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RICHMOND, Va. — Having already served their sentences, hundreds of Virginia sex offenders are held behind bars for months — some for years — while waiting to see whether they'll be sent to a psychiatric center indefinitely, an Associated Press review has found. Judges acting on the requests of both prosecutors and defense attorneys routinely shrug off the legal deadline for making that decision, leaving the inmates in limbo well beyond their designated punishment and without access to the very kind of treatment the state says they may need. Attorneys and authorities blame the delays on court backlogs and note...

The General Assembly's investigative arm is set to release its months-long review of Virginia's costly program to indefinitely detain sex offenders considered likely to offend again. Legislators ordered the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission to review Virginia's civil commitment program for those deemed sexually violent predators when the program experienced budget shortfalls due to the dramatic increase in offenders committed for treatment after their release from prison

NEW YORK (AP) — On "Saturday Night Live," even the devil was offended by the Penn State child sex abuse scandal. "SNL" cast member Jason Sudeikis reprised his role as Satan, appearing with red horns and pitchfork. The devil was informed by "Weekend Update" host Seth Meyers of sex charges against a former defensive coordinator and allegations that university officials failed to report the abuse. Even he was disturbed by the news. Addressing Penn State students who protested football coach Joe Paterno's firing, the devil spoke directly into the camera, asking, "Do you know how bad that made you look?"...

The two most talked about scandals this week have a lot in common. The sexual harassment allegations being made against Herman Cain expose a peculiar phenomenon also present in the scandal of Penn State icon Joe Paterno. Although both of these men are being accused of despicable behavior, people have rallied to their sides as if they are unfortunate victims. The revelation that Paterno, an icon in the sport of college football, had knowledge that his former assistant coach Jerry Sandusky was allegedly sexually abusing boys should have been devastating to the students at Penn State. These students should have...

Cornelius Osborne may not seem like baby-sitting material. He was convicted of raping two women. A succession of felonies, from robbery to failing to register as a sex offender, repeatedly sent him to prison, state records show. But over more than two years, the state paid Osborne nearly $5,000 to baby-sit two children before his latest conviction — for dealing drugs — put him back behind bars

The Delaware American Civil Liberties Union has filed court papers to stop sex offenders from being evicted from a safe house that is located near a new day care center. The ACLU along with an attorney representing the safe house and three sex offenders has asked a judge to issue a temporary restraining order to prevent the city from evicting the residents. “The state has asked the residents to leave and if they don’t leave they will be arrested,” attorney Daniel Wolcott, Jr. told Fox News Radio. Read the entire story at www.toddstarnes.com

ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. -- Residents in an exclusive west Orange County subdivision want to ban registered sex offenders from moving in. State law requires convicted sex offenders to live at least 1,000 feet from schools or playgrounds, but residents in the Keene's Pointe gated community in Windermere said they want to bump that up to 2,500 feet. A rule like that would keep any sex offender from moving into the subdivision. "Everybody wants this to be as safe a place as possible to raise their kids and they all recognize that this is one of the ways to do that,"...

Ruben Alvarez, an imposing presence with a shaved head and the physique of a professional wrestler, was impossible to miss in sex court. Circuit Judge Chet A. Tharpe glared. He knew the sex offender well, had sent him to prison 10 years ago for lewd behavior with teen girls. Tharpe knew what was coming: Alvarez now runs a shelter for other sex offenders and had come to collect one. The would-be boarder was 23. He had served time for having sex with a young girl but was back over a minor probation violation. When the case came up, Tharpe let...

Scandal: The less said about the shocking arrest of International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn the better. Except for this: It reflects poorly on the IMF and raises serious questions about its future. Strauss-Kahn, or DSK as he's universally known in France, has big problems. Not only has he been charged with the sexual assault of a 32-year-old African-born chambermaid, but this isn't the first time. A French journalist alleges he sexually assaulted her in an apartment in 2002. And, in 2008, the IMF discovered DSK, who is married to French journalist Anne Sinclair, having an affair with a married...

