where you would find a dentist, an attorney, an ob/gyn. There’s plenty of parking.
When Whole Systems Counseling was located in Sellwood/Moreland, it was in a nondescript building at 7304 SE Milwaukie Ave. Residents were concerned that the Boys and Girls Club was nearby at 7119 SE Milwaukie, and a Montessori pre-school was at 7126 SE Milwaukie.
But it’s also a lively, well-traveled stretch of Milwaukie Avenue. It brims with people – pedestrians, bicyclists, motorists – all potential witnesses who could discourage criminal activity. These are not just any people, either; they are middle-class and upper middle-class professionals. The kind of people who, if they – or their sons and daughters – were victimized in a violent crime, would receive immediate attention.
By comparison, the new location of Whole Systems Counseling in Outer Southeast Portland looks like the kind of neighborhood where someone might get the idea that they could get away with a crime.
That was the concern of the 50 or so residents who gathered last week in the board room at David Douglas High School, not far from the clinic.
“Is there anyone here who thinks it is OK for a sex offender clinic to be located by kids?” asked Chris Piekarski who led the meeting.
- Not all ex-sex offenders have harmed children. You are just putting them all into one basket.
Madison raised his hand. Many of the men and women in the room had the weary appearance that comes after putting in a day’s work. Madison looked crisp and chipper, like a man going into a job interview. He was one of the few men in the room wearing a tie.
He stood before the residents and told them that he wanted to put out all the facts about sex offenders.
Madison didn’t volunteer that he was a registered sex offender until he was later asked. Instead he delved into studies and statistics.
“Ninety-four percent of brand new sex crimes are committed by people not on the sex offender registry … not the few over here at Whole Systems…,” he said. “More than 90 percent of sex crimes are committed by people in the family.”
Madison eventually led up to this declaration: “It is all of us that commit sex offenses.”
That’s when Piekarski asked him if he was a registered sex offender.
“Yes, I am a registered sex offender,” he said.
There was a brief gasp from the audience, and a woman cried out that she was a victim. Another woman reached out to comfort her, and the audience quickly calmed down. They let Madison continue.
It was only when he veered off into what he really came to talk about – he belongs to a group that wants to do away with sex registration entirely – that the audience turned on him.
“We’ve heard enough of this,” one man shouted, and Madison sat down.
State Rep. Jessica Vega Pederson spoke briefly about HB 3509 (PDF) she has sponsored that would allow counties to govern where sex offender clinics can be located.
It seems like a gesture that probably won’t have much impact if it passes. These clinics are going to be located somewhere.
Members of the audience struggled with what to do. Piekarski pointed out that one of the local TV news shows had portrayed them negatively. The show had focused on the fears of the clinic’s owner, Johneen Manno, who said windows had been shot with a BB gun.
Nobody at the meeting took credit for the vandalism, and Piekarski reminded them not to support that kind of activity.
“It just makes us look like kooks. …. ‘Those people in east Portland are so immature … they are criminals and hooligans.’ … Violence is not acceptable …,” he said.
- Wow, the typical blame others mentality. Some in East Portland may be mature, but so are you, in our opinion.
Finally, one woman rose. It would be great, she said, if they could step up as a group and find a solution for the clinic. She wondered if the clinic had deliberately chosen their neighborhood because there is a large number of residents who don’t speak English.
- Well, if you live in this country, you should speak English, in our opinion. And do you really think that is the reason they moved there? That is just the typical BS to make somebody look racist.
“I hate to say this, but it’s a needed service. … Don’t be a NIMBY…,” she said. “It’s not appropriate for anybody’s back yard.”She is right, but if it has to be in somebody’s backyard make it a prosperous one.
For too long, violent crime has been borne primarily by the poor and working class. The good people of communities like Sellwood/Moreland seem like the kind of folks who gladly embrace politicians who promote rehabilitation over incarceration. It’s an easy concept to support when felons settle in poor neighborhoods. But wouldn’t they stand a better chance at rehabilitation in a nice neighborhood?
- I don't think it matters if it's a poor or rich neighborhood, as long as the treatment is doing it's job. And again, the fact is, most ex-sex offenders do not re-offend, so the crime in that county would not be due to ex-sex offenders but probably gang bangers, drug dealers and DUI offenders. Do you raise this much hell for crack houses and other places in the neighborhood? We doubt it.
If it takes a village to raise a child, maybe it takes a village of well-educated, broad-minded liberals to watch over and rehabilitate a sex offender.
- No it doesn't "take a village" to raise a child. It takes one responsible adult.
In which case, the people of Sellwood/Moreland and the Inner Southeast should come to the aid of their less fortunate brothers and sisters in the Outer Southeast.
Perhaps the sex offender clinic could relocate near Reed College, considered one of the most intellectual colleges in the U.S. It could be a merger of academic theory, philosophy and hard-core reality. The life of the mind meeting the temptations of the flesh.
As a bonus, the school’s president is John Kroger, former Oregon attorney general and a fan of Jeremy Bentham, the 19th Century philosopher who influenced prison and law reform.
Among other ideas, Bentham believed that public humiliation could be useful in deterring deviant behavior. He might have found sex offender registries and clinics practical crime prevention tools.
- Just because someone believes in something doesn't make it right. Many countries believe in cutting your head off, fingers, or putting you to death for some small crime, doesn't mean it's right.
It would be something for Reed’s intellectuals and Whole Systems’ clients to explore.
Wednesday, May 8, 2013
NY - Guest view: A solution to the homeless sex offender issue
Spoken like a true man of God!
05/08/2013
By J. BARRETT LEE
To my fellow Christians in Oneida County: There has been much ado in the headlines about the county’s temporary housing of sex offenders in Utica motels. Private citizens and elected officials alike are raising the voice of protest against this practice. I’ve repeatedly heard complaints about the county using Utica as a “dumping ground” for sex offenders.
The implication behind these statements is that such people amount to human garbage. I find this implication to be spiritually and morally troubling because of what it says about us as a community.
As a survivor of sexual assault, I can testify to the dehumanizing effect that such a violent act has on a person’s sense of self. The perpetrators of such acts necessarily objectify their victims and treat them like garbage, tossing them aside when there is no longer any use for them. I know firsthand what that feels like.
When we as a society compare our sex offenders to garbage, we do the same thing to them that they did to us. In doing so, we stoop to their level and perpetuate the cycle of violence.
American society at large endorses such violence because no one is said to be more despicable than a sex offender. We seem to have made it OK to dehumanize and hate these people because of what they have done to others. We use them as scapegoats and a “dumping ground” for our own rage, frustration, and self-hatred. Again, we do to them what they did to us. We become what we judge.
