COVID-19: Strategies for Reducing Transmission
In response to the current COVID-19 Pandemic, the Sex Offense Litigation and Policy Resource Center has