Sheran receives award for her Minnesota Sex Offender Program reform efforts

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4-30-2014 Minnesota:

Sen. Kathy Sheran, DFL-Mankato, will receive the 2014 AWARE Award this evening for her efforts in reforming the state’s sex offender program. Each year, the Minnesota Coalition Against Sexual Assault and Rape uses the award to draw attention to those who have contributed outstanding work to raise awareness about an aspect of sexual violence needing attention.

“We believe that the solution to ending sexual violence must be a collaborative one that engages multiple voices working at multiple levels — in families, communities and at the policy level,” said Donna Dunn, MNCASA Executive Director. “As we often say, we are stronger together!”

Sheran will be honored for her work on the sex offender program during the 2013 Legislative Session. The issue has been a controversial political topic for a number of years, but Sheran has not shied away from making tough legislative decisions on the issue – an effort that MNCASA appreciates and wants to highlight.

“Sen. Sheran is being honored today for her courageous leadership to settle civil commitment reform as chief author of the Senate bill that passed during the last legislative session,” said Dunn. “In the face of criticism regarding a politicized issue, she continues to understand the urgency of taking on the challenge while other legislators are being overly cautious. We appreciate her willingness and courage to step out and take up what we believe is a critical issue that needs to be solved.” ..Source.. by Suzy Rook

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Officials: Community notification would impede Security Hospital offenders' treatment

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4-30-2014 Minnesota:

An apparent double standard applied to predatory and sex offenders not only grants anonymity to the more than 100 St. Peter Regional Treatment Center patients allowed to leave campus, but keeps residents largely in the dark as to their presence in the community.

Local police and public officials’ hands are tied by state statute when it comes to sharing information about the patients with St. Peter residents. By law, they are not permitted to disclose the offender’s conviction histories or information about their presence with the community, simply because they reside at the Minnesota Security Hospital.

“There is a provision in the sex offender statute that says you cannot provide community notification [if the offender lives in a residential facility like the state hospital],” St. Peter Police Chief Matthew Peters said. “The idea is that it would be detrimental to their continued therapy.”

Peters, as well as representatives for the Department of Human Services and the Minnesota Coalition Against Sexual Assault, say residents shouldn’t be concerned since patients issued day passes are deemed ready to safely interact with the public. When contacted about the story and asked if the lack of community notification posed a public safety risk, Governor Mark Dayton’s office had no comment.

But there is a disparity in how community notification laws are applied to offenders housed at the treatment center and to convicted criminals who’ve served their sentences.

All clients provisionally discharged from the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP), as well as predatory and sexual offenders discharged from the Security Hospital, are subject to broad community notification, according to state statute.

When anyone required to register as predatory or sex offender moves into a community, local law enforcement agencies must notify schools, daycare providers, victims, witnesses and any entities and organizations that primarily serve individuals likely to be victimized by the offender. Community meetings about the offender are typically held.

In comparison, MSOP and state hospital clients, including many who would need to register if they had served their time, are frequently allowed on day trips, both supervised and unsupervised, throughout the city.

Community notification is not given in these cases, allowing patients to interact with residents without scrutiny. In turn, residents are unaware of patients’ criminal pasts.

State had secret plan to move sex offenders to Liberty County

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4-29-2014 Texas:

Officials were kept in dark about Liberty County site

The state agency that quietly moved more than two dozen sex offenders classified as among Texas' most dangerous into a north Houston neighborhood last month planned to relocate them to Liberty County without telling officials there, previously secret documents revealed Wednesday.

The records include a detailed proposal and a notice of an award of contract for a prison camp-like facility about 40 miles northeast of Houston to be operated by a company partly owned by a former Houston Police Department officer charged in 2008 in connection with theft of between $100,000 and $200,000 from the Houston Police Officers Union, where he served as treasurer.

Former HPD officer Jeffrey Larson, 45, later pleaded guilty to a Class A misdemeanor charge of misapplication of fiduciary property and received deferred adjudication in 2011.

Neither Larson nor the state Office of Violent Sex Offender Management returned repeated calls Wednesday for comment on the Liberty County plan.

Liberty County Judge Craig McNair said he and other county officials were not made aware of the contract or plans to build the facility until he received calls from angry lawmakers on Wednesday.

