Sex Offender Policies Research Articles

The management of sex offenders in the community: from policy to practice

This paper provides an overview of the most significant public policy initiatives that apply to known sexual offenders who live in the community. It is argued that while registration schemes, community notification, and offender residency restrictions have become a prominent feature of contemporary sex offender policy, the evidence base supporting their implementation is, at best, limited. There is a need to develop policies which are more tailored to the needs of individual offenders and which are explicitly designed to manage risk. Policies which mandate and facilitate interagency and partnership working represent one way in which individualised and research‐informed approaches can be developed. It is suggested that the implementation of this type of approach may ultimately lead to more effective community responses to preventing sexual reoffending than those which rely solely on monitoring and supervision.

Responding to Sex Offenders

The science examining institutional and community-based responses to sexual offending has been well documented. The responses to this form of criminal behavior include penal incarceration followed by civil commitment, community notification, and sex offender registration. To date, evidence-based findings report that these correctives and/or curatives yield limited effectiveness sufficient to justify their continued maintenance as statewide or even national criminal justice and mental health policy prescription. One official systems-level way that policy receives legitimacy is through the Courts. Interestingly, the precedent-setting sex offender case law indicates that current policy prescriptions are constitutionally permissible and therefore justifiable as regulatory practices, notwithstanding the empirical evidence that challenges their soundness. This article summarizes the science regarding sex offender policy from the point of imprisonment to reentry, recounts the relevant case law that judicially sanctions such institutional and community practices, and explains how the driver for sex offender law and policy is legal moralism grounded in and advanced by utilitarian reasoning and duty-based logic. This article concludes by suggesting how judicial reliance on legal moralism could further the interests of public safety and civil liberties if insights from virtue jurisprudence informed the analysis.

Assessment of public attitudes towards sex offenders in an Australian population

Public attitudes towards sex offenders are believed to play a key role in the development of legislation and public policy designed to manage the risks posed by known sex offenders who live in the community. There have, however, been few previous attempts to validate methods by which public attitudes can be measured. The current study aims to address this issue by establishing the factor structure of the Community Attitudes Towards Sex Offenders (CATSO) scale with an Australian community sample and examine the extent to which demographic variables and support for sex offender management policies influence these attitudes. A sample of 552 participants recruited through online social media sites completed the CATSO as well as a number of items developed by the researchers designed to assess individuals' support for specific sex offender policies. Results of an exploratory factor analysis suggested the presence of four distinct factors which were labelled ‘social tendencies’, ‘treatment and punishment’, ‘crime characteristics’ and ‘sexual behaviour’. Individuals with higher levels of educational attainment rated sex offenders less negatively than those with lower educational attainment, while those who reported being supportive of community notification reported more negative attitudes towards sex offenders.

'They're Planting Stories in the Press': The Impact of Media Distortions on Sex Offender Law and Policy

'They're Planting Stories in the Press': The Impact of Media Distortions on Sex Offender Law and Policy

Predictors of Support for Juvenile Sex Offender Registration: Educated Individuals Recognize the Flaws of Juvenile Registration

We investigated demographic predictors of support for juvenile sex offender registration policies, including education level, gender, political orientation, and age. Participants were 168 individuals recruited from public places in a Midwest community (45% women; M age = 42). In line with hypotheses, as education level increased, support for juvenile registration decreased, as did the belief that juvenile registration protects the community. In addition, as education level increased, belief that the juvenile understood his actions decreased, as did support for juvenile registration when it is framed as ineffective at reducing sex crime. These beliefs mediated the relationship between education level and diminished support for juvenile registration. Implications of these results for the advancement of effective juvenile sex offender policy are discussed.