State police are investigating an apparent suicide after a body was found at Camp Good News in Sandwich — the same Cape Cod camp where U.S. Sen. Scott Brown said he was molested as a boy. The dead man, who has not yet been publicly identified, apparently took his own life with a gunshot to the head and was found in his car just outside the camp, according to a law enforcement source. A state police spokesman confirmed to the Herald today they are treating the death as a suicide. The 43-year-old man left a couple of notes indicating he...

RACINE, Wis. (AP) -- A billionaire executive whose family has run SC Johnson for five generations was charged Thursday with having sexual contact with a now 15-year-old girl over the course of several years. Samuel Curtis Johnson III, who goes by Curt, faces a count of repeated sexual assault of a child. The charge carries a maximum penalty of 40 years in prison and a $100,000 fine. Johnson, 55, is the former chairman of Sturtevant-based Diversey Inc., a cleaning-products company that was spun off from SC Johnson in the late 1990s. Privately held SC Johnson makes household products including Pledge,...

(AP) — Officials at a Northern California prison believe an inmate found dead in his cell was killed by his cellmate. Officials at High Desert State Prison say the inmate was pronounced dead around 9:29 a.m. Thursday after being found unresponsive in his cell. Officials have not released the name of the inmate, but say he was serving 90 years to life on a conviction out of Riverside County for the aggravated sexual assault of a child.

A former Crescent City police officer admitted to a judge Tuesday that he was a pedophile and molested hundreds of children. Sixty-year-old Pomona Park resident Paul Joseph Blair confessed to a lifetime of sexually abusing children during a dramatic hearing at the Putnam County Courthouse in Palatka. "I've been a pedophile my whole life," Blair said. "In my lifetime, I've probably molested 200-300 girls."Blair was sentenced Tuesday to 25 years in state prison for two counts of sexual battery on a minor 12 to 18 years of age. "You have wrecked and ruined quite a few lives, even more than...

Virginia state Sen. Emmett Hanger is pushing a measure that would allow for the castration of sex offenders. The controversial proposal passed the Virginia General Assembly four years ago, but then-Governor Tim Kaine vetoed it. The bill would require the state to study the use of physical castration as an alternative to civil commitment for those deemed sexually violent predators. Now, the Commonwealth pays to detain and treat sex offenders after they served their prison sentence. Hanger acknowledged that castration isn't the answer for all offenders, but said studies have shown it to work on many. He said Virginia must...

Hundreds of paroled sex offenders are winning reprieves from a ban against their living near schools or parks as they flood local courts with constitutional challenges to the most controversial part of Jessica's Law. Judges in Contra Costa and elsewhere have routinely issued stays permitting sex offender parolees to ignore the ban on their living within 2,000 feet of a school or park where children "regularly gather," pending rulings in their cases. The slow pace of those challenges means the stays could last until their parole terms expire and the restrictions no longer affect them. In the East Bay, at...

here's no telling how many juvenile sex offenders are in South Carolina public schools, because only a handful are required to publicly disclose their status. According to a SLED document concerning juvenile sex offenders, only those convicted of serious sexual crimes (i.e. first degree criminal sexual conduct) must disclose their offender status. Those convicted of less serious crimes, such as lesser degrees of criminal sexual conduct, do not have to disclose on the public registry. Even when they turn 18, their status does not become public -- unless they're convicted of another crime. They would, however, in certain circumstances be...

Michael Harden's problems were just beginning when agents rolled up to his cluttered trailer to arrest him for letting the battery in his GPS ankle bracelet run low, making it difficult to track the movements of the paroled child molester. Then the agents found something even more disturbing: graphically sexual photographs on his cell phone. Seven months after he left prison, the 44-year-old Sacramento man was on his way back. He was one of more than 285 paroled sex offenders swept up throughout California this week by recently formed law enforcement teams, which were created partly as a response to...

California corrections officials this week stopped enforcing portions of Jessica's Law in Los Angeles County after a judge ruled that the 2006 statute restricting how close sex offenders can live to parks or schools is unconstitutional. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Peter Espinoza concluded that the controversial measure left sex offenders in some areas with the choice of being homeless or going to jail because the law restricts them from living in large swaths of some cities such as Los Angeles. He issued the 10-page ruling Monday after four registered sex offenders petitioned the court. He noted that the...

