State yanks online registry from Web after pair gunned down in own homes

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Turns out we now have a little more data on one of the victims:
One of the two Maine sex offenders killed by an apparent vigilante was listed in the state's online registry because of a 2002 conviction for having sex with a minor when he was 19.

The death of William Elliott, 24, is reigniting the national debate over sex offender registries. His anguished mother said yesterday that he should not have been on the same list as criminals who preyed on children.

He had been convicted of having sex with a girlfriend who was two weeks shy of her 16th birthday, the mother said.
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http://www.boston.com/news/local/maine/articles/2006/04/18/sex_crime_disclosure_questioned/

So...how many of you, at nineteen, had girlfriends who were about sixteen? I'm betting more than are willing to admit it.

Incidentally, the age of consent in Maine is 16 (according to the article). This guy definitely needed to be murdered for not waiting two weeks; that sounds just and righteous.

Some little girl was just saved from a brutal rape some day.
Click to expand...
Yeah. Right.
 
Flyboy said:
Yeah. Right.
Click to expand...

I don't believe anyone, myself included, is saying the vigilante incident in Maine was justified. It was a horrible crime. However, using logic, that does not make the online registry of offenders itself bad! That is a logical fallacy if you are trying to make that illogical leap! I suggest that you review the many incidents nationally where parents praise the online registries of offenders and the many incidents that have been avoided from repeat offenders.
 
While convictions are a matter of public record, that doesn't mean we need to publish lists. If you want to know, go down to the courthouse and pull the records.

I wonder how politicians would feel if I started maintaining lists on their previous misdeeds. I'd imagine cars crashes kill a lot more people every year than sex offenders. Perhaps I'll start publishing personal info (including my own) of all the people who get traffic tickets. Those unsafe drivers are just an auto death waiting to happen and we need to protect our children.
After all, a list certainly keeps people from breaking laws. :rolleyes:
 
The debate concerning the relevancy of a SO list will go on as it has in the past. Personally, I agree with it but also respect the rights of those who don't. But, as far as the State pulling the list as soon as the crime was comitted; it was shortly reinstated and is online now.
 
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I don't believe anyone, myself included, is saying the vigilante incident in Maine was justified.
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"He gave them what they deserved."
--SomeKid

"Shooter is a hero.

Some little girl was just saved from a brutal rape some day."
--Don't Tread on Me

"I can't shed a tear for two child molestors. Sorry"
--LAR-15

Sounds to me like a few people are.
 
Hey flyboy, nice job at partial quotes. Why don't you copy the two sentences before that quote from me?
 
SomeKid - You said that if it was public urination, the shooter should fry... It wasn't that.

You said if it was doing things to kids, they deserved it... That's what it was.

A partial quote isn't a misquote if it doesn't obscure the meaning of the original quote - he was probably just saving some space.
 
Flyboy said:
Sounds to me like a few people are.
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The point of the issue is that this isolated Maine incident of vigilantism does not take away from the national need for online registries. Parents especially have a use for them for the protection of their children. However, if you can find a different way to protect children when judges are releasing these predators upon society, I'm all ears....
 
How do these lists better enable you to protect children?
What steps can you take with them that you couldn't take without them?

Offender lists do nothing to protect children. Its ALWAYS been up to the parent to protect their child. Whether that means taking them to school yourself or simply making sure they check in when you ask them to.

Listing the personal information of these people is an extra punishment after they have served their sentences. Violating privacy isn't the way to go about it. Stripping the right to protect themselves and the right to vote is pretty rough as it is...do you now need to make felons true second class citizens by removing their privacy?
 
Do you have children?


I think the list is useful. While it does have a "leper" effect, I don't care. Gun owners are abused constantly. Anti-gun newspapers print the names of license holders all the time. Is it right? No. But the gloves are off, and in our country, no one gives a damn anymore. So why play by idealistic rules. I know that is fundamentally wrong, but I'm not here to reform the system, I'm trying to live through it.


I think that once a person serves their time, they should have all rights restored and be treated the same as anyone else. Problem is, probation and other after-the-fact punishments are a way of our system saying "we still don't trust you". If that's the case, then they should be locked up. This was discussed extensively in another thread just recently.


Science has shown that sex offenders are almost always repeat offenders. Just look at the nature of that crime. It is the type of crime that you have to be of a certain character to commit in the first place. Those types do not change easily.


The only reason our system lets them out is because they are corrupt and the prisons are full.


If I know my next door neighbor is a child mollestor, you can bet your bottom dollar I will have my guard up extra high (my guard is up all the time, and I wouldn't leave kids unattended). A child to a mollestor has an attraction much stronger than say an 18 year old guy in his sexual peak surrounded by thonged victoria's secret models. At least we know not to present any temptations near or around them. That invites problems. The registry is warning system for us because the government is impotent to handle these types of people by locking them up for a LONG time.


People who are against the registry certainly don't have children or live right next door to a convicted child abuser. If they did, they'd be singing a different tune. Trust me.


And as a personal note, I could care less about the feelings of the child abusers. I think they are dirt. While they do have rights, they don't have a right to receive kind treatment from me. We're talking about the sickest scum in our society. People who sodomize little children. I think some people in this thread need to read and learn about the victims of such beasts. If one lived next to or around me, I'd make it VERY Clear to them that I mean business. I wouldn't threaten them with death or do anything illegal though...
 
The List should be only for true SOs, not public urinaters, high school lovers, etc. who shouldn't have been convicted of a sex crime to begin with.
The list can be useful in any case. It enabled me to find out that a true SO was living in the apts next door to me last summer which prompted me to run him out of the neighborhood. He's gone and my neighborhood is better and safer for it.
Biker
 
Science has shown that sex offenders are almost always repeat offenders.
Click to expand...