Embattled agency's director hires sex offenders' lawyer

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4-28-2014 Texas:

AUSTIN - The lawyer hired to help the embattled director of the state's Office of Violent Sex Offender Management keep her job has criticized the operation as unconstitutional and, until last week, had been assisting some offenders with the lawsuits against the office and his new client.

Austin attorney Doug Becker told some of those offenders last week that he no longer could help with their "pro se" lawsuits against the agency and its executive director, Allison Taylor, because he had been hired by her to help save her $84,000-a-year job.

Taylor is under fire from lawmakers for her decision to quietly move nearly three dozen high-risk sex offenders into Houston and Austin neighborhoods last month without notifying area residents. She later ordered the Houston men moved back to a Beaumont Highway halfway house that primarily houses parolees.

Texas Violent Sex Offender agency appears in flux

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4-27-2014 Texas:

Questions are being raised about who is running the state's embattled Office of Violent Sex Offender Management since the presiding officer has resigned while two other top agency leaders are on leave, according to a published report Friday.

The Houston Chronicle reports that executive director Allison Taylor and program manager Deborah Morgan are on leave. Word that the two have left their jobs comes days after the office's volunteer board chairman, Dan Powers, resigned. He said the workload was too heavy for a volunteer.

Agency general counsel Celeste Blackburn confirmed that Taylor is on leave until next Thursday. It's unclear how long Morgan will be gone.

Taylor and Morgan didn't return calls seeking comment. In the meantime, five lower-level supervisors are managing agency operations.

Sex Offender Agency's Presiding Board Member Quits

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4-27-2014 Texas:

Amid controversy over the placement of dangerous sex offenders who have completed their prison sentences, the presiding member of a board that oversees a little-known agency that manages civilly committed violent sex offenders resigned on Tuesday.

In a resignation letter to Gov. Rick Perry, Dan Powers wrote that the three-member governing body's small size made it less effective and that in recent weeks, the workload at the embattled agency has become too much. The agency is responsible for overseeing the treatment and housing of sex offenders who have been civilly committed, deemed too dangerous to live at liberty in society.

"With only a three-member board it is impossible to provide the appropriate oversight required for such an important agency," Powers wrote. "Although I have been proud to serve the State of Texas, in recent months the time commitment has gone way beyond the expectations of a volunteer and my job and [redacted] has suffered."

The agency has been in search of a long-term home for some of its sex offenders since the private operators of a halfway house for parolees on the Beaumont Highway in Houston said they could no longer live there.

Housing violent sex offenders in Liberty County opposed by commissioners

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4-27-2014 Texas:

Liberty County Commissioners Court was a bumpy ride for Pct. 4 Commissioner Norman Brown Tuesday morning, April 22, as he presided in place of the absent County Judge Craig McNair, who along with his wife is still recuperating from a weekend auto accident. ... ... ...

Another upsetting issue was introduced near the end of the meeting when commissioners discussed and passed a resolution opposing an attempt by the State of Texas to locate a sex-offender “transition center” in Liberty County.

The Office of Violent Sex Offender Management is seeking to purchase land in Liberty County to house violent sex offenders after they have completed their prison terms but have been committed through civil proceedings to live under supervision in a facility similar to a halfway house.

State Sen. Robert Nichols and Rep. John Otto have resisted attempts by Office of Violent Sex Offender Management to locate such a facility in Liberty County.

The Office of Violent Sex Offender Management is now reportedly seeking to purchase land off of FM 1960 near the Harris County line. ... ... ... ..Source.. by CASEY STINNETT

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Perry picks new head of sex offender agency

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4-27-2014 Texas:

Gov. Rick Perry on Friday tapped a Fort Worth deputy chief district attorney to head the state’s embattled Office of Violent Sex Offender Management amid questions about who was running the agency.

Elizabeth “Christy” Jack, who has been on the agency’s board since 2011, will now head it. Her term expires at the pleasure of the governor.

The agency performs functions relating to the sex offender civil commitment program. Jack replaces Dan Powers, who resigned this week citing too heavy a workload for a volunteer position.