With this housing crisis, I believe God is presenting us with an opportunity to rise above revenge and break the cycle of dehumanizing violence. We have a chance to stand in solidarity with Jesus, who ate with tax collectors and sinners, the scapegoats and “sex offenders” of his day and age.Christ’s commitment to a deep theology of grace empowered him to accept the “bad guys” and separate sinner from sin.
There are communities around the continent who have committed themselves to Christ’s path of radical hospitality. I’m thinking primarily of churches like Welcome Inn, a Mennonite church in Hamilton, Ontario. Their church has chosen to welcome sex offenders and surround them with circles of acceptance and accountability. They become a second family for program participants. They meet regularly with released offenders and nurture them into reintegration and active participation in community life. This way, sex offenders are simultaneously cared for and checked up on by people who care enough to love like Jesus.
Is there any reason why churches in the Mohawk Valley could not start similar programs? I can’t think of one.
All I can think of is what Jesus told his followers in Matthew 25:40: “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.”
Be blessed and be a blessing,
J. Barrett Lee is the pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Boonville and a participant in St. James Mission, a progressive, ecumenical, spiritual community in Utica. He also teaches philosophy at Utica College.
Tuesday, May 7, 2013
PA - Hulmeville residents vow to continue efforts to rid town of sex offender treatment center
Labels: MobMentality , Pennsylvania , Treatment , Video
05/06/2013
By Jo Ciavaglia
Hulmeville Council members say they were told an outpatient treatment center that is state licensed to treat sexually violent predators currently does not have any clients that meet that definition.
But the news did little to calm the nerves of at least 100 residents who packed Monday’s borough council meeting room to demand action to evict Resources for Human Development.
Many didn’t know that the center — which treats deviant sexual behavior and sex offenders — existed until recently. Most called the current location — in a largely residential area — inappropriate.
- And it was never a problem, until now?
Some vowed to picket and patrol the area surrounding the Reetz Avenue office building on nights when counseling meetings are held. Others requested police presence at the building on the center’s meeting nights. Nearly 160 people on Monday night signed a petition calling for the building’s landlord to evict the center.
Resident David Goodman says his 8-year-old son is scared to go to the bus stop alone now.
- Because you've put fear into his heart.
“What are we going to do to protect the community,” he added.
Another resident claimed that the center’s clients loiter on the property and nearby streets after the meetings.
- What's wrong with that? People usually congregate after meetings.
“I almost feel like they’re casing the neighborhood,” one woman said.
- Wow, you need to get a life!
Thursday, May 2, 2013
OR - County, city officials skip public forum on clinic that treats sex offenders
Labels: MobMentality , Oregon , Treatment
It doesn't matter where this clinic moves to, there will always be a mob to raise hell about it and that is probably why many did not attend, they are sick and tired of the mob mentality.
04/30/2013
By Steve Beaven
More than 60 people crowded into the boardroom at the David Douglas School District offices Tuesday night and vowed to push a clinic that treats sex offenders out of their Southeast Portland neighborhood.
“If we don’t all make an effort to band together on this issue, nothing will happen,” said Chris Piekarski, who lives six blocks from the clinic and helped lead the meeting. “We cannot let it blow over.”
The Whole Systems Counseling & Consultation clinic moved into its new office at Southeast 126th Avenue and Stark Street in early March after angry Sellwood residents forced it out of their neighborhood late last year. The clinic has contracts with Multnomah and Clackamas counties to treat sex offenders.
Tuesday night’s forum had been planned as a panel discussion featuring Johneen Manno, the owner of the clinic, and officials from Multnomah County and the City of Portland.
But Manno, who previously said she would be out of town and participate by phone, cancelled, Piekarski said. A clinic representative who initially had been scheduled to attend wasn’t there either.
Nor were representatives from Multnomah County, including communications director David Austin and Patrick Schreiner of the Department of Community Justice. City officials who had been expected to attend cancelled as well.
It was unclear why the panelists didn’t appear. Neither Manno nor Austin could be reached for comment late Tuesday.
“It’s disheartening,” Piekarski said after the meeting. “We had sincerely hoped these people would be here.”
Still, the meeting lasted for two hours and featured representatives from the David Douglas School District. It included a discussion of the clinic’s past and repeated requests for community action.
Neighbors were encouraged to picket the clinic, write to county and city officials, contact Manno or complain to the owner of Plaza 125, the office park where the clinic is now located.
Organizers handed out a long list of contact information for officials from the school district, the city, county, neighborhood leaders and the landlord.
Opponents of the clinic also announced the creation of a group called Neighbors of Upper Southeast Portland (Facebook) to provide information on the issue and a way for residents to communicate.
Neighbors were encouraged to travel to Salem on May 6 for a public hearing on legislation proposed by Rep. Jessica Vega Pederson that would give counties the authority to govern where such clinics can be located.
Vega Pederson recently met with Manno and said she was “very disappointed” that Manno didn’t participate.
For now, Piekarski said, he wants neighbors to communicate with each other and public officials. And he still hopes for a community meeting with Manno.
“But at the same time,” he added, “we can’t defer action until we achieve that meeting.”
Tuesday, April 30, 2013
OR - Window shot at SE Portland sex-offender clinic
Labels: CrimeVigilante , Oregon , Shot , Treatment , Video
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04/29/2013
More proof that the public cannot handle the online registry without stooping to vigilantism.
By Carla Castano
PORTLAND (KOIN) - A counseling clinic that already relocated once because of neighborhood concerns is getting backlash from residents in its new location and called the police over a few issues.
Whole Systems Clinic and Consultation recently moved to 125th and Stark in Southeast Portland, but critics worry it’s too close to several schools in the area. Tensions have gotten so high police are now involved.
What appears to be BB gun holes are visible in the windows of the clinic that primarily serves convicted sex offenders. They moved out of a Sellwood neighborhood earlier this year.
But neighbors said they weren’t notified until after the clinic opened its doors on Stark.
“I worry for the children at the bus stop,” neighbor Lauren Mosbrucker told KOIN 6 News.
Area residents understand counseling for sex offenders is a necessary service, but they don’t want it near their neighborhood or schools.
Clinic employees, who said they’ve been harassed and threatened by neighbors, called Portland police in the past week. That’s why they’ve backed out of a Tuesday night community forum, though a mediator will attend along with neighbors, police and county officials.
Tuesday’s meeting is from 7-9 p.m. at the David Douglas District Office Boardroom at 1500 SE 130th in Portland.
See Also:
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Clinician Prejudice Toward Sex Offenders
Labels: Fear , MassHysteria , National , Treatment
By ROBERT WEISS LCSW, CSAT-S
Perverts and Rapists and Creeps, Oh My!