Identifying the Sources of Community Corrections Professionals’ Attitudes About Sex Offender Residence Restrictions

Over the past two decades, a number of different types of policies have been developed to govern sex offenders. Sex offender residence restriction policies have proliferated as part of this growth in sex offender policies. Several studies have focused on how different types of respondents perceive these policies. These studies show that individuals have mixed perceptions about the policies. Less attention has been given to the factors that influence professionals’ attitudes about sex offender residence restriction. In this study, 716 community corrections professionals were surveyed in an effort to identify how they framed their perceptions about residence restriction. Specific attention was given to the impact of demographic factors, education, and perceptions of the fairness and efficacy of sex offender policies. Results show that support for the policies is tied to gender, education, and perceptions of fairness and effectiveness. Implications are discussed.

Sex Fiends, Perverts, and Pedophiles: Understanding Sex Crime Policy in America. By Chrysanthi Leon. New York: New York University Press, 2011. 444 pp. $70.00 cloth, $23.00 paper.

Sex Fiends, Perverts, and Pedophiles: Understanding Sex Crime Policy in America. By Chrysanthi Leon. New York: New York University Press, 2011. 444 pp. $70.00 cloth, $23.00 paper.At the crux of the current crisis of mass incarceration, increasing punitiveness, and alarmist politics, is the heated controversy about sex offender policy. Current policies create the impression that sex offender policy has always consisted of lengthy, incapacitating sentences and pervasive post-sentence supervision; moreover, many previous studies have focused on the punitive discourse surrounding sex offenders, thus blurring the line between perceptions and representations of the problem and the methods adopted to address it.Chrysanthi Leon's new book is a welcome and knowledgeable addition to this debate. The book thoroughly analyzes sex offender policy, challenging the existing academic and practical discourse in two important ways. First, it offers a much-needed historical perspective, breaking the timeline into roughly three periods: the sexual psychopath era, featuring a plethora of approaches toward sexual offenses; the rehabilitative era, during which the belief that propensity to commit sex offenses was curable led to a focus on clinical approaches; and the modern containment era, in which mass incarceration and numerous restrictions are related to a belief in incurability. In doing so, the book reveals nuance and layers that existing scholarship tends to mask and compress.Second, the book analyzes both discourse and policy, drawing on an astounding variety of sources, including interviews with practitioners, field observations, quantitative databases of arrest, conviction and civil commitment rates, academic sources, newspapers, and popular culture. In doing so, it provides a more complete perspective on the relationship between academic opinions, political initiatives, professional practices, and public discourse and perceptions.The conclusions Leon draws from this extensive inquiry are nuanced and sophisticated. The most noticeable trend is a unification of the sex offender category. While the sexual psychopath era and the rehabilitation era (to a lesser extent) feature efforts to distinguish sex offenders from each other, in the containment era sex offenders are perceived as a monolithic category of monsters. This trend has disturbing, and sometimes surprising, implications: Our ability to properly assess risk is hindered by our perception of propensity to offend as static and unchanging, therefore leading to an overbroad category of monitored and controlled sex offenders, but simultaneously diverting our attention away from sexual offenses committed within the family.Leon also problematizes the usual explanations for sex offender incarceration, which focus on moral panics and regard sex offenders as a unique category of subjects, separate from general criminal justice trend. Instead, she offers an integrated explanation that sees sex offender incarceration as part of the general trend toward more frequent and more severe incarceration. …

Applying Developmental Criminology to Law: Reconsidering Juvenile Sex Offenses

In this article we apply a developmental psychology analysis to sex offender laws and policies for adolescents to examine how such laws and policies, derived primarily from downward extension of adult criminal predatory sexual offender statutes and policies, serve the early identification of predators, constraint of such behavior, and/or engagement in rehabilitation. This focus is framed within advances in the past 20 years in the understanding of neurobiology and the social development of adolescence and in the understanding of the makeup of the population potentially coming under juvenile sex offender regulations. We find a significant mismatch between the prevailing laws and policies and the scientific knowledge about adolescents' development and the intended service to public safety. We provide suggestions from the attending empirical knowledge for increasing differentiation in the understanding of and treatment of adolescents and adult offenders. We also suggest heterogeneity, or subgroup differences, within the adolescent population now considered offenders are an important contributor to the mismatch. We discuss the benefits of structuring policies and laws so they are grounded in a developmental understanding of behavior, which will likely lead to a reduction in recidivism and an increase in public safety. Similarly, important research efforts to shore up understanding are proposed.