Also, the Houston Chronicle reported Friday that two other top agency officials were on leave. Agency general counsel Celeste Blackburn said Taylor is on leave until next Thursday. It’s unclear how long Morgan will be gone.

Taylor and Morgan didn’t return calls seeking comment. In the meantime, five lower-level supervisors were managing agency operations.

For sex offenders who completed their sentences, 'the only way out appears to be to die'

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4-27-2014 Texas:

'The only way out appears to be to die,' says one legal expert

As criminals go, these few hundred men officially are labeled the worst of the worst, offenders whose past sexual crimes have branded them as such pariahs that the state has decided to keep them confined in jails and halfway houses and run-down boarding homes across Texas at taxpayer expense, even though they long ago completed their prison sentences.

They were the unknown, until a month ago when the little-known agency that supervises them - the Office of Violent Sex Offender Management - relocated more than two dozen into the Acres Homes neighborhood in north Houston, without any advance public notice, causing controversy and alarm.

A few days later, disclosure of the agency's plan to build a center in rural Liberty County to house perhaps more than 100 offenders there brought immediate local opposition.

But legal experts, former employees and legislators now suggest that the biggest controversy may involve the program itself: Why outpatient treatment supposedly intended to transition offenders out of confinement once they complete rehabilitation programs, never has.

Not one. Not in 15 years.

"The only way out appears to be to die," said Nicolas Hughes, a Harris County assistant public defender who has represented several offenders in the program. "That's not how it's supposed to work. In that regard, it's clearly not constitutional. These people are just being kept locked up."

Proponents of civil commitment programs for sex offenders insist it is legal, pointing to a string of court decisions upholding its strict rules.

While none of the civilly committed offenders ever have been discharged, Allison Taylor, the program's executive director, has said repeatedly that none of the offenders in the program ever have been charged with committing another sexually violent act. "That, to me, is success," she told the Houston Chronicle in 2012.

Minnesota Supreme Court takes unusual step of reversing sex offender's commitment

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4-23-2014 Minnesota:

The Minnesota Supreme Court has taken the unusual step of reversing the commitment of a man to the Minnesota Sex Offender Program and sent the case back to a lower court for further proceedings.

The high court reaffirmed Wednesday that courts must find sex offenders "highly likely" to reoffend before civilly committing them to the secure treatment program, which is the subject of a constitutional challenge in federal court and debate at the Legislature. But the justices said judges need to make formal findings of fact on whether less restrictive treatment programs are available.

So the justices sent the case of Cedrick Scott Ince (INTS) back to Sibley County District Court for clarification. His lawyers say they'll argue he should be freed on intensive supervised release pending a final ruling. ..Source.. by STEVE KARNOWSKI

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In the Matter of the Civil Commitment of: Cedrick Scott Ince.
Court of Appeals.
1. The term “likely,” as used in the determination of whether a person is “likely to engage in acts of harmful sexual conduct” under Minn. Stat. § 253B.02, subd. 18c(a) (2012), does not indicate a defined numeric level of certainty or require that the fact-finder be substantially certain that the person will engage in acts of harmful sexual conduct. We continue to adhere to our previous construction of this provision, which requires evidence that the person is “highly likely” to engage in acts of harmful sexual conduct. In re Linehan (Linehan III), 557 N.W.2d 171, 180 (Minn. 1996), vacated sub nom. Linehan v. Minnesota, 522 U.S. 1011 (1997).

2. The determination of whether an individual is highly likely to engage in acts of harmful sexual conduct should be based on the multi-factor analysis for dangerousness prediction adopted in In re Linehan (Linehan I), 518 N.W.2d 609 (Minn. 1994), and all other evidence, including actuarial data, that the district court finds relevant and reliable. The relative weight provided to each Linehan factor and other evidence should be determined on a case-by-case basis by the district court.

3. Findings of fact that support the district court’s conclusions on the availability of a less restrictive treatment program must be sufficient to permit meaningful appellate review.

4. Because of the unusual nature of the facts and circumstances presented, a remand to the district court for reconsideration in light of this opinion is required to reevaluate whether appellant is highly likely to engage in acts of harmful sexual conduct and whether a less restrictive alternative for treatment is available.