I was so eager to forgive David Frum and return to the status quo we had before he believed Alex Knepper's lies about us. Politically Frum and NewsReal Blog might have some substantive disagreements but on the key issues of support for Israel and a hawkish response to Islamofascism he maintained my respect. And so I hoped we could return to a more cordial relationship akin to when he and David Horowitz debated the merits of Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, and the Tea Parties last fall. Unfortunately Frum has chosen to be more horrified by our attempt to prevent...

Thousands of sex offenders across the U.S. were left completely unmonitored after an electronic tagging system shut down earlier this week. The GPS monitoring system - which holds more than two million records - went offline on Tuesday leaving authorities in 49 states blind to offender's movements for around 12 hours. BI Incorporated, which runs the system, said the problem was caused by a data overload. As a result, prisons and correction agencies were prevented for receiving notifications on tens of thousands of people nationwide. In Wisconsin prison officials made local police and probation agents detain around 140 offenders at...

In Part I of this Illinois Family Institute series, I brought attention to a report from the Illinois Auditor General, William Holland, which revealed some stunning information regarding the licensing of day care centers in Illinois. * See Part I: Sex Offenders Reside In Homes Which Are Licensed Day Care Centers In Illinois: http://www.illinoisfamily.org/news/contentview.asp?c=35011 In June of 2010, Holland revealed that 90 licensed day care centers in Illinois had the same addresses as those who are listed on the registry of sex offenders. It has also been reported at least one of the registered sex offenders received payment from the...

"http://therothshow.com/2010/09/day-care-centers-and-sex-offenders-all-living-together/#more-1298 Laurie Roth September 28, 2010 therothshow.com My eyes are still rolling into the back of my head and my head is still shaking at the thought of what I heard this week on my national radio show.   Danny Zanoza of http: www.rffm.org  and Dave Smith,  Director of Illinois Family Institute have discovered through there intense digging that in Illinois there are at least 90 licensed day care centers who have the same addresses as those who are listed on a sex offender registry.  What!DHS is responsible for licensing these child chare facilities which are actual homes,  where over 170,000 children are...

Dr. Laurie Roth Radio Show: Illinois Family Institute's Dave Smith and RFFM.org's Dan Zanoza Discuss Fact Sex Offenders Reside In 90 Homes Which Are Licensed Day Care Centers In Illinois Dave Smith, Executive Director of the Illinois Family Institute (IFI) and Dan Zanoza, a contract writer for IFI and Executive Director of RFFM.org will guest on the Dr. Laurie Roth Radio Show [www.therothshow.com] on Monday, September 27, 2010 between 6 and 7 P.M. Central time. Smith and Zanoza will be discussing a series of columns to be posted on IFI, the first of which is titled "Sex Offenders Reside In...

Government Bureaucracy Fails To Protect Children There are many forms of child abuse...verbal, physical and perhaps the most abhorrent is sexual. The stories of teachers who are having sexual relations with their students is a case in point. Just 20 or 30 years ago, such crimes were rare. Today, they are so numerous, many are no longer reported on by the media. Also, children fall prey to sexual abuse from stepparents, foster parents, big brothers, big sisters, even parents themselves (in some cases), and other authority figures. Those who sexually abuse children violate a sacred trust and scar innocent lives....

Special investigation: How predatory gangs force middle-class girls into the sex trade By Sue Reid This week a girl who was abducted at the age of 14 and forced to work as a sex slave gave evidence in court that helped convict the nine men who sexually abused her. In this article, Sue Reid reveals how charities are helping those victims of this terrible abuse and importantly, why they are pushing the state to not hold back in their quest to find and convict the grotesque individuals. At 13, Emma still played with dolls and loved nothing more than walking...

Analysis shows need for increased focus on sexuality, not social skills, in study and treatment of young sex offendersWASHINGTON – Adolescent sex offenders are often stereotyped and treated as socially inept, but new research negates this image, finding that they are more likely to be characterized by atypical sexual interests -- such as desire for prepubescent children, coercive sex with peers and adults, and exposing their genitals to strangers. Adolescent sex offenders are also more likely to have a history of sexual abuse themselves, been exposed to sexual violence in their families, and experienced early exposure to sex or pornography....