Assessing Community Residents’ Perceptions of Local Registered Sex Offenders: Results from a Pilot Survey

Building on a social capital and social control framework that emphasizes the importance of the local neighborhood context for residential action, this research utilizes data from surveys of community residents to examine their perceptions of their neighborhhood, their familiarity with sex offender policies, and their awareness of and attitudes toward local registered sex offenders. Results indicate that a majority of residents are unaware of the presence of local sex offenders. However, residents who perceive their neighborhoods as high in informal social control also perceive their neighbors as more likely to report on local sex offenders.

Sex fiends, perverts, and pedophiles: understanding sex crime policy in America

Acknowledgments Introduction 1 Punishment Stories 2 The Sexual Psychopath Era: 1930-1955 3 The Era of Rehabilitative Debate: 1950-1980 4 Sex Offender Rehabilitation in California and How It Worked: 1950-1980 5 Sex Offender Policy in the Containment Era: 1980-Present 6 Experts and Governance: Shifting Politics and Disappearing Strategies 7 Chilling Effects 8 National Sex Offender Punishment Trends since 1920 9 Conclusion Appendix A: Research Methodology Appendix B: Timeline: Contexts of Sex Crime Policy Notes Bibliography Index About the Author

Sex offender policies in an era of zero tolerance

Criminology & Public PolicyVolume 10, Issue 2 p. 229-233 EDITORIAL INTRODUCTION Sex offender policies in an era of zero tolerance What does effectiveness really mean? Jill S. Levenson, Jill S. Levenson Senior Editor Lynn UniversitySearch for more papers by this author Jill S. Levenson, Jill S. Levenson Senior Editor Lynn UniversitySearch for more papers by this author First published: 03 April 2011 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-9133.2011.00704.xCitations: 3 Direct correspondence to Jill S. Levenson, Lynn University, 3601 N. Military Trail, Boca Raton, FL 33431 (e-mail: [email protected]). Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Citing Literature Volume10, Issue2May 2011Pages 229-233 RelatedInformation

The contexts and politics of evidence-based sex offender policy

The contexts and politics of evidence-based sex offender policy

What is smart sex offender policy?

InJuly 1994, 7-year-old Megan Kanka was raped and killed by a recidivist sex offender living across the street from her in Hamilton Township, NJ. The perpetrator, Jesse Timmendequas, had a history of sexually abusing children and lived with two other sex offenders; yet his neighbors were unaware of their criminal history. Because of Jesse’s anonymity, he lured Megan into his house to see his puppy. Megan’s parents said that if they had only known that sex offenders were living across the street from them, Megan would be alive today. They then advocated for notification of sex offenders’ whereabouts to become mandatory in all states, and many politicians were eager to support her and any legislation that could potentially protect children from sexual predators. As a result, the federal government and all states enacted their own versions of registration and community notification laws (RCNLs), which are known colloquially as “Megan’s Law.” During the last decade and a half, RCNLs have overcome legal challenges to be developed and expanded; now, RCNLs regulate the rights and movements of sex offenders living in the community. Like Megan’s Law, most of these policies are “memorial laws” based on the emotionally charged cases of a child being raped and/or killed by a stranger (Terry and Furlong, 2008). The goal of RCNLs are to raise awareness of sex offenders in the community so that individuals can protect themselves from victimization, and such awareness should in turn reduce the likelihood that the registered offenders will recidivate (Beck and Travis, 2006). But the laws were not based on a sound theoretical framework of crime prevention and control, and there are some fundamental flaws in the basis of this legislation. More than a dozen years after their implementation, empirical studies now show moderate, if any, effects of this legislation on either the recidivism levels of the offenders (Zgoba, Witt, Dalessandro, and Veysey, 2008) or the protective behaviors that they are