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Lawmaker says cost cuts to housing sex offenders fall short

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4-15-2014 Wisconsin:

Another sex offender being placed on supervised release from the state’s secure treatment facility is moving into a state-rented home in Green Bay.

But this time the placement won’t cost taxpayers any excessive money in rent. That’s because of changes being made by the Department of Health Services following a FOX 11 Investigates report exposing the high rental costs.

But is it enough? Not according to one area lawmaker.

Convicted sex offender Chester Flowers will be released from Sand Ridge Treatment Center in Mauston on Wednesday. His treatment there, following prison time, makes him eligible for supervised release at taxpayer expense.

The Green Bay community has already been notified of where Flowers will live. And he won’t live in the house alone. You see the state has been renting the home for the past several years to house another sex offender on supervised release. So now there will be two living there and it won’t cost any more. But the state already pays $1,800 a month in rent. That’s two to three times what neighbors of similar sized homes pay.

Reform on sex offenders stalls in Minnesota Legislature

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4-15-2014 Minnesota:

Judge has ordered state program overhauled, but doing so means huge political risks for legislators.

The pressure to overhaul a state sex offender treatment program that has been called “clearly broken” by a federal judge is mounting daily, but the Legislature may not act in time to prevent court intervention.

With just weeks to go in the session, Gov. Mark Dayton and legislators are blaming one another for failing to address the problems identified by Judge Donovan Frank. In February, Frank called on state lawmakers to take immediate action or face a court-ordered remedy.

But little has happened since then.

Human Services Commissioner Lucinda Jesson, whose department oversees the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP), said recently that she had hoped for a different outcome this session. “I’m disappointed,” she said. “I’m concerned about the lack of progress toward overall system reform.”

Leaving the program as it is heightens the possibility that the federal courts could, at some point, declare it unconstitutional and order the release of hundreds of the state’s most violent sex offenders. There is precedent for such dramatic intervention: In 2011, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that California’s overcrowded prisons amounted to cruel and unusual punishment and ordered the state to reduce its inmate population by 30,000.

Proposed House bonding bill contains less money for St. Peter Security Hospital

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4-14-2014 Minnesota:

A nearly $1 billion bonding bill unveiled by Minnesota House Democrats earlier this month sets aside less money for St. Peter Security Hospital improvement than originally proposed.

Gov. Mark Dayton earlier this year recommended investing nearly $64 million in the Minnesota Security Hospital and facilities that house those in the Minnesota Sex Offender Program, releasing a bonding proposal in January that set aside money for both the construction and renovation of several campus buildings.

In contrast, a bill proposed by the House includes $41.32 million for what would be phase one of a two-phase expansion of the hospital's facilities. The Senate has yet to unveil its bonding proposal, but is expected to do so after returning from spring break April 21.

Dayton addressed the hospital upgrades during an April 2 press conference, saying he'd like to see more money invested in the facility.

“I have tried for three years now in my bonding proposals to get funding for a significant upgrade for St. Peter, the security hospital and the sex offender program,” Dayton said. “Both are really decrepit and the Legislature has refused to support either one of those for the last three years.”

Attorney General’s sex predator unit seeks to prevent release of Clark County sex offender

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What is important here is not what the Attorney General can do, but what was done and when! An abuse of process in this writer's mind.

4-9-2014 Washington:

What the AG did:

The state alleges that Richard Hatfield, 60, has committed two prior offenses that qualify him to be committed under the SVP law. In 1982, in California, Hatfield was convicted of Attempted Lewd and Lascivious Conduct with a Minor under 14. In 1998, in Clark County, Hatfield was convicted of Child Molestation in the First Degree. Hatfield originally had been scheduled to be released from prison in February 2012. However, because the state filed an SVP civil commitment petition against him, he has been confined at the state’s Special Commitment Center on McNeil Island pending trial.

In its civil commitment petition, the AGO SVP Unit alleges Hatfield suffers from both a mental abnormality and a personality disorder that cause him to have serious difficulty in controlling his dangerous behavior. SVP attorneys further allege that since the petition was filed in 2012, Hatfield’s mental state has significantly deteriorated and he is unable to control his sexually violent behavior. The court has appointed a guardian ad litem to make decisions for Hatfield. The state’s civil commitment petition consists of allegations that have not yet been proven in a court of law. The State of Washington has the burden to prove any and all of its allegations in court. ..Source..

