Judge tosses lawsuit against Kansas sexual predator program

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7-19-17 Kansas:

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit brought by Kansas sex offenders who are confined indefinitely in a state program for post-prison mental health treatment, saying they didn't do enough to substantiate their claims.

U.S. District Judge J. Thomas Marten ruled Monday that the lawsuit failed to adequately argue that the treatment the offenders are receiving at Larned State Hospital in western Kansas is so lacking that their confinement violates their constitutional rights.

Kansas law allows the courts to order sex offenders to be held indefinitely for treatment after they've served their prison sentences. Legislators created the program in 1994 after the rape and murder of a college student by a sex offender who had been released from prison, and the U.S. Supreme Court declared it constitutional in 1997 because of the promised treatment.

The 25 men who filed the lawsuit in 2014 are among 261 offenders now being held in the Sexual Predator Treatment Program. Four offenders have been released since the program's inception and nine others are living independently but are still under court supervision, according to the state Department for Aging and Disability Services. ..Continued..

Advocates say psych hospital newsletters being blocked

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7-19-17 New York:

Marked "Return to Sender"

In what advocates characterize as a communications lockdown, newsletters going to sex offenders who are confined in a state-run hospital have been sent back to their publisher unopened with a “Return to Sender” notice.

“A disturbing trend is developing on civil facilities not allowing our newsletter,’’ said Wayne Bowers, who puts out the quarterly CURE-SORT News, which compiles stories about the latest treatment options as well as legal developments pertaining to convicted sex offenders who have completed their prison terms but remain indefinitely locked up in psychiatric hospitals under civil commitment laws.

CURE-SORT are acronyms for prison reform groups behind the newsletters: Citizens United for the Rehabilitation of Errants and Sex Offenders Restored Through Treatment.

State officials say that the newsletters are normally delivered to hospital residents as long as their names are on the envelope. ..Source..

Phone conferences curtailed for sex offenders

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7-15-17 New York:

Patients at state-run hospital under civil confinement can't join in national teleconferences

The state-run psychiatric hospital that houses civilly confined sex offenders has barred them from participating in monthly phone conferences on treatment and developments in the laws that allow their incarceration.

Advocates say the shift is a violation of their rights and represents an ongoing crackdown on the civilly confined.

"The monthly calls halted a year ago," said Charles Sullivan, who runs CURE or Citizens United for Rehabilitation of Errants, a Washington-based group that advocates for prison reform.

The state Office of Mental Health, which operates the Central New York Psychiatric Center and other civil confinement facilities, said the agency is within its rights to ban participation in conference calls. ..Continued..

He spent 9 years on McNeil Island without his day in court

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7-15-17 Washington:

Jesse McReynolds had spent more than a year in the Yakima County Jail when he filed an Alford plea — not admitting the crime but conceding he likely would be convicted — on a second-degree attempted kidnapping charge.

“I was told that I was going to be released the day I was processed,” he said.

Instead, he spent the next nine years at the Special Commitment Center on McNeil Island, without ever having a civil commitment trial or being convicted of a violent sexual offense.

McReynolds, now 34, was unconditionally released late last month from the state’s home for sexually violent predators after the state Attorney General’s Office lost before a judge and dropped its petition to have him civilly committed to the SCC two weeks before his trial.

The state spent more than $1.3 million to keep him there, all without a solid case, said his attorney, Rachel Forde. ..Continued..

Law enforcement lauds proposed changes to sex offender policy

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7-5-17 Wisconsin:

FOND DU LAC - New legislation aims to clarify a law that has led courts to place a rare class of violent sex offenders on supervised release in small towns with little warning.

It's an issue that has raised the blood pressure of law enforcement officials around the state. Earlier this year, Fond du Lac County Sheriff Mick Fink led a crusade to block the Wisconsin Department of Health Services from placing a sex offender who had committed his crime in Washington County in Eldorado.

A new bipartisan budget amendment would establish a group of stakeholders in each county to find a suitable home for these violent sex offenders. It's a change Fink welcomes, after filing an open records request to find out that the DHS planned to place Terry L. Olson, arrested in 2003 for sexually assaulting more than 30 children, in Eldorado last November.

"I stayed pretty low until you kick sand in this office," Fink said. "The way we're treated is just not right. I’d welcome any change that gives us more say." ..Continued..