Note: Photo and video included. "Obama’s Appeals Court Nominee Sent to Full Senate with Record of Leniency for Sex Offenders, Serial Killer" SNIPPET: "U.S. District Judge Robert Chatigny of Connecticut took what many considered extraordinary judicial actions in 2005 to prevent the execution of a serial killer, and the judge also has a record of lenient sentencing for sex offenders. Nevertheless, the Senate Judiciary Committee, on a party-line vote, sent his nomination to the full Senate on Thursday. The committee vote was 11-7-1, with only Democrat, Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, abstaining. All the Republicans voted against the nomination. “This...

Calif. Pol Touts 'Pedophile Island' for Sex Offenders (May 21) -- California gubernatorial candidate Douglas Hughes has made quite a name for himself in recent weeks -- not so much by surging ahead in the polls, but rather by promising, if elected, to create a "Pedophile Island" for convicted sex offenders. "I read the newspapers, and always somewhere buried in the paper somebody has [been] raped, tortured, kidnapped and so forth," Hughes told AOL News. "We are not getting anywhere [by] putting them back in the neighborhood. ... It's like any alcoholic, sex or drug addict -- have it around...

SALT LAKE CITY — In 1983, when Sen. Lyle Hillyard, R-Logan, then a state representative, pushed through a bill imposing tougher sex-offender laws, it was a different era. "I was convinced at the time that society had not really looked at sexual abuse," Hillyard said. "There were things going on, even within families, that nobody dared talk about." And while 1996 legislation, also proposed by Hillyard, eliminated mandatory minimum sentences and widened options for prosecutors and judges, Utah still has one of the country's toughest stances on sex crime — with the prison population to show for it. That's why...

(Newser) – USA Swimming has been rocked by the disclosure that 36 coaches have been banned for life for molesting teen athletes over the last 10 years, according to a suit brought by victims' families. Coaches secretly videotaped, fondled, and were otherwise indecent with their charges, court papers reveal. One coach in Indiana set up a camera in a "special" shower room and secretly filmed his athletes while they bathed, ABC News reports. In some cases, the itinerant coaching lifestyle allowed predators to stay one step ahead of authorities and victims' families. Another coach, who was sentenced to 40 years...

06:39 p.m., March 25, 2010, updated 07:01 p.m., March 25, 2010 EDITORIAL: Obamacare's subsidy for the sexually depraved THE WASHINGTON TIMES Senate Democrats voted almost unanimously Wednesday night to ensure the right of rapists and child molesters to have guaranteed access to government-subsidized Viagra under the president's health care plan. Only Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana broke ranks with his Democratic colleagues. Sen. Tom Coburn, Oklahoma Republican, put the Senate's majority party on the spot by offering an amendment denying convicted sex offenders coverage for erectile-dysfunction medications. Dr. Coburn's proposal would also have prohibited health care exchanges from offering any...

Patty Murray Votes To Allow Convicted Sex Offenders To Receive Taxpayer-Funded Viagra   Wednesday, March 24, 2010 @ 09:03 PM Highlighting her left-wing agenda and the extreme lengths to which Democrats are going to preserve their massive government-run health care bill, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) voted today to block an amendment that would have prohibited health care plans administered by the federal government from covering erectile dysfunction drugs for individuals convicted of child molestation, rape, or other forms of sexual assault.The amendment, which was offered by U.S. Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK), was defeated by Murray and her Democrat Senate...

Dems reject amendment to ban Viagra for sex offenders Democrats killed an amendment by Republican Sen. Tom Coburn to prevent the newly created insurance exchanges from using federal money to cover Viagra and other erectile dysfunction drugs for rapists, pedophiles and other sex offenders. The amendment failed 57-42 "The vast majority of Americans don't want their taxpayer dollars paying for this kind of drug for those kind of people," Coburn said. Democratic Sen. Max Baucus urged his colleagues to defeat the amendment. "This is a serious bill. This is a serious debate. The amendment offered by the senator from Oklahoma...