A couple of weeks ago my colleague Jenner Bishop posted an open letter on the IITAP (International Institute for Trauma and Addiction Professionals) listserv about clinician prejudice toward sex addicts and sex offenders. Jenner had just come from a “suite meeting” for an office she’d recently rented, at which she’d been bombarded with angry questions from the other therapists about how they were supposed to protect their clients from her “unsupervised” sex addicts and offenders. She had explained that she doesn’t work with violent offenders, and that the offending behaviors of her clients were typically something along the lines of hiring prostitutes and/or looking at illegal pornography – which the other therapists’ clients were probably also doing, even if the therapists weren’t aware of it – but Jenner’s fellow professionals just wouldn’t let it go.
She writes:
I was shocked. Eventually someone admitted that – despite the landlord sending around an advance email informing tenants the potential new renter is a Certified Sex Addiction Therapist – they wish they’d further investigated what a CSAT does, because they’d have informed the landlord that my practice is incompatible with theirs. You know, I just forget. We’re on the front lines of healing such a grossly misunderstood population. And it’s not just the masses, it’s fellow clinicians with these massive prejudices and blind spots.
Jenner is absolutely right. The world is filled with sexual prejudice of all types, and even highly trained professionals are not immune to this bias. I face this fact every single day both in my educational efforts and in my practice. Honestly, even the most basic and factual of my blogs is likely to draw “friendly fire” from certain colleagues. And only a year ago I had to host a three-day staff training session at one of the addiction treatment facilities I work for, the sole purpose of which was to calm the staff’s fears about working with a sexually addicted, potentially offending population. And their concerns – their prejudices if you will – were exactly the same as what Jenner recently faced. In other words, they were convinced that the facility’s sexually addicted clients were monsters who were going to be molesting and raping all over campus. Never mind the fact that they’d been treating these same people for years as part of the chemical dependency population.
Ignorance = Fear
The good news when it comes to clinicians is proper education can help to alleviate concerns. While it is true that some people’s prejudices toward sex offenders are simply too deep to overcome, for the most part therapists are open-minded individuals who respond well to unbiased, factual information. And that is my goal with this blog – to present the facts about who sex offenders are and the risks these men and women do and don’t present.
CO - Audit rips Colorado's lifetime-supervision sentence for sex offenders
Labels: Colorado , RegistryAudit , Treatment
04/24/2013
By David Olinger
A 15-year-old state law that created a lifetime-supervision sentence for Colorado sex offenders provides insufficient treatment for many of the highest-risk inmates and has left thousands of others waiting for therapy in prison, according to a recent audit.
Demand for treatment in the Department of Corrections' Sex Offender Treatment and Monitoring Program greatly exceeds supply, the audit found. Just one-sixth of inmates eligible to begin treatment are able to start the program each year — effectively keeping many sex offenders in prison indefinitely.
More than 1,000 inmates who are ready and waiting for treatment have passed their parole-eligibility dates, the auditors found. Their prolonged incarceration may be costing Colorado taxpayers as much as $30 million a year.
In a scathing audit given to corrections officials in February, Central Coast Clinical and Forensic Psychology Services Inc. also found the sex-offender program suffers from poorly qualified therapists and inappropriate levels of treatment given offenders.
"It's a disaster," said Laurie Kepros, who directs sexual-litigation cases for the Colorado public defender's office.
"Thousands of people are being told you have to have treatment to get out of prison" by a system failing to provide that treatment, she said. "We're paying for this every day."
Former Republican state Rep. Norma Anderson, who sponsored the 1998 law, said she recognizes the high cost of keeping many violent sex offenders in prison indefinitely and would like to see funding for treatment increased. Still, "I'd rather have them there than out committing another sex crime," she said. "I'm on the side of the victim and always will be."
- So is she basically saying that anybody who commits any crime, especially one that harms children, should be locked up for life? Sounds like it to us.
Slaying of prisons chief
Tom Clements, the state corrections chief who was killed March 19, had promised a swift response to the issues raised by the audit and fundamental changes to the sex-offender program in a March 8 letter to the legislative Joint Budget Committee.Clements was shot to death at the door of his Monument home. The suspected killer, [name withheld], was an inmate who had been released directly from solitary confinement to "intensive supervision" parole.
Clements' murder brought intense scrutiny to the state parole system because [name withheld] paroled on robbery and related charges, had slipped off his ankle bracelet five days earlier.
Now, legislators say they also plan to scrutinize the sex-offender treatment program within the prisons — and the law that created potential lifetime sentences for sex offenses.
The law established indeterminate sentences — five years to life, for example — for many sex-offense crimes in Colorado. Sex offenders who successfully complete a prison-treatment program and get paroled then enter a community-based lifetime-supervision program.
The lifetime-supervision sentence applies to people convicted of sexual-contact crimes ranging from statutory rape to sexual assaults of children, incest and rape. It does not apply to lesser sex crimes such as indecent exposure, adult prostitution and some attempted sexual assaults.
More sex offenders
The number of Colorado inmates classified as sex offenders has grown from 21 percent to 26 percent of the total prison population in five years. Much of the growth can be traced to the 1998 law.By 2012, more than 1,600 of the nearly 4,000 men classified as sex offenders in Colorado prisons were sentenced under the law.
The audit of the program was undertaken at the behest of state Rep. Claire Levy, a Boulder Democrat who serves on the Joint Budget Committee. She said it confirmed her longstanding concerns about the program's fairness and effectiveness.
It affirmed that "low-risk sex offenders can be treated as effectively in the community," Levy said. "The lifetime-supervision law does not allow that."
The report described the state's sex-offender treatment program as "largely a one-size-fits-all program in which all treatment participants are generally expected to complete the same treatment exercises."
This treatment occurs in groups that "are very large, often with 14 per group," the experts wrote.
The auditors reported that low-risk sex offenders in Colorado remain imprisoned at great cost, that the most dangerous offenders get too little attention and that nearly half the therapists they observed were "poor" — conducting group therapy sessions with behaviors "outside the range of what is acceptable for a therapist."
In some cases, those therapists appeared bored and "sometimes expressed hostility," the authors reported. "Therapists sometimes appeared demeaning and condescending, mocking their patients."
The state spends about $31,000 a year to keep a single person in prison. That's $30 million a year the state is spending unnecessarily if the prison system holds a thousand sex offenders who could be treated safely outside, said Kepros of the public defender's office.
"Highest priority"
Kellie Wasko, director of clinical services for the prison system, said the department is taking steps to improve training for therapists and plans to detail a set of proposed reforms to legislative committees next month."Our goal is to get all those offenders through a risk assessment" to determine how many low-risk inmates the prisons hold, she said. "That is our current and highest priority."
Wasko said the department has been working with the auditors to identify problems it can correct without legislative action.
"We want to make sure people understand we took this evaluation very seriously," she said.
The sex-offender treatment program has about 41 full-time employees, a number that will climb by two next fiscal year, when its $3 million budget is set to rise 0.6 percent.