Whats wrong with what the AG did:

1) The man was scheduled to be released from prison in Feb 2012. Today is April 2014; 26 months later and no civil commitment hearing.

2) The man's mental state has deteriorated over that time frame and no indication whther he is receiving treatment of any kind. The state is contributing to the dangerousness of this person, if any, by failing to treat him.

Twenty-six months and still no court hearing; clearly an abuse of process, allowed by law?

Readers decide.

Unfortunately this happens regularly in civil commitment hearings!

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Florida becomes the harshest state for sex offenders

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4-5-2014 Florida:

Florida toughens laws detaining sex offenders indefinitely for crimes they haven't yet committed

In Arcadia, a town of 6,000 east of Sarasota, there's a facility wrapped in sky-high barbed wire, where no one can choose to get in or out. This isn't a prison, and its residents aren't serving a sentence. It's the Florida Civil Commitment Center, home to 650 men whom the state fears could molest, assault or rape again if released.

"A lot of people try to take themselves out while they're in there," said David, who spent 4 1/2 years in Arcadia, and asked that we conceal his identity. "I've seen it, blood all over the place, walking down the hall with a razor, cutting themselves up."

In Florida, it's legal to lock someone up indefinitely for a crime they haven't yet committed. Called civil commitment, it's similar to forcing a severely mentally ill person into treatment. But this process is reserved for those who were convicted of violent sexual offenses, completed their sentences, but then were judged to still be a risk. Over the past two decades, the practice has spread across the country and is now law in 20 states, plus Washington, D.C. and the federal government.

This week, the civil commitment process was expanded to include offenders serving time in jail. And given certain findings, a state attorney is now required to refer a person to civil commitment, and a judge is required to order a person into civil commitment custody. It's part of a bundle of new laws that has made the state the harshest one in the country for sex offenders.

SOCCPN Report of Deaths

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December 2012 National:

BOP = 0
AZ = 3
CA = 36
FL = 46
IA = 7
IL = 22
KS = 20
MN = 24
ND = 1
NH = 0
NJ = 27
NY = 3
PA = 1
SC = 7
VA = 3
WA = 19
WI = 21
Total: 240

..Source.. by SOCCPN

Missing from SOCCPN report are:

Deaths:
MA = 5 (1 in 2010 and 4 in 1987 see links)
MO = 10 (See HERE)
TX = 7 (See HERE)

Suicides:
MA = 4 (See HERE)
MO = 1 (See HERE)

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Texas Statistics and Recidivism/Re-Offense Rates for Civily Committed Sex Offenders

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4-5-2014 Texas:

SVP Recidivism Rates: Recidivism rates are based upon information gathered from an arrest, a conviction, or incarceration. Recidivism may be based on a technical violation related to the civil commitment order, a sexual re-offense, or a new criminal offense.

As of August 31, 2012, there were 263 sexually violent predators that have been committed under Health & Safety Code Chapter 841. Of the 263:

-- 158 resided in an approved location in the community (of these 3 have been committed to a mental state hospital and 1 to a state school);

-- 105 were incarcerated in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice-Correctional Institutional Division (Note: this number is comprised of new commitments waiting initial release into the program and re-releases of SVPs incarcerated for parole violations and/or new civil commitment charges);

-- 0 absconders; and

-- 7 were deceased and are not counted in the total number of commitments.

Forty-four percent (44%) of SVPs have been convicted of new non-sexual offenses, (e.g.,failure to comply with the civil commitment order), and were sentenced to the TDCJ-Correctional  Institutional Division, served county jail time, or received probation.

Two percent (2%) of SVPs have been convicted of new non-sexual felony criminal offenses, (e.g., aggravated assault on peace officer, assault on a peace officer, criminal impersonation, retaliation, assault, failure to register, and failure to identify).