Place a moratorium on the passage of sex offender residence restriction laws

D uring the past few decades, lawmakers have devoted increasing attention to policies aimed at managing sex offenders released to the community. Indeed, since 1994, all 50 states have enacted at least two pieces of legislation specific to sex offenders; at the minimum, each of the 50 states has established a sex offender registry and a community notification system in compliance with the Jacob Wetterling Act of 1994 and Megan’s Law of 1996, respectively (CSOM, 2008). Since this time, states have passed several other laws targeted at sex offenders. For example, some states require sex offenders to carry special identification cards, whereas other states have the authority to impose chemical castration (Mancini, 2009). Among the newest wave of sex offender policies to sweep the United States are residence restrictions. A recent analysis revealed that since 1999 more than half of all states have enacted a residence restriction law (Mancini, 2009). Residence restrictions come in different shapes (i.e., different “hot-spot” locations) and sizes (i.e., different “buffer zones”). A hot spot is a specific location that is restricted for sex offenders, and it typically is defined as a park, playground, daycare center, or school. A buffer zone is the exclusion perimeter that is established around identified hot spots. For example, a buffer zone of 500 feet means that sex offenders cannot reside within 500 feet of hot spots. Buffer zones can range from 500 feet to more than 5,000 feet depending on the state of interest (Mancini, 2009; Meloy, Miller, and Curtis, 2008). Despite variation in the scope of hot spots that can be included and the size of buffer zones that can be used, all residence restriction laws operate on the following underlying rationale: keeping a sex offender away from areas where children are

Are Actuarial Risk Data Used to Make Determinations of Sex Offender Risk Classification?

This study examined whether evaluators use actuarial risk scores and risk information to make determinations about sex offender risk status for the purpose of enhanced registration and notification. Although it was expected that sexual offenders selected for enhanced registration and notification would have higher scores on actuarial risk assessment tools than those who were not selected, few differences were found between groups with regard to risk factors associated with sexual offense recidivism. Given that actuarial tools enhance the prediction of sexual recidivism, this study may shed light on problems in the implementation of sex offender policy measures. Results are discussed as they pertain to the assessment and application of registration and community notification statutes for sexual offenders.

Introduction to the Special Issue of International Criminal Justice Review on Criminal Careers in International Perspective

It has been nearly 40 years since the publication of the classic study Delinquency in a Birth Cohort(1972) by Marvin Wolfgang, Robert Figlio, and Thorsten Sellin, a book that launched the study ofcriminal careers to the forefront of criminology. Today, criminal careers research is one of the mostpopular areas of study, and a vibrant collection of scholars around the world explores the onset,course, desistance, and termination of individual offending careers; the sources of criminal propen-sityandthewaysinwhichitmanifestsinattimesgeneralandothertimesspecificformsofantisocialbehavior; and ways that public policy and criminal justice systems can intervene to reduce crime bytargeting the small cadre of high-rate offenders. Several of these vibrant scholars participated in thecurrent special issue of International Criminal Justice Review, an issue that is devoted to the world-wide study of criminal careers and individual-level constructs that propel criminal careers based ondiverse samples of data.Using a sample of convicted adult sex offenders from the province of Quebec, Canada, PatrickLussier, Stacy Tzoumakis, Jesse Cale, and Joanna Amirault tracked their offending patterns fromadolescence to age 35. Contrary to the popular notion that all sex offenders demonstrate astable andhigh likelihood of continued offending, Lussier and his colleagues found that 56% were very low-rate offenders, 12% were late bloomers, and 25% were low-rate desisters who ‘‘aged out’’ of sexualoffending. Among the sample, 8% of offenders were high-rate, chronic sex offenders. Given theseresults, policy makers should tailor sex offender policies to treat all offenders while providing thegreatest supervision and control to the latter 8%.One of the most important individual-level constructs that drives sustained antisocial behavior islowself-control(Gottfredson&Hirschi,1990),andrecentresearchfoundthatpersonswithverylowself-control were nearly 5.5 times more likely than persons with greater self-control to becomecareer criminals (DeLisi & Vaughn, 2008). In a comparative study using samples selected fromJapan and the United States, Emiko Kobayashi, Alexander Vazsonyi, Pan Chen, and Susan Sharp

