My previous post on smoke detectors reminded me of a much more serious issue: the travesty of justice that is the sex offender registry. This is an issue that is once again driven by anecdote. A spectacularly rare and horrible crime occurs: a boy is kidnapped, raped and murdered. The perpetrator lived next door and had a previous sex offense. "Why was I not told that a sex offender was living next door?" bellows the father. Legislators listen, likely urged on by constituents who are gripped by the news story. The sex offender registry is created.
The short answer to the father's question, if you were thinking statistically, is that 999,999 sex offenders never abduct or rape their neighbors. But sex offenders are the scum of the earth; who could sympathize with them? The registry is a law, and once passed, it applies to everyone. Who is a sex offender? Surely not just those who brutally rape children. Lesser touching or indecent exposure offenders will qualify. It is also those who rape adults, because are you going to tell me that rape of an adult woman isn't as serious a crime as the rape of a child? What about those who access child pornography? Well, they're disgusting pedophiles, so no punishment is too harsh. By the time we're done, the registry contains 14-year-olds who touched their younger sister in a way they shouldn't have. It contains 19-year-olds who had sex with their 13-year-old girlfriends. It contains in some places those caught urinating in public.
The next question is what we do with the registry information. We make it public, so ordinary citizens can check on where the sex offenders are living. Surely there are some nearby, and modern Google-like tools make it easier than ever to find them. One thing this can result in is harassment -- protesters or rocks through the window. People rarely check on exactly what the crime was. In other jurisdictions there are legal restrictions, like the inability to live within 400 yards of a school or playground, which in some places means there is virtually no place in a metropolitan area for a sex offender to live. Surely the sex offender can't get a job. Ten years on the registry are 10 years of a ruined life. In some states registry is for life.
Do you feel safer? If so, it's an illusion. In fact, the vast majority of sex offenses are committed by people with no prior record. The recidivism rate for sex offenses is something like 2%, compared to something like 60% for auto theft.
The rational approach would certainly include asking if we are meting out punishments for crimes roughly in proportion to the harm they cause. There is no registry for murderers, or for those who do armed robbery. None for drunk drivers, or those who beat people to within an inch of their lives. Last I knew, the recommended federal penalty for taking a picture of a 17-year-old boy's erect penis was twice as long as if you tried to kill him.
The fact is, in our society we don't lock up everyone for life who has committed a crime. We set them free after a reasonable period, and give them a second chance. That means that there will always be many people with criminal records living near you. Most of them never bother us. And it's a chance we take as part of a free society. Those with sex crimes should be treated no differently.
Suppose a legislator supports getting rid of the registry. You can be sure that in the next election cycle, the opponent will claim that the legislator is a friend of pedophiles. It is a difficult problems to solve.
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