Today the paper seems to have disappeared and replaced with opinionated television news segments and social media platforms that always dictate the narrative rather than allow a reasonably developed opinion. We rarely, if ever, witness an errors and corrections segment on the 6 o’clock news or an apology statement on social media platforms. We see reporters seeking pro-registry supporters for an eight-second impromptu camera appearance, citing, “they need to be on the registry!”

Recently in the Eastern part of North Carolina, people were accused of sex crimes. The names of the accused were splattered all over the television and social media sites. What makes this interesting is that the people indicted or criminally charged had their charges dropped because of false statements by victims. You won’t find any section marked errors and corrections to restore dignity to the accused. Instead, they are forced to rebuild their shattered lives while the same newsagents go about their business as if nothing happened with no regard for the harm they levied.

What makes matters worse is that the news agencies and social media platforms that created a panic culture of a predator on the loose quickly forgot about the true predator that made the false claim. It seems incredible that news and social media are habitually responsible for maintaining a false narrative about sex crimes when it appears that, in some cases, there is nothing to lose by “victims” reporting a false claim. If police and prosecutors won’t punish those for making false police reports, what is the incentive for the news and social media to post an error or correction?

If the registry was supposed to keep the public safe from predatory sexual offenses, then why is it that news, social media, police, prosecutors, and pro-registry allies shield “predators that pretend to be victims” who break the law and lie to communities about false sexual claims? Maybe this is why public trust in police, social media, the press, and our legal system is deteriorating at a rapid level. There isn’t a big rubber band or plastic sleeve to keep this mess together.

Sexting is the new black sheep

Depending on who is doing the judging, a sexting scandal in a Virginia high-school is either a darn shame or a child-porn case on a massive scale. In Hanna Rosin’s Atlantic article Why Kids Sext, she reports on some of the unintended consequences of these situations.

The key components are:
1. A girl (usually a female, but not exclusively) will send a racy or nude picture to a guy on his cell-phone, aka “sexting”;
2. Her intention, according to Ms. Rosin, is either to a) share intimacy inside a pre-existing relationship, b) attract the attention of a potential future mate, c) get herself noticed on an internet-wide scale, or, and most disturbingly, d) because she felt pressured or was blackmailed into doing so;
3. The picture is sometimes shared, sometimes with malice, normally without, and this can lead to some embarrassment for the teens, parents of the teens, and the school administration if somebody reports the incident;
4. The decision lies with the parents or school as to whether to handle the issue in-house or make it a police matter;
5. The police and prosecutors, for their part, have some discretion as whether or not to charge/prosecute the persons involved;
6. In many cases, statutes have for years forced the hand of the courts in subjecting “victims” to prosecution when they produced the images of themselves, ostensibly perpetrating a “crime” against themselves.

At Louisa County High School, Ms. Rosin reports a situation involving a sizable collection of nude photographs of high-school girls, all under the age of 18, posted to an Instagram account. The pictures were taken by the victims themselves and sent to one trusted person who then violated that trust. Police became involved, and a large investigation ensued.

Soon, hundreds of interviews of students revealed a systemic problem: more than a third of the school was involved in sexting, either sending or requesting “sexts.”

Bearing down on the culprits

The charge of “production of child pornography” carries with it possible long-term imprisonment, invariably creating new registrants, often for life. The investigator in the case of Louisa County High, Major Donald Lowe, began the inquiry into the source of the pictures, ready to find the culprits and act according to the laws at his disposal. At first figuring all the subjects as victims and those disseminating the photographs as suspects, Major Lowe had a change of perspective, like so many who find themselves a part of a system they do not themselves fully understand. Legally, Major Lowe’s victims were also suspects, as they had both produced and sent the pictures.

His mind-set changed at some point, as evidenced by his characterization of the nature of the offenses and offenders, from “victims,” to, “I guess I’ll call them victims,” to “they just fell into this category where they victimized themselves.”

The issues needing immediate redress are two-fold: hasty legislation grossly over-stepping the role of parents of hormonal teens (who are going to express themselves sexually) and the need to give help to those who have genuine criminal conduct because attacking crime with vengeance is like the proverbial “bombing for peace.”