The audit found Colorado prisons can yearly accept just 675 of 3,959 sex offenders who are within four years of parole eligibility, leaving 3,284 unable to participate in treatment.
As a result, other sex offenders may be unable to get any treatment before their release "even if they present an exceptionally high risk" to the community, the audit said.
It noted that therapists and inmates alike described the treatment programs as "under-resourced," with little attention to individual needs and scant opportunity for private, individual therapy.
Anderson, who sponsored the 1998 law, said she was inspired to act after witnessing the pain, medical costs and years of therapy an acquaintance endured after being attacked by a serial rapist.
She defends the law today, saying problems with waiting lists and therapist training could be solved with adequate funding of treatment programs.
"It's all about money," she said. "I've known for some time that they haven't had enough money in the treatment budget."
Sen. Kent Lambert, a Republican on the budget committee, said he was disturbed to learn that "they're treating them all the same, giving them all the same training," in prison sex-offender treatment programs.
Deserving of attention
And if some therapists "are doing things that are so inappropriate that they're counterproductive, that's a problem," he said. "That's the kind of thing that really ought to get the department's attention."A November corrections department report shows that 42 percent of the 1,797 sex offenders sentenced under the lifetime-supervision law had passed their parole-eligibility dates. Of the 168 paroled since the law passed, half were released the previous year. In some earlier years, the program paroled one inmate in 12 months.
Kepros attributes some of the increase in the number of sex offenders to the fact that inmates sentenced for other crimes can become classified as sex offenders for behavior inside the prison.
Many of those classifications involve men who become sexually abusive in prison. At the other extreme, Kepros said, one of her clients was given a sexual-misconduct write-up while taking part in a program that trains dogs to work with disabled people.
"The no-no," she said, "was letting the dog sleep on the bed."
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
IL - New therapy proves effective for juvenile sex offenders
Labels: Illinois , OffenderChild , Treatment
04/24/2013
By Sarah Boslaugh
How big a difference can new evidence-based treatment methods make in the cases of juvenile offenders with mental health problems?
In Cook County, Illinois, juvenile court leaders decided to find out. Specifically, they agreed to participate in a randomized controlled experiment to test the impact of Multisystemic Therapy (MST) – a prominent new treatment methodology – against the court’s usual services for youth accused or adjudicated for juvenile sex offenses.
The study, published in 2009, involved 127 youth accused of sex offenses and ordered by the court to attend sex offender treatment. Sixty-seven were assigned to MST, and 60 were assigned to Cook County probation department’s existing juvenile sex offender unit and required to take part in weekly sex offender treatment groups.
The offenders’ mean age was 14.6 years (range 11 to 18 years). Most youth (98 percent) were male, 54 percent Black, 44 percent White, with 31 percent reporting Hispanic ethnicity. Their offenses included aggravated criminal sexual assault (31 percent), criminal sexual abuse (24 percent), criminal sexual assault (18 percent), and aggravated criminal sexual abuse (15 percent). Evaluators found no differences between youth in the MST and comparison groups in terms of their sexual offense records or demographics.
Youth assigned to MST received treatment at home and in community settings such as school, scheduled for the family’s convenience. Caregivers as well as the juvenile offender were included in the treatment, which was delivered by clinicians specifically trained on the MST model. MST focuses on giving parents the skills and resources they need to deal with difficulties commonly experienced while raising adolescents, and giving the juveniles the skills and resources to deal with problems both inside and outside the family. For the sex offender group, the MST model was tailored to address youth and caregiver denial of the offense, minimize the youths’ access to potential victims, and promote normative, age-appropriate sexual experiences with peers.
The Treatment as Usual (TAU) group received services primarily from personnel from the juvenile sexual offender unit of Cook County’s juvenile probation department. They attended weekly sex offender treatment groups of 8 to 10, for 60-minute sessions led by probation officers who had completed a certification course for treating juvenile sexual offenders. The sessions addressed issues such as victim empathy, deviant arousal, and cognitive distortions, with the goals of helping youth accept responsibility for their offenses, break the sexual offense cycle, and devise strategies to reduce the risks for recidivism.
Researchers collected data on problem sexual behavior, delinquency, substance use, mental health symptoms, and out of home placement (e.g., foster care, detention, residential treatment) at baseline (within 72 hours of recruitment into the study) and at 6 and 12 months after recruitment. Sexual reoffending was not examined as an outcome because it is too rare to support statistical analysis—in fact only one incident of sexual recidivism was recorded for the entire study group during the 12-month period.
The study found that youth in the MST group proved far and away more successful than those receiving usual treatment. Juveniles in MST experienced significant reduction in problem sexual behavior (e.g., having unprotected sex, pressuring others into having sex), relative to the TAU group, as well as a significant reduction in delinquent behavior and substance use relative to the TAU group over the 12-month period. For instance, involvement in delinquent behavior declined from 75 percent to 30 percent for MST youth, versus a much smaller decline for youth in the TAU group (52 percent to 42 percent). Finally, MST youth proved far less likely than TAU youth to be removed from home in the year after treatment: 7 percent versus 18 percent.
“The findings suggest that family- and community-based interventions, especially those with an established evidence-base in treating adolescent antisocial behavior, hold considerable promise in meeting the clinical needs of juvenile sexual offenders,” the study concluded. “In addition, current results supporting MST bring into question the public health/safety effects of the increasingly severe legal consequences (e.g., lifetime public registration, prolonged residential treatment) placed on juveniles who sexually offend.”
Monday, April 22, 2013
ME - Bangor council restricts where sex offenders may live
Original Article04/22/2013
By Nick McCrea
BANGOR - In a 6-3 vote Monday night, the City Council passed an ordinance that bans some sex offenders from moving to within 750 feet of a publicly owned property frequented by children.
When the council first voted on the ordinance 28 months ago, Councilor David Nealley was the only councilor to vote in favor of the ordinance. This time around, he was joined by Councilors Joe Baldacci, Pauline Civiello, James Gallant, Charlie Longo and Benjamin Sprague.
Councilors Susan Hawes, Patricia Blanchette and council Chairman Nelson Durgin voted against the ordinance.
The residency restriction applies to individuals convicted of Class A, B or C sex offenses committed against a child under age 14. Offenders in that category who live within a 750-foot boundary won’t be required to move. However, if they did move, their residence would have to be outside the restricted zone, and they could not move back into a restricted area. That’s the most restrictive ordinance allowed under Maine law.
Bangor residents who spoke at committee and council meetings had voiced support for the ordinance.
David Green of Dunning Boulevard, who helped revive the proposed ordinance, said it would “make Bangor a less attractive destination for sex offenders,” pointing out that 21 of Bangor’s 141 registered offender registrants are from out of state and more than 60 percent of them are from outside Penobscot County.