Fake “Conservatives” Embrace Homosexual “Monster” AIM Column By Cliff Kincaid February 18, 2010 Kathleen Parker is the "conservative" columnist liberals can count on to bash conservative personalities and causes. This is why her column is syndicated by the Washington Post and why she is featured on the Chris Matthews show. Now, Parker has done her best imitation of lesbian MSNBC-TV commentator Rachel Maddow by writing a column bashing Uganda's Christian majority for considering passage of a bill to toughen laws against homosexuality. This has been a Maddow cause for months, and Parker is now on the bandwagon. When the MSNBC-TV...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- The state of Tennessee gave a medical license to a known violent sex offender because state law doesn't necessarily prohibit a sex offender from practicing medicine. Video: State Gives Medical License To Sex Offender Doc Channel 4 News is protecting a concerned parent's identity because the mother made a shocking discovery after she took her sick 8-year-old daughter to see their doctor. "I'm outraged. I'm really confused," she said. "Well, first, I got a hunch from him, just a mom hunch. I just really didn't get a good vibe from him." That hunch took her to the...

Los Angeles prosecutors argued Friday against allowing director Roman Polanski, under house arrest at his Swiss chalet, to be sentenced in absentia after making "a mockery of our criminal justice system" for more than three decades. -snip- Polanski's attorney, Chad Hummel, has been pushing for Polanski to be sentenced without having to return to Los Angeles. Prosecutors have vigorously opposed sentencing him in absentia. In court papers filed Friday, Deputy District Attorney David Walgren stated the reasons in no uncertain terms. "The defendant is a fugitive," Walgren wrote. "A fugitive child rapist, who for 32 years has made a mockery...

Nation's Perverts Endorse Full-Body Airport Scanners A woman waits patiently for her luggage after undergoing the airlines' new WYSIWYG scan. RENO, Nev. (CAP) - America's largest organized group of perverts and degenerates has released a statement wholeheartedly supporting plans to install full-body scanning equipment in the nation's airports. "Any device that can prevent terrorism while at the same time allowing you to see through people's clothes is A-OK in our book," said Nigel Friedrichsen, president of the Reno-based National Association of Perverts (NAP). "That's the definition of win-win. Um ... At least our definition." The scanners have been highly controversial,...

In an open letter, the filmmaker Roman Polanski has offered his gratitude to people who have written him letters of support while he was jailed in Winterthur prison, near Zurich, and while he remains under house arrest in his chalet in Gstaad, Switzerland, The Associated Press reported. In a letter to his friend Bernard-Henri Lévy published online at The Huffington Post, Mr. Polanski wrote: “I would like every one of them to know how heartening it is, when one is locked up in a cell, to hear this murmur of human voices and of solidarity in the morning mail.

The body of a Maryland girl who authorities say was abducted by a registered sex offender was found Friday after thousands of volunteers fanned out to look for her. Wicomico County Sheriff Mike Lewis said that the body of 11-year-old Sarah H. Foxwell was discovered at about 4 p.m. near the Delaware state line. He offered few other details. Thomas J. Leggs Jr., 30, has been charged in her kidnapping. Leggs is a former boyfriend of the girl's aunt, who is her legal guardian. A public defender representing him has not returned a phone call. Thousands of volunteers gathered in...

<p>SALISBURY, Md. — The body of a Maryland girl who authorities say was abducted by a registered sex offender was found Friday after thousands of volunteers fanned out to look for her.</p> <p>Wicomico County Sheriff Mike Lewis said that the body of 11-year-old Sarah H. Foxwell was discovered at about 4 p.m. near the Delaware state line. He offered few other details. Thomas J. Leggs Jr., 30, has been charged in her kidnapping.</p>

A convicted sex offender has been charged with beating and sexually assaulting a elderly woman as she gave him a tour of a rural Kandiyohi County church last month. According to charges filed Monday, Lindon Roy Knutson, 61, left the 73-year-old victim bloodied on the ground outside the Crow River Church on the afternoon of Nov. 24. Knutson has been convicted of a string of sexual assaults dating back to 1973 and has spent much of the past three decades in prison. In Wisconsin, he was committed as a habitual sex offender, most recently at a mental health institution in...