New crimes

For the past decade, the United States Congress has created over 50 new crimes each year. In an article by John Baker on the growth of new federal crimes, he explores the difficulty in defining “crime” in the federal system, as the term is not given a specific definition. Instead, activities became crimes because Congress applied penalties.
So then, crime, a social construct, is given birth not by an actor in violation of a statute but by the creation of a statute criminalizing what was heretofore not criminal behavior. We create criminals where previously there was no crime and therefore no criminal.

In this way youth become criminals by doing what youth have done for centuries – except for centuries there was no permanent record of their curiosity and their experimentation, and they grew up and led normal, productive lives. Today their indiscretions are captured forever, and their lives are changed forever because of it.

This was written as a rebuttal to an editorial in the Longview, WA Daily News:

In response to your March 13 editorial, “Laws help keep children safe,” I would first like to thank you for your condemnation of vigilante activity. Fully agreeing with the title of your op-ed, I too want laws that help keep children safe, and there is nothing about vengeance-motivated activity that works toward that goal.

The organization you criticize, WAR, or Women Against Registry, is one of several organizations that advocate for laws that do just that — keep children safe. Another is SOSEN, Sex Offender Solutions and Education Network. And yet another is RSOL, Reform Sex Offender Laws, Inc. These organizations agree with what research studies show: laws that keep children — and indeed everyone — safe must, in order to do that, be based on facts and empirical evidence.

The public registry system is not based on empirical evidence, and, in your defense of it, you say that the murder of Adam Walsh is “not uncommon.” Actually, it is very rare. Whether or not Adam’s kidnapping and subsequent murder were sexually motivated will never be known, but it was a heinous crime as was the murder of Megan Kanka and another handful of horrific child murders at the hands of murderers.

Your statement that WAR grew out of murders such as these is untrue. WAR, SOSEN, and RSOL grew out of a realization, based on research, that public registration of those who had previously committed a sexual offense — not murdered, not decapitated, but committed an offense ranging from the trivial to the serious — actually was not deterring sexual crimes against children at all. It was in some cases increasing the risk for re-offense, and it was and is creating conditions that seriously interfere with mandated rehabilitative efforts.

It was and does negatively impact the lives of family members, especially the children of registrants. This is well documented through research studies.

According to a study published in the American Journal of Public Health, “[t]hese policies have led to multiple collateral consequences, creating an ominous environment that inhibits successful reintegration and may contribute to an increasing risk for recidivism. In fact, evidence on the effectiveness of these laws suggests that they may not prevent recidivism or sexual violence and result in more harm than good.”

Reform organizations do not defend the actions that have triggered registration, and we recognize appropriate punishment as desirable and necessary, but it is difficult to claim that, in all cases, the children suffer through the actions of the registrant family member rather than the effects of public registration. Many situations exist where the offense was committed when the registrant was a child or juvenile himself. A number of cases involve premarital sex where the offender and “victim” later married and had a family, yet the offender remains on a public registry, often for life, and his children suffer greatly due to it. This continuation of punishment long after a sentence has been completed is but another form of vengeance and amounts to legalized, governmental vigilante action, exacting punishment far beyond what the courts assessed.

The impotency of the public registry to deter re-offense and to protect children is well documented also. Dr. Bill O’Leary is a forensic psychologist and longtime critic of public notification and tracking. He notes, “95 percent of sexual abuse occurs between a victim and a known acquaintance, not a stranger living down the street. One of the most unethical pieces of the situation has been saying that we need to do this to prevent sexual abuse when we know statistically that this has nothing to do with preventing sexual abuse.”

According to the United States Department of Justice, from 1992 to 2010 there was a steep decline in all major crime. There is no evidence that a decrease in sexual crime is due to our current policies, and that theory is actually negated by research.

Many people and organizations advocate every day for policies that will keep children safe, but we know that until the focus is put on the victims and the actual facts about child sexual abuse, that is highly unlikely to occur.

Source at Daily News, Longview, Washington.