The effectiveness of such ordinances across the country has been called into question in studies in Iowa, Colorado, California, Florida and other states. Most studies argue that the restrictions don’t have any effect, and some say they create a false sense of security in communities and decrease safety.
Councilors who voted against the ordinance, both in 2010 and again in 2013, argued that the proposal was nothing more than a feel-good ordinance.
In Minnesota, the state’s Department of Corrections conducted studies in 2003 and 2007 and found that there was no evidence that residential proximity to schools or parks affected recidivism rates, as people who offend tend to do so away from their own neighborhoods. The department’s research also found that pushing high-risk sex offenders to rural or suburban areas resulted in less access to services and supervision.
National studies indicate that more than 90 percent of child sexual assaults are perpetrated by someone who knows the child, oftentimes in the offender’s or victim’s home, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. Other studies indicate that sexual predators seldom offend in their own neighborhoods and target children away from their homes.
Shawn Yardley, the city’s director of health and community services, said during Monday’s meeting that while the ordinance seemed to be “well intended,” it could give parents and the public a false sense of security by indicating to parents that it’s safe to send their kids to a park because there aren’t any sex offenders in the area. Councilors Blanchette, Durgin and Hawes have echoed those same concerns, pointing at the ineffectiveness outlined in the studies.
Even some councilors who voted in favor of the ordinance Monday conceded it might not have tangible effects, but argued that it sent a message and took a step toward solving growing problems in the city.
Nealley and Sprague each said they “struggled” with their positions on the ordinance based on questions of efficacy.
“Probably they’re right,” Nealley said of the case studies’ findings, but he added that he didn’t believe doing nothing was the right move for the city.
Gallant pointed out that one of the studies states that “only” 7 percent of child sexual assaults are perpetrated by strangers. He said the use of “only” was troubling, as was the 7 percent figure.
“Even if we could save 7 percent — only 7 percent — it would be a good idea,” Gallant said.
Other councilors said that if the ordinance prevented one incidence of sexual abuse of a child, it would be worthwhile.
“We need to make our families here in Bangor our No. 1 priority,” Civiello said, arguing that the passage of the ordinance would send a message to residents and outsiders, much like the disruptive property ordinance and support of a bill that would reduce the city’s share of methadone patients.
Also during Monday’s meeting, the council voted to place a 180-day moratorium on quarries in the city after year-old concerns about noise and ailing property values suddenly re-emerged during committee meetings in March. Councilors said they would like to come to a solution well before the 180 days are up.
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Wednesday, April 17, 2013
CA - Sexual offenses not a life sentence
Labels: California , Church , GPS , National , Park , Punishment , Residency , School , Treatment , WronglyAccused
04/16/2013
By AMANDA ZIVE
Laws are always being made and revised when it comes to sexually-charged crimes. It’s a very difficult situation that many feel is preventable. The goal is an understandable one: protect the children.
The methods, on the other hand, are not.
Lumping together all felons, with sexually-charged crimes against them, is the first atrocity. Though classified as differing risk levels, the long term punishment for these crimes are the same. Sexual offenses range from child pornography, sexual battery and assault all the way to molestation and sexual annoyances.
The age of the offender, context of the offense, and even the severity of the action doesn’t deter the judicial system from giving these people lifetime punishments. Those who do properly register, even those with minor offenses, are barred from living in almost any busy city due to restrictions based on school, church and park locations for the rest of their lives.
But If the real aim is to protect children, than the studies done on offenders need to be taken into account.
According to the government-run Megan’s Law website, 90 percent of juvenile victims had known their assailant, while shockingly almost half the time it’s a family member doing the crime.
Barring all labeled a sexual deviants from living near schools is less helpful than banning family reunions for these people.
The reality is there is needed action. While a point can be made that sexually-charged crimes generally carry a lesser sentence than traditional violent crime, a gross stereotyping and lifelong damnation of all offenders isn’t going to help.
The attempt at crime prevention is valiant, but preventing criminals from moving on from their crimes hinders progression. If some of the efforts were shifted from punishment to rehabilitation, some convicts could successfully rejoin society as active members.
Unfortunately these people are rarely seen as mentally ill (which they often are) so they aren’t treated. Instead of identifying and treating the problem, we’ve resorted simply to removing it, seemingly forgetting that these felons are actually human beings.
A distasteful joke, or an inappropriate smack between coworkers could mean a lifetime of registering as a sex offender.
Clearly, something must be done to protect victims of this system: Those wrongfully accused, convicted of single offenses, or minor offenses must be offered forgiveness and a chance to rejoin a community.
In California, one is only awarded a life sentence in custody for murder or attempting it, or kidnapping with special circumstances like ransom. Yet, it is seen as just and fair to essentially imprison sex offenders for life by barring them from living near city buildings.
Sex offenders need to be treated the same as other criminals; a set amount of detention, a set amount of probation and the guarantee that with good behavior they can be forgiven.
Another flaw with these laws is how hard they are to enforce. With life terms, the registry of offenders is only ever going to grow.
Yet as of now, there is a constant increase of sex offenders not properly registering or reporting. When these members stop reporting, or remove GPS tracking anklets, they simply fall off of the grid entirely. With so many cases and such a heavy workload, officers often focus on the offenders they can locate.
Reasons for not reporting could include laziness, but it is a sign that the person is not willing to conform to what society demands of them for retribution. The punishment, if the assailant is located and detained, is generally a six-month sentence that is often reduced due to overcrowding; an empty threat and an unfit punishment.
Finally, these laws give a false sense of security to people with children who live near schools, parks or churches. Many are aware of these laws and feel safer knowing their neighbor isn’t a sexual deviant.
The truth is some offenders don’t report and statistics show offenders rarely abduct random children they don’t know.
These laws and restrictions, though they may be intended as prevention turn out to be nothing more than on-going punishments.
Tuesday, April 16, 2013
UK - Would you befriend a child abuser?
Labels: CirclesOfSupport , SupportGroups , Treatment , UnitedKingdom , Video
NOTE: Article has a video, but it's not playing right now. If it ever starts working, then we will embed it below. See the link above for the video.
04/16/2013
As part of This Morning's Crime Week, Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby have been discussing whether anyone would befriend a child abuser if they thought it could prevent them from re-offending?
Joining the presenters in the studio was Stephen Hanvey, who is the Chief Executive of Circles UK - a charity organisation which aims to rehabilitate child abusers and Chloe Stirk, who is a volunteer.
Speaking about the organisation, Stephen said: "It's a small group of very carefully selected, trained, supervised volunteers who will dedicate time to spend with somebody who has committed these offences."
"(They are) keeping an eye on them, monitoring what they do, work very closely with probation officers and police. But also to counteract that isolation and alienation they experience."