Implementing the Adam Walsh Act’s Sex Offender Registration and Notification Provisions: A Survey of the States

With the 2006 passage of the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act (AWA), the United States Congress established a range of requirements for sex offender registration and notification (R&N) systems operated by states, tribal jurisdictions, and U.S. territories. In the years since the law’s passage, these congressional mandates have generated concern within some covered jurisdictions and among national organizations over matters such as the perceived undermining of jurisdictional autonomy, the variance between the law and emerging “best practices,” and perceived threats to the viability of state-based sex offender management efforts. To examine these concerns, a national survey was conducted in the fall of 2008 to evaluate the consistency between AWA requirements and existing state policies and practices, and to assess state-based barriers to AWA implementation. The survey results identified several areas of inconsistency between AWA mandates and state practices, particularly those relating to inclusion of juveniles, classification methods, and retroactive application of R&N requirements. The study revealed the barriers to AWA implementation within many states to be multifaceted and complex, suggesting the potential need for a recalibration of federal policy governing registration and notification. Implications for the respective roles of federal and state governments in the shaping of sex offender policy are discussed.

Proposition 83, Framing and Public Attitudes toward Sex Offenders: An Application of Heuristic Models of Social Judgment

This ongoing study seeks to accomplish two objectives: 1) evaluate framing of thematic representations in newspaper articles about sex offenders, sex offense cases, and sex offender policy; and 2) measure the role of media exemplars and heuristics on individuals’ attitudes and social judgment. In 2006, California voters passed a sweeping measure known as Proposition 83, or “Jessica’s Law,” which increased dramatically the state’s punitive response to persons convicted of sex crimes and registered as sex offenders. In a preliminary content analysis of a representative sample of articles from the Sacramento Bee during the 2006 election year, articles tended to portray sex offenders as predatory and non-human, focusing primarily on the most extreme cases and prolific offenders, without regard for the vast heterogeneity of individuals and offenses subsumed by the term “sex offender.” This manner of newspaper framing also over-emphasized child molestation in comparison to rape and other categories of sex offenses. Moreover, even where newspaper articles sought to convince readers to vote against the measure using centrally persuasive techniques, sensational language and non-representative exemplars were highly correlated with arguments that Proposition 83 would not achieve greater public safety. The implications of these preliminary findings offer an opportunity to experimentally test the role of the availability and representativeness heuristics on social judgment for persons exposed to sensational and unrepresentative media framing. The relationship between these phenomena and concerns for social justice according to feminist critical theory are also discussed.

Lifers on the Outside

This article examines the effects of labeling though informal and formal sanctions on sex offender reintegration, using qualitative analysis from a probability sample of 153 registered sex offenders in four counties in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It also provides an overview of sex offender legislation and literature. Results of the study indicate that the majority of respondents experienced negative treatment because of their status as a sex offender. Results also indicate that formal and informal sanctions are stifling opportunities for sex offenders to be fully reintegrated into society and that treatment programs are not as effective as they could be. Implications for sex offender policy and further research are discussed.

A Look in the Mirror: Sexual Abuse Professionals' Perceptions about Sex Offenders

Sex offender policies have been enacted based on anomalous cases of child abduction and murder, leading to public misperceptions about sex offenders, recidivism, and stranger danger. Professionals working in the sexual abuse field were surveyed to determine to what extent their knowledge and perceptions are consistent with current empirical literature. Professionals had accurate perceptions of the rates at which strangers victimize children and offenders come to the attention of authorities. Significant differences were found regarding perceptions of sex offense recidivism rates, treatment effectiveness, and sex offenders' history of childhood sexual abuse. Implications for treatment, training, and advocacy are discussed.