In their desire to make their communities safer, cities, counties and state legislators are considering the concept of strict geographical limitations on where a registered sex offender may work or live. The goal is reasonable. The proposed solution is not.
Recently the Colorado House Judiciary Committee killed a bill that would have prohibited a person convicted of a sex offense against a child from living or working within 1,500 feet of a school, day care center or playground. The committee killed the bill on a bipartisan vote after hearing abundant testimony that the proposed law was unnecessary, counterproductive and nearly impossible to implement.
The concept is now being considered at the local level. For instance, the Greenwood Village City Council is considering an ordinance that is in many ways far more restrictive than the defeated House bill. That ordinance would make it unlawful for any registered sex offender “to establish a permanent residence or temporary residence within 1,000 feet of any school, day care center, designated public or private school bus stop, walk to school route, park, playground, public swimming pool or recreation center.” In short, the ordinance would make it virtually impossible for any registered sex offender to live within Greenwood Village.
If Greenwood Village can bar all sex offenders, why would Arapahoe County and then Denver, Douglas and the rest not do the same? One may reasonably expect that counties will also add restrictions barring registered sex offenders from working within 1,000 feet (or 1,500 feet or 2,500 feet) of any of those enumerated places. Each county’s geographic restrictions up the ante for the next county. In the end, no city or county will permit a registered sex offender to live or work within its borders.
And what is wrong with that, you ask? Cities are lining up to ban pit bulls, after all, but these are people, not dogs. There is no stereotypical sex offender. The phrase “registered sex offender” covers an enormous span of forbidden conduct, which can range from touching outside of the clothing to unconscionably violent sexual acts. Different crimes require a different treatment and sentencing options. Colorado law recognizes this. But inflexible geographical limitations on work or residence do not recognize these distinctions. One size does not fit all when it comes to sex offenders.
A person convicted of a sex offense is ordinarily in treatment and supervision for a period of years. Is it really in the best interest of our society that we create geographical limitations that will force probationers who are meeting every goal of their treatment plan to lose their employment, or sell their home and relocate the family they are supporting?
When a juvenile inappropriately touches a young child while babysitting, his guilty plea in juvenile court will result in sex-offender registration. But if these geographical restrictions are in place, the consequence is to force the juvenile’s family to expel him from the family home or sell their home and move.
Often citizens are accused of sexual offenses in which the guilt of the individual is open to question. Such cases are often resolved through a deferred judgment. If the defendant satisfactorily completes probation, his case will be dismissed. But during probation, he must register as a sex offender. If his place of business is in an office tower, and that 25-story building happens to be too close to a day care center, is it really in society’s best interest that he lose that career? That he lose the ability to pay restitution to the victim, to pay for his own treatment?
Colorado already has adopted some of the toughest evaluation, treatment and supervision standards in the United States. Under our existing laws, when certified sex-offender treatment providers and experienced sex-offender probation officers believe it necessary to remove a person from a particular work environment or residence, they can seek the appropriate geographical restrictions. But when these restrictions are inflexibly and unalterably forced upon the legal system without regard to the specifics of the case, their imposition is counterproductive.
We do not become a safer society by adopting a one-size-fits-all strategy toward sex offenders. We vary the treatment, the levels of supervision and the length of sentences because we recognize that different types of sex offenses and different psychological profiles of offenders justify different levels of supervision, treatment or incarceration.
Now is not the time, and Colorado is not the place, to take a giant step backwards into unreasonable, ineffective and unnecessary blanket geographical limitations restricting where a registered sex offender can work or live. This is not a plea for leniency. It is a prayer for sanity.
Larry Pozner is a trial lawyer handling criminal defense and business litigation cases at Hoffman Reilly and Pozner LLP. His clients include people charged with sex offenses.