"And the evidence is that if you provide them with a level of attention and some social and practical support you can help keep them on the straight and narrow."
"It's about the community taking responsibility."
Stephen Hanvey, Chief Executive of Circles UK
Initiatives such as Circles UK first came to prominence in Canada in 1995, after a Quaker community befriended a known sex offender to help him rehabilitate.
Circles UK volunteer Chloe Stirk told Phillip and Holly her work was very rewarding, but she was aware of the dangers of working with a notoriously manipulative group of offenders.
"We go through a lot of training....and really the rule of thumb is just to always err on the side of caution," she said.
"So if I come out of a meeting thinking everything is great then I know that I need to pick myself up again."
"Once you're aware of that, you learn to be a bit more confident about spotting when you are being manipulated."
"You don't sign up to it to go in and be judgmental."
Chloe Stirk, Circles UK volunteer
Statistics suggested that in medium to high risk sex offenders around 30% have reoffended in the past five years.
- We assume that when they say "reoffended" it means a new sex crime, but that is only a guess since they didn't specify that or not, but, ex-sex offenders already have one of the lowest reoffense rates of any other ex-felon, yet they are not on an online shaming hit-list nor punished as much as those less likely to reoffend.
Stephen said that of the 160 offenders his organisation have worked with, only eight have reoffended,
He admited that while the concept of Circles UK may be controversial to many, people should recognise the importance of the work they are doing.
"There is no cure (for pedophilia), but what you can do is to help these people recognise the triggers and the dangers of falling back into dangerous and distorted thing," he said.
- And not all ex-sex offenders are pedophiles either.
Monday, April 15, 2013
CO - Complex sex offender system isn't working, say lawmakers and lawyers
04/14/2013
By RYAN MAYE HANDY
When he was 22 years old in 2003, [name withheld #1] met a girl online. She was two months away from her 15th birthday, and he knew it.
Both were living in Colorado Springs, and after two months of chatting online, they met and had sex. The girl told [name withheld #1] that she had been sexually involved with men his age before, so he thought it was no big deal, he said.
“I kind of got myself into feeling I was her friend,” [name withheld #1] said. “If I said no, she was going to take that wrong.”
During the next couple of months, they had sex three or four times, and in June 2004, [name withheld #1] was arrested for sex assault on a child, after the girl’s parents discovered their relationship, [name withheld #1] said.
The arrest marked the beginning of a long, winding trip for [name withheld #1] through the correctional system, a trip determined by Colorado’s Lifetime Supervision Act of 1998.
Concern for public safety was at the heart of the act’s creation; it was designed to keep people convicted of the worst types of sex offenses behind bars, possibly for life, while using therapy to treat others with lesser offenses, allowing them to transition back into society and live under strict parole requirements.
But the system isn’t working as lawmakers intended.
The system has become an expensive way to warehouse sex offenders of all types, state lawmakers and lawyers say. Thousands of offenders, including [name withheld #1], are serving what are essentially life sentences in prison, where release on parole depends on the availability of money and treatment spots. Of the nearly 2,000 Colorado sex offenders sent to prison under the Lifetime Supervision Act, 168 have been released.
Costs for the treatment program are rising yearly, as more offenders require treatment and others are on a years-long waitlist, with a disproportionate amount of money supporting a relatively small prison population. A state-ordered study of the offender treatment program found that it is poorly funded and is staffed by therapists whose training is out of date and who use antiquated treatment techniques.
Without more money, Department of Corrections officials have said, the system bears little resemblance to the one lawmakers envisioned and is further threatened by the costs of lawsuits by prisoners desperate to get into the treatment program that is the key to their release.
Raising red flags
“With the benefit of this hindsight, I probably wouldn’t have supported it, but back then, who knows?” Sen. Pat Steadman, head of the Joint Budget Committee, said of the act. “It’s hard to be rational and evidence-based when you are talking about sex offenders. It’s so easy to let the emotion and the fear and demonizing these guys rule the day in terms of how policy decisions get made. That’s unfortunate, and we need to try to avoid that.”
In April 2012, state lawmakers ordered a study of the sex offender treatment program that is mandated by the Lifetime Supervision Act. The findings, released Feb. 1, confirmed the most problematic aspects of the treatment program: It is inefficient, costly and poorly executed. The study showed that budget cuts have crippled the program’s effectiveness and that undertrained and often underqualified therapists, distrusted by offenders, base their treatment on outdated research.
The sentencing system for sex offenders can be fixed by two things, the report said: more money and new laws.
The Department of Corrections agrees. It says the Lifetime Supervision Act cannot work without millions more dollars to push hundreds of offenders through the system.
But plans to enact changes have been derailed by a busy General Assembly session — dominated by gun control and civil union bills — and the March shooting death of Tom Clements, Department of Corrections director.
The most crucial change to the sex offender treatment program, namely eliminating the mandate that every offender get treatment, requires a change in law and must wait until the next session, said Rep. Claire Levy, D-Boulder, vice chairwoman of the Joint Budget Committee.
A work in progress
Meanwhile, sex offenders desperate for freedom are suing the DOC. One class-action lawsuit questions the constitutionality of keeping sex offenders in prison. Without the funds to get offenders through treatment, the department expects it will be the target of several more lawsuits.
Two months after [name withheld #1]’s arrest, he was given a deferred sentence of four years and put on probation. Three months later, he violated his probationary restrictions and was sentenced to a Community Corrections program in Colorado Springs for two years. He spent more than two years going through treatment and probation programs, failing to meet the requirements each time.
Five years after meeting the girl online and after multiple probation failures, [name withheld #1] was given an indeterminate sentence, a minimum of two years to life in prison. Four years into his sentence, he is still in prison.
[name withheld #1] feels the effects of the tightening state corrections budget.
“I’m kind of at the back of the list right now,” he said in November. “It feels like a punishment for me. I bring it up in group (therapy).”
In desperation, [name withheld #1] and other offenders will do nearly anything to progress through treatment and get their tickets to freedom — even admit to crimes they did not commit, [name withheld #1] said. Sex offenders take a lie-detector test, which is meant to ferret out confessions to crimes they might have lied about in the past. [name withheld #1] continually fails the test — meaning, he must be lying, he said — and in frustration he has resorted to making up crimes and false confessions. The study of the treatment system confirmed that inmates have been known to deliberately lie on the test, called a polygraph.
“We have an expensive philosophy — if you don’t say you did it, then you’re going to stay in prison until you do,” said Laurie Rose Kepros, a public defender.
Penalties were largely unknown
Under the Lifetime Supervision Act, the term sex offender is broad and encompasses many offenses — some of which are punished more severely than they were before 1998. The act aims to put sex offenders through a heavily supervised and intense system of treatment, whether they are in prison or on probation. That has made the process — from court, to prison, to parole — more complicated.
