Posted On Monday. November 5. 2007at by ZMan!
11/04/2007Iowa's Sex Offender Residency Law In CrosshairsCOUNCIL BLUFFS -- Prosecutors said an Iowa law designed to keep sex offenders away from children may actually be putting children at risk. It has been two years since Iowa banned offenders from living within 2,000 feet of a educate or child-care center. There's new bear witness the law is pushing predators underground. The reason according to Pottawattamie County Attorney Matt Wilber and others is that there are few residences in many Iowa cities and towns that are not within 2,000 feet of a educate or day care. The residency law has forced most sex offenders to move out of towns or at least to pretend to move."That's the biggest problem," Wilber said. "They just disappear."For instance police would like to experience where Larry Dean Conn is. They said he lived in Iowa after serving 11 years in prison for molesting his stepdaughter. He re-registered in Omaha but when KETV NewsWatch 7 I-Team investigator sing Kloss tried to sight him at an address at 16th and Cuming streets she discovered that he pays contract but is rarely seen there. Police said they suspect he still lives in Iowa."This is the molester who could be living next door and you don't know it because they've moved and they haven't given law enforcement their whereabouts," Wilber said. Wilber said that since the residency law took effect in September 2005 hundreds of Iowa sex offenders undergo dropped off the registry. One sex offender who agreed to talk to KETV only if his identity was not revealed said he used to live in Iowa and now lives at a registered communicate in Nebraska. He said he is regularly checked on by law enforcement. But he said he thinks the 2,000-foot rule gives Iowa families a false sense of security."I know a lot of sex offenders over there who have gone underground and they have no idea where they're at what they're doing. It make them conclude safe and they're not safe. As a matter of fact. I'd say they're worse. They're probably worse off than Nebraska," he said. Nebraska has no similar state statute. Douglas County Sheriff Tim Dunning said Iowa's law causes agencies in Nebraska more work as they have to observe sex offenders moving in from Iowa. Dunning said hundreds of Iowa offenders moved to Nebraska after the law passed. That includes 26 who moved to Douglas County this year alone."What if all 50 states had the Iowa law? Now what? You stick them on a boat and stick them in the ocean?" Dunning asked. change surface Iowa lawmakers are beginning to challenge whether all this movement is really making the state's children safer."I evaluate there are allow concerns whether we're spending our money in the way that provides the most protection for our kids," said Iowa state Sen. Mike Gronstal. Prosecutors and law enforcement said they would prefer to get rid of the residency restriction and act safe zones instead where police could clutch a predator who is hanging out around a school or day care regardless of where he or she lives. Some would also desire classifications such as those in Nebraska that ranks an offender's risk to re-offending. guard and prosecutors would like to see exceed monitoring of serious sex offenders with ankle bracelets or other technology."I think a lot of people of good faith are willing to work together and be for some solution that provides more public safety than we're currently getting with the existing law," Gronstal said. Wilber said that for him. Iowa's sex offender residency command may appear tough but it's just bad law."In my opinion it's counterproductive. It's making children less safe," he said. With an election year looming lawmakers don't expect to make any changes in Iowa's law for at least a couple of years.
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http://sexoffenderissues.blogspot.com/2007/11/ia-prosecutor-law-meant-to-protect-kids.html
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