That is a lie. A downright fabricated piece of propaganda that does not look at any real scientific evidence. Sex offender recidivism is nowhere even close to 100%. Just search online for real studies and you will see that while some do commit more crimes, there are many who do not.

From: http://www.johnhoward.ab.ca/docs/sxoffend/page1.htm

One research project looked at 61 previous studies of sexual recidivism using a 4-5 year follow up period. This research on sex offenders found that 13.4% recidivated with a sexual offence, 12.2% recidivated with a non-sexual, violent offence and 36.6% recidivated with any other offence.1

A long term follow-up study of child molesters in Canada found that 42% were reconvicted of sexual or violent crime during the 15-30 year follow-up period.2

In addition, the long-term follow-up study (15-30 years) of child molesters showed that the average recidivism rate for this group of offenders is actually lower than the average recidivism rate for non-sexual offenders (61% versus 83.2% respectively for any new conviction).​

/Fight the falsehoods with facts.
 
the liberal newspapaers

say it's ok to list ccw holders, they say it doesn't increase the chance of a gun owner being robbed.

The liberals insist on gun registration you have a right to own a gun, you don't have a right to rape little children.

if we register guns we should damm well register child molesters.
 
The liberals insist on gun registration you have a right to own a gun, you don't have a right to rape little children.

if we register guns we should damm well register child molesters.
Click to expand...
Here's the problem. From earlier in the thread:
One of the two Maine sex offenders killed by an apparent vigilante was listed in the state's online registry because of a 2002 conviction for having sex with a minor when he was 19.

The death of William Elliott, 24, is reigniting the national debate over sex offender registries. His anguished mother said yesterday that he should not have been on the same list as criminals who preyed on children.

He had been convicted of having sex with a girlfriend who was two weeks shy of her 16th birthday, the mother said.
Click to expand...
So this guy had sex with his girlfriend in high school, and at the time she was a few days shy of the age of consent in her state.

Now, he's labelled a "sex offender" for the rest of his life, and forced to register with the state. And apparently, someone used that data to find and kill him, assuming like you, that "sex offender" means "violent cild rapist."

And then folks here come out and say "fine with me." That ain't right, folks.
 
Don't Tread On Me,
Just because gun owners have to jump through extra hoops and get nasty labels and stereotypes, doesn't make it right. If you recall, thats what gun ownership is about. Its about enforcing your rights.

Thats the funny thing about rights, they belong to everybody, not just those we deem "more equal." If you don't protect the rights of everyone, you may as well get ready to give yours up as well. The government has ensured that it has legal power as well as the equipment and manpower to come after those that it doesn't like. In the past, its been sheer numbers of armed citizens that can oppose them. Now, we are stripping more and more people of basic rights (like privacy) from people (thats how citizens become subjects) and the numbers decrease. Why would those newly minted subjects have any desire to fight the government? They won't get rights back because they've been branded as bad people and they have no way of using meaningful force because they can't own guns.
Well, they can, but thats just breaking another law and if they fail in their attempts to effect violent change, they go back to prison.

You stated that if you lived next to a sex offender, your guard would be extra high. Why couldn't you have been on guard anyway? Did the lack of a SO list prevent it before? Did the lack of a list prevent you from protecting children?

This is a classic example of blissninny behavior. Its kinda like people who don't like guns because they don't like to think the world is a dangerous place. Whether I have children or not makes no difference in my disdain for these registries. If you are releasing someone back into society, you are making them a private citizen again. While they may not get all their rights back (which I disagree with) violating a right so fundamental to our society sets a precedent.
Lets see if I can be Orwellian for a minute. *begin 1984speak*
Obviously a criminal has something to hide. They got caught and now they don't want people to know what they did. Dirty buggers are just waiting for a chance to do it again, but we can stop em by exposing them.
But wouldn't it be great if we could prevent these crimes? You know what, lets start listing people for other reasons. After all, if you've got nothing to hide, what are you afraid of? The openess of all this information will be doubleplusgood.
*end 1984speak*

Do you see where this is leading?
 
think alist is needed for people who commit violent illegal sex acts. but this list should be for leo use only and they need to monitor the people on this lis a little more than average people and mabee life time probation and required dna samples so if any one does reoffend then we have their dna on file and can catch them that much faster but of course if yo build a better mouse trap the mouse gets smarter
Click to expand...

If the ultimate government authority is the people (per the constitution), then the general public at large needs to know how many sex offenders live in their communities, and that most sex offenders spend less than three years in prison and end up repeat offenders when released.

We should have a registry of sex offenders until we stop releasing them.

Michael Courtney
 
Clean97GTI said:
Mr. Courtney, that just isn't true
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The Bureau of Justice statistics you cite are 12 years or more old; re: your link to: "...tracked for 3 years after their release from prisons in 15 States in 1994..."...

Recent recidivism rates for sexual abusers have escalated tremendously. More recent follow-up studies of child molesters in Canada found that 42% were reconvicted of sexual or violent crime during the 15-30 year follow-up period.
 
of sexual OR violent crime.

now, what about just sex crimes? was it the same crime?

source?



http://www.csom.org/pubs/recidsexof.html
Here's another source you can pull numbers from. Depending on which study you want to follow, you get recidivism rates as low as 6% and as high as 46% depending on what the crime was. Regardless, 40% isn't "most" of the offenders. The majority is not reconvicted.
 
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