A small percentage of sex offenders in Colorado are serial pedophiles or violent rapists who go straight to prison. Most convicted sex offenders, 70 percent, are like [name withheld #1]. They are convicted of consensual sex crimes with minors, for example, and are given probationary sentences.
Offenders with different crimes or differing contexts can get the same conviction. [name withheld #1], for instance, was convicted of sex assault on a child in a position of trust — one of the same counts brought against former Colorado Springs police officer [name withheld #2], who on Feb. 22 was sentenced to 70 years to life for molesting schoolchildren. But the context of [name withheld #2]’s and [name withheld #1]’s crimes were viewed differently by the court, and the men were given different sentences.
To tailor sentences to the crime, judges and lawyers study closely the context of the sex offense. Kepros, statewide director of sexual offense defense for the Colorado Public Defenders Office, and El Paso County Judge Tom Kennedy, among other lawyers and judges, said the system works best when an offender’s situation is closely considered. Unlike murder or manslaughter — convictions that carry a consistent sentence — a sex offense felony doesn’t necessarily send an offender straight to prison.
“For the majority of sex crimes, a person is probation-eligible,” said Kennedy, who serves on the Sex Offender Management Board, a group that oversees the prison treatment programs.
These sex offenders spend time in a Community Corrections sex offender treatment program or are sentenced to work duty. Offenders, even those on probation, face decades of state supervision. It is only when they violate the terms of their probation that they face a prison sentence. Whether on probation, in Community Corrections programs or in prison, sex offenders are part of the same group — regardless of the severity of their crime. They must register as sex offenders and often do treatment together, Kennedy said.
[name withheld #1]’s first probationary sentence was the result of a plea bargain — he told the court he was guilty in exchange for avoiding a possible life sentence.
But after [name withheld #1]’s repeated failures on probation, what he sought to avoid became his fate: He was given an indeterminate sentence.
Changing strategy
“If I was a practicing attorney and I was having a client who was pleading guilty, you’d certainly have to advise them that they could spend time in prison,” he said.
Just one-quarter of sex offenders begin their sentences in prison. But because so few of them get out, the group dominates the population of lifetime offenders.
Since 1998, there have been 1,940 people sentenced to prison under the Lifetime Supervision Act, according to Colorado Judicial Department statistics released in January. Of those, 1,797 sex offenders are still in prison. There are more sex offenders in the Colorado Department of Corrections than prisoners serving a lifetime sentence for first-degree murder, at 831 offenders.
Because of the Lifetime Supervision Act, every sex offender sentenced under the act in Colorado is counted among those serving lifetime sentences. There are 2,474 prisoners in Colorado facing a maximum of life, and sex offenders make up almost exactly half of that group.
Far-reaching impact
Before the Lifetime Supervision Act, a person convicted of sex assault on a child in a position of trust, a class 3 felony, served a minimum of 12 years in prison. Today, an offender guilty of the same crime can receive a sentence of 12 years to life in prison. If that offender is paroled, he or she could spend at least 20 years under close state supervision.
The act was designed to keep perpetrators of violent sex crimes in prison for as long as possible. But many sex offenders across the spectrum, regardless of the severity of the crime, face long prison sentences and delayed access to treatment that is required for parole, defense attorneys and public defenders said.
Lifetime probation, parole in bill
“We cannot afford to keep them in jail or in prison for the rest of their life, and that’s not fair,” she said when she introduced the bill. “So, what this bill does — it does not change the sentencing requirements as already in law, but it does establish lifetime probation and lifetime parole.”
It was part of a national trend, said Peggy Heil of Denver, who has worked with sex offender treatment programs since before the bill passed.
“Back then in the United States, there was a trend in civil commitment laws,” Heil said last year. Civil commitment laws placed sex offenders in mental institutions instead of prison. In Kansas, the sex offender program required mental evaluations before offenders were paroled. Arizona instituted a program that placed sex offenders under state supervision, even after they were paroled.
Records of Colorado House Judiciary Committee meetings that year show the act was wildly popular, with representatives eager to place sex offenders behind bars for life. But attorneys who testified before the committee were apprehensive. While the bill considered the needs of pattern pedophiles, it didn’t make allowances for a lower class of sex offender, someone with a statutory rape or consensual sex charge, they argued.
Saskia Jordan, now a private defense attorney and former president of the Colorado Criminal Defense Bar, predicted that the bill would present many complications.
“You will have people being sentenced to life sentences who, in the past, wouldn’t have … and the sentence may well be unduly harsh,” she told the committee.
Jordan was also concerned that the bill’s plan for parole was unrealistic; it wouldn’t allow inmates out until it could be assured they wouldn’t reoffend. No one can be certain that an offender won’t reoffend, Jordan said.
'No known cure'
Erin Jemison, executive director of the Colorado Coalition Against Sex Assault, said the benefits of the Lifetime Supervision Act far outweigh its problems. Offenders who violate probation need the prison environment to take treatment seriously, Jemison said.
“It’s hard for me to be convinced that the guy who is in prison is the guy who made one mistake,” Jemison said.
Victims of sex assault experience a lifetime of trauma, said Doug Cohen, an assistant district attorney in Jefferson County who was formerly an assistant district attorney in Colorado Springs.
“When the defendant was committing the crime, did they think about the fact that they were submitting the victim to an indeterminate life sentence?” Cohen said.
“I think in a lot of ways, they (victims) may just be left out there after a certain amount of time to fend for themselves. (That’s the) unanswered problem — like I said, their sentences are indeterminate,” Cohen said.
Anderson was inspired to champion the act after a close family friend was sexually assaulted. While she acknowledged that many offenders object to the system she helped create, Anderson contended that they cannot understand a victim’s pain.
“I guess they haven’t had a family member who’s had to live their lives under the burden of a sex offense,” she said in November 2011.
Considering a fix
“We really did not want to continue investment in treatment programs that weren’t working, that weren’t evidence-based, that weren’t getting the results we want,” said Steadman, who as chairman of the House Joint Budget Committee commissioned the report. “We don’t want to just warehouse these guys in prison for the rest of their lives.”
The report’s findings echo many of [name withheld #1]’s and other inmates’ complaints about the treatment they receive in prison.
[name withheld #1] said he dislikes the “one size fits all” style of treatment, where offenders with vastly different crimes are treated together. That’s something the report harshly criticized as well. Because of this philosophy, a portion of low-risk offenders are being “over treated,” the report said. The limited treatment slots should be saved for high-risk offenders, the report said, while offenders such as [name withheld #1] should be on the fast-track to get out of prison and finish treatment outside.
