Are sex-offender laws in need of reform?

Are sex-offender laws in need of reform?
[link to www.mlive.com]


America's sex-offender laws no doubt will cheer a Muskegon-area man's successful effort to get his name off the state's registry.

A state appeals court ruled unanimously this week that keeping the man's name on the list [link to www.mipsor.state.mi.us] constituted cruel and unusual punishment.

When he was 18, Robert Dipiazza engaged in a consensual sexual relationship with his 14-year-old girlfriend (whom he eventually married). A teacher who found a provocative photograph of the couple contacted authorities.

As a first-time offender, Dipiazza was not convicted of a sex crime, but he was listed on the state's sex-offender registry. He said he has struggled to find and keep jobs since.

In what his attorney called "a victory for common sense," the court, in effect, acknowledged the question of whether teenagers who engage in consensual sex belong on the same list as, say, child molesters or sexual predators. Many argue there should be a "Romeo and Juliet" exemption for young lovers.

Well, should there? Sex below the age of consent (16 in Michigan) is still illegal, but does the offense warrant inclusion on a list that notoriously stigmatizes those on it and is vague about the crime committed?

A scathing report in the Economist over the summer makes the case for reform. Since the magazine's Web site requires a subscription, I'll summarize.

It leads with the story of Wendy Whitaker, a Georgia resident who at age 17 performed oral sex on a 15-year-old classmate. She was convicted of sodomy -- which according to Georgia law at the time included oral sex -- and given five years of probation. She failed to meet certain terms of the probation and was thrown in jail for more than a year.

In her late 20s, she struggles to find employment and housing and is socially ostracized because her name remains on the state's sex-offender registry. Sound familiar?

The report goes on:

"Every American state keeps a register of sex offenders. California has had one since 1947, but most states started theirs in the 1990s. Many people assume that anyone listed on a sex-offender registry must be a rapist or a child molester. But most states spread the net much more widely. A report by Sarah Tofte of Human Rights Watch, a pressure group, found that at least five states required men to register if they were caught visiting prostitutes. At least 13 required it for urinating in public (in two of which, only if a child was present). No fewer than 29 states required registration for teenagers who had consensual sex with another teenager. And 32 states registered flashers and streakers.

"Because so many offenses require registration, the number of registered sex offenders in America has exploded. As of December last year, there were 674,000 of them, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. If they were all crammed into a single state, it would be more populous than Wyoming, Vermont or North Dakota. As a share of its population, America registers more than four times as many people as Britain, which is unusually harsh on sex offenders. America's registers keep swelling, not least because in 17 states, registration is for life."

Earlier in the decade, a judge declared Michigan's sex-offender registry unconstitutional because there was no way for offenders to challenge their placement on the list, thereby violating their rights to due process.

The registry temporarily was shut down, but it was reactivated upon reversal of the ruling. Expect this week's court decision to revive debate.