To date, none of the SVPs committed to the program have been charged with or convicted of a new sexual crime, which represents a 0% sexual re-offense rate. ..Source.. by Office of Violent Sex Offender Management Biennal Report to the Legislature

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Controversial sex-offenders to move from Acres Homes house

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4-5-2014 Texas:

A group of men walk outside the home where high-risk sex offenders had been moved to on the 9300 block of W. Montgomery Road in the Acres Homes neighborhood Friday, April 4, 2014, in Houston. The high-risk offenders had been moved out of the halfway house because they were taking up beds there that were needed for low-risk regular felons who were exiting prison on parole, for treatment and rehabilitation programs.

Facing intense pressure from state officials and angry neighbors, a group of civil-commitment sex offenders quietly moved to an unlicensed Acres Homes boarding house is to be moved back to the Beaumont Highway halfway house from where they came, officials confirmed Friday.

State officials in Austin said up to 29 former convicts – classified by the state as so dangerous they must be kept in custody after they completed their prison sentences in a little-known program called the Office of Violent Sex Offender Management – would remain at the Southeast Texas Transition Center on East Beaumont Highway for no longer than 30 days, until a new location can be found for them to live.

The men were quietly moved to a three-bedroom house at 9330 1/2 West Montgomery in late February, and neighbors did not learn they were present until they received postcards several days ago from the state's sex-offender registry. After the Houston Chronicle on Wednesday disclosed the first details, and that the city had red-tagged the house for building and fire-code violations, neighborhood leaders and lawmakers demanded the offenders be moved immediately.

Bill linked to Kathlynn Shepard slaying signed into law

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4-4-2014 Iowa:

Gov. Terry Branstad has signed 25 bills into law, including legislation adopted in the wake of the kidnapping and slaying last year of Kathlynn Shepard of Dayton.

Senate File 2211 relates to the civil commitment of a sexually violent predator. The bill allows those convicted of a violent sexual offense as a juvenile to be sent to a civil containment unit for sexually violent predators upon release from prison. Officials now don't consider such juvenile convictions when making adult release decisions.

Lawmakers said that those who commit sex offenses as juveniles could be dangerous as adults. That was true in the case of Michael Klunder, who committed suicide after abducting and killing Shepard, lawmakers said. If the legislation had been in effect when Klunder was freed from prison for past crimes, he could have been kept in civil containment instead of being freed.

Branstad also signed Senate File 2321, relating to sexual assaults committed by Iowa National Guard soldiers and airmen, and establishing notification and reporting requirements. The legislation comes in the wake of an increased focus on sexual assaults in the nation's military forces. The bill prohibits Iowa National Guard commanders commanders from interfering with sexual assault victims' right to report incidents involving members of the Guard to civilian law enforcement officials. ..Source.. by William Petroski

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Former North Kitsap man, convicted of sex offenses, asks court to release him from involuntary civil commitment

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4-1-2014 Washington:

A trial to keep a man convicted of three sexually violent offenses in Washington's Special Commitment Center began March 31 in Kitsap County Superior Court.

The state Attorney General's Office is working to keep Elmer Todd Gillis, 49, confined. Gillis is asking the court for unconditional release into the community, as allowed under law.

The Attorney General's Office must demonstrate Gillis suffers from a mental abnormality and/or personality disorder that causes him to have serious difficulty controlling his behavior and makes him likely to engage in predatory acts of sexual violence, if not confined to a secure facility.

The trial is expected to continue into the second week of April.

Gillis' record dates back to 1984 in Spokane County, where he was found guilty of indecent liberties at the age of 18. In 1990, he was convicted of second-degree rape in Snohomish County. In June 1993, he was convicted of second-degree assault with sexual motivation in Kitsap County; the assault occurred in Suquamish. He was also charged with fourth-degree assault of a Kingston woman that year.

Gillis has been confined either at the Special Commitment Center or at the Secure Community Transition Facility on McNeil Island since 1997.

Gillis was committed under a law that permits the involuntary civil commitment of sex offenders. The predator laws help "protect communities from offenders who are likely to reoffend if released," Attorney General Bob Ferguson noted in a press release.

The Sexually Violent Predator Unit within the Attorney General's Office was created in response to the laws permitting involuntary commitment of sex offenders. The unit is responsible for prosecuting predator cases for 38 counties in Washington. In 2013, the unit tried 19 cases and won 16.

As of March 2014, about 296 sexually violent predators are in the Special Commitment Program. ..Source.. by KIPP ROBERTSON

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