And a lack of money means that therapists aren’t well trained, the report said. Training for new therapists is sporadic and inefficient and relies on out-of-date techniques. Therapists isolate the offenders, making them feel like monsters, [name withheld #1] said. Therapists are often quick to discipline, sometimes unfairly, [name withheld #1] claims. He said he doesn’t trust his therapists and like other offenders fears retaliation from them, particularly if they admit to disliking the treatment program. The report also noted and criticized the inmates’ fear of their therapists.
“There tends to be corner cutting and drift away from therapeutic models,” the report said.
Judge: Program sets up failure
Of all the probation programs for offenders, sex offender probation is the toughest, said Angel Weant, a probation services liaison officer for the Colorado Judicial Department. Although most offenders, roughly 70 percent, start with probation, many end up in prison. Kennedy, the judge, said the program’s challenges set many up for failure.
“It’s very demanding, so many people who initially get a probationary sentence will fail,” he said.
After [name withheld #1] violated his first probation sentence, he had to move out of his parents’ home because his young niece was living with them. He was given two years in Community Corrections, a state-run program that provides treatment to offenders, with a 10-years-to-life probation sentence afterward.
[name withheld #1] finished the Community Corrections program, but as before, he flouted some restrictions. He dated a woman, and in 2006, they went to the annual Balloon Glo at Memorial Park, where [name withheld #1] bumped into his probation officer. Events like the Balloon Glo, teeming with children, are prohibited for someone with [name withheld #1]’s history. He was sentenced to another four-year stint with Community Corrections but was kicked out after six months because he continued to see his girlfriend and his family members, he said. Like many sex offenders, [name withheld #1] said he did not understand the severity of a lifetime offense until it looked him squarely in the face. [name withheld #1] also said he felt that his punishment did not fit his crime: He was originally sentenced because of his interactions with a 14-year-old, and with no history of pedophilia, he did not understand why he should be barred from interacting with adult women or young children.
'Toughest' program
Sex offender treatment specialists consider sex assault a manipulative crime, where victims are coerced into keeping silent and trusting their perpetrators. And sex offenses are widely recognized as some of the most under-reported crimes; probationary restrictions attempt to assiduously control whom offenders come in contact with to prevent them from reoffending, judges and victims advocates say.The intensive program for sex offenders is “probably the toughest that a person could be under,” for good reason, Kennedy said.
Allison Boyd, a victims advocate for Jefferson County, said most offenders fail probation because it does not provide the same motivation as a potential lifetime sentence in prison.
“(In many cases), sex offenders start out on probation, where they appear remorseful and want to change. But once they start, this is not the path they choose. They don’t choose to change their behavior,” Boyd said.
Offenders who violate the terms of a probationary sentence deserve what they get: prison, said Jemison, the director of Colorado Coalition Against Sex Assault. She doesn’t buy the argument that inmates are being held for unjustifiably long sentences — if they’ve ended up in prison, it was because their offenses were serious or they repeatedly violated probation, Jemison said.
“It’s hard for me to be convinced that the guy who is in prison is the guy who made one mistake,” she said.
For many sex offenders, the restrictions of probation often seem incongruous with their crimes, said Laurie Knight, a sex offender therapist who worked for Adams County Social Services for two decades.
For a man such as [name withheld #1], whose initial crime involved a teenage girl, dating an adult woman or attending an event with children younger than 10 might not seem like an issue, Knight said.
But the rules are determined by research, Knight said. Research shows that one sex offending behavior can stem from another — even if [name withheld #1] had no sexual history involving children younger than 15, his one-time attraction to a minor means he runs a higher risk.
“People who come into the system rarely only committed a crime they’ve got caught for. Sixty percent of adult rapists have also molested children,” Knight said.
The strict probation system isn’t perfect, Knight said, but the probationary rules aren’t the problem.
“It’s how the rules are implemented. Every probation (program) has a different culture,” she said.
Her solution for offenders such as [name withheld #1] is simple: “Get out and stay out.”
But in 2008, after violating the conditions of two probationary sentences, [name withheld #1] was sentenced to serve two years to life in Fremont Correctional Facility outside Cañon City.
The ticket to freedom
To be considered for parole, offenders must start and finish treatment programs in prison, including taking lie-detector tests, called polygraphs, and meticulously recalling and discussing their personal sexual histories. Both are meant to ensure honesty from offenders, a key in their treatment, according to the program philosophy.
An inability to finish the second of two phases of treatment has kept [name withheld #1] in prison past his parole date. For more than a year, he has failed polygraphs and stalled in his treatment. He has now given up hope that he’ll be paroled.
Glenice [name withheld #1] has watched her son fail repeatedly in the treatment programs; she is frustrated, too. She is one of the founding members of Advocates for Change, a group working on behalf of sex offenders. The members are mostly mothers or spouses, who keep in touch with offenders and push legislators to change the Lifetime Supervision Act. While treatment might have helped [name withheld #1]’s son, she now thinks it is past the point of doing any good.
“He’s learned a lot about himself. But once you get to a certain point, it’s like beating a dead horse,” she said in late 2011. “They (sex offenders) made a really bad choice. To spend your life behind bars for something like that is ridiculous.”
Trouble with treatment
Sex offender treatment is a contentious subject for therapists and offenders — and it’s expensive.Sex offenders complain that treatment casts them as hopeless and helpless monsters, with no hope of change. Therapists have adopted various philosophies of treatment — at one point, they treated offenders as if they suffered from incurable diseases, while other therapists believe sex offending is a choice.
Once in prison, offenders are put on a list to get into the treatment program. The program’s philosophy is based on helping sex offenders control their behaviors, said Heil, who heads the program for the Department of Corrections.
“Sex offending is a behavior. What treatment can do is teach people how to manage the problems that lead to their offending,” Heil said.
[name withheld #1] and other offenders said they dislike their therapists and have resorted to lying on polygraphs out of desperation to pass them.
The audit confirmed that offenders are often terminated from treatment too quickly or easily. The program has a notoriously high termination rate, inmates said. Offenders can be bumped out of the program for disciplinary issues or for being what inmates call “in denial” of their crime. In 2011, more than 90 percent of the offenders in the first phase of treatment were terminated, for various reasons.
Still, a few offenders have extracted some good from their treatment. [name withheld #1], who said he considers himself an introvert, said he has gained confidence.
Nonetheless, as he struggles to get through Phase II, [name withheld #1] has given up. After more than a year in prison keeping a low profile and cooperating with his therapists, [name withheld #1] continued to fail multiple polygraphs, which he was counting on to help him pass out of Phase II and get one step closer to parole.
[name withheld #1] said he remained frustrated, even as signs of change trickled into the prison. Last fall, auditors visited Fremont Correctional Facility, where [name withheld #1] is serving his time, and interviewed inmates, giving them a rare chance to vent their frustrations in privacy.
“The hope around here is that they’ll make some changes,” [name withheld #1] said.
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