Fear tends to hide the truth from us. Most of what our society believes about sex offenders is not true. Below are just a few of the beliefs we were taught that are either misleading or completely untrue: • Epidemic of rape-murders: The Somer Renee Thompson case is a tragedy indeed, but is a very rare tragedy. In the NISMART-2 study from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, only 115 “stereotypical kidnappings” occurred in the year of the study, with only 45 of those cases ended in death or were permanently missing [1]. Your child has a far...

“There’s no such thing as monsters.” We tell our kids that. The truth is that monsters are real. A real live monster might live next door to you, or across the street from your child’s school, even around the corner from your church. These monsters are called “Sex Offenders”, a label that is far too innocuous to convey the evil of those who have earned it. Somer Renee Thompson...Only one thing is known for certain: on the way home from school that fateful day, Somer met a monster face-to-face.

DOUGLAS — Federal authorities say they have seized nearly 700 pounds of marijuana at the Douglas Port of Entry. U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers were screening travelers and vehicles Sunday night when they came in contact with a 20-year-old Douglas man driving a truck. The vehicle was inspected and authorities discovered that the bed of the F-150 had been completely altered to accommodate the concealment of nearly 700 pounds of marijuana with an estimated street value of $1.1 million, authorities said. Officers seized the vehicle and marijuana and the man was turned over to the custody of Immigration and...

Twin Falls, Idaho » The headquarters for 620 Girls Scouts in south-central Idaho is moving because too many registered sex offenders live near its current downtown office, officials said. "Do we feel this is the safest environment for girls being served in the area?" asked Shelli Rambo Robertson, CEO of the Girl Scouts of Silver Sage Council, which includes Idaho, Oregon and Nevada. "We did not." The group last month discontinued meetings at the southern Idaho office and is moving to a new office near the College of Southern Idaho. The headquarters on Fourth Avenue was in an industrial part...

The big screen, flat panel TVs that so recently hung on the walls of the Moose Lake sex offender program will soon be enjoyed by patients at veterans homes across the state. In a move designed to put an end to an embarrassing episode for a cost-conscious administration, Gov. Tim Pawlenty said Friday that at least 14 of the two dozen sets will go to veterans homes in Minneapolis, Fergus Falls, Hastings and Silver Bay. Jon Skillingstad, the administrator of the veterans home in Fergus Falls, said the new televisions will be a welcome addition. "We can easily make use...

In today’s New York Times arts section, film industry correspondent Brooks Barnes analyzes Hollywood’s attitude to fugitive sex predator/Oscar-winning director Roman Polanski. Most prominent artists have lined up behind the push to let the famed director off the hook for having drugged and raped a 13-year-old girl over 30 years ago. Polanski fled the country to avoid sentencing after he plead guilty to the lesser charge of unlawful sex with a minor and has since lived in a cushy exile in Europe. After his recent arrest, Polanski is currently sitting in a Swiss jail awaiting possible extradition to the United...

MARIETTA, Ga. (AP) -- A small group of homeless sex offenders have set up camp in densely wooded area behind a suburban Atlanta office park, directed there by probation officers who say it's a place of last resort for those with nowhere else to go. The nine sex offenders live in tents surrounding a makeshift fire pit in the trees behind a towering "no trespassing" sign, waiting out their probation sentences as they face numerous living restrictions under one of the nation's toughest sex offender policies...

At the heart of this inquiry lies the nature of the community where Garrido chose to make his home after serving just 11 years of a 50-year sentence for a previous sex attack. For contrary to initial reports, this is far from being mainstream, middle-class, suburban America. Together with his new wife, Nancy, whom he had met while she was visiting her uncle in jail, Garrido settled in a crime-ridden backwater where nobody pries into anyone else's business - unless they are willing to pay the price. 'The people here are like hillbillies,' says one local film-maker. 'They are all...

At 11 years of age, Jayce Lee Dugard was snatched from her family in 1991 at a school bus stop in South Lake Tahoe, California. Convicted sex offender, Phillip Garrido kept Miss Duggard in a complex of sheds in his backyard for 18 long years. During that time, Mr. Garrido is said to have fathered two daughters, aged 11 and 15 respectively, by Miss Duggardd. He kept all three females hidden within the sheds of his back yard in Antioch, California. Miss Duggard resurfaced this week, when Mr. Garrido was called into a Concord, California parole office. The Telegraph has...