I've wondered before if the economics of enforcing residency restrictions might provide a tipping point against the flawed policies. Berman has a great post pointing to an article about Ohio's experience with AWA compliance:
The three weeks since Ohio rushed to implement tougher sex offender registration laws have been filled with confusion, lawsuits and concern that the provisions may do more harm than good.
Ohio is one of the first states to pass legislation to comply with the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act, a set of federal laws that stiffens registration requirements for convicted sex offenders.
The act mandates that all states uniformly register sex offenders and place them into a national registry by 2009. It was billed as a way to prevent people who commit sex crimes from slipping through the cracks and committing other offenses.
Being on the forefront of the movement has landed Ohio courts in the middle of constitutional arguments over retroactively classifying some offenders - often with harsher penalties - without a court hearing.
It also has put a strain on sheriff's offices, who could see a 60 percent increase in their workload as they scramble - with no extra money for personnel - to register thousands of new sex offenders who now have to check in every 90 days.
And child advocates across the state are concerned about parts of the law requiring juveniles who committed sex crimes to register for life and, in some cases, have their pictures placed on the Internet.
They say those measures negate the purpose of Juvenile Court and ignore evidence that juvenile offenders have low recidivism rates -- between 4 and 13 percent.
The experience of Ohio will be repeated across the country as other states choose to comply with the AWA. However, the costs of AWA compliance are dwarfed by the foolishness of California believing it can offer lifetime real-time GPS monitoring for sex offenders:
Representatives of county sheriff's and local police departments said they do not have enough money or staff to take over the monitoring program. The corrections department estimates it could cost about $7 per day to monitor each offender with a minimal GPS monitoring system. The state's more extensive GPS system costs about $33 per offender per day, but that includes the cost of the parole agents.
"We don't know what it's going to cost, and the conservative estimates are hundreds of millions of dollars" as more offenders complete parole, said Nancy O'Malley, chief assistant district attorney in Alameda County.
Even the UK approach of microchipping offenders won't change those costs. Rational argument against restrictions probably won't have nearly the effect of basic economics.
I am beginning to work on an article regarding the true cost of sex offender legislation. There are a lot of obvious costs like personnel and litigation,along with less though-of costs such as gas, cost of flyers. If the government mandates 100 Million but it costs 1 BILLION to implement, does that make sense? Anyways, I hope to have up an article on the subject soon.
The Fallen One
www.oncefallen.com
Posted by: The Fallen One | January 23, 2008 at 04:51 PM