DENVER—Authorities in Colorado are concerned a state law that no longer requires them to track homeless sex offenders may encourage more of them to drop off their radar.
The law was intended to prevent police from spending a lot of time trying to find sex offenders who move often and have no permanent home, but it may have had unintended consequences.
Law enforcement agencies statewide are required to report their numbers of homeless sex offenders every six months, but state officials said last week that no such reports exist. The law took effect last year and requires the Colorado Bureau of Investigation to issue its own reports on how the system is working every six months until January 2015, but those records are incomplete.
Bureau spokeswoman Susan Medina said the reporting requirement is “subject to available resources.”
Medina said that as of last week, the bureau listed 722 adult and juvenile sex offenders as homeless, the only figures available.
“It just seems like a loophole to me,” said Larry Valencia, who managed the sex offender registration program for the Denver Police Department until last September. “If you don’t know where they’re at, why bother trying to register them?”
Rep. Bob Gardner, the Colorado state House sponsor, said that provision was a police request.
“I will tell you that local law enforcement agencies wanted it to be clear that they had no obligation to do this,” he said. “Is that ideal? No.”
The law contains provisions to test its effectiveness. But The Denver Post found state compliance with the reporting requirements ( ) has ranged from minimal to nonexistent.
The state Sex Offender Management Board also conducted an informal count in February concerning homeless sex offenders. But it received only a partial response from law enforcement agencies and a statewide total of 341 offenders that did not break down where they lived.
The board also asked whether homeless sex offenders are reporting their whereabouts to police departments more often, as the new law requires. The survey did not ask for specifics.
In Colorado Springs, the state’s second-largest city, detectives are seeing a steady growth in the reported number of homeless sex offenders. Most of them report living at intersections.
Sgt. Steve Noblitt said Colorado Springs offenders were “given a lot of leeway” in the first months after the law required more frequent appearances at the police station. His department has issued five arrest warrants in the past three weeks, however, for people it can’t find.
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Information from: The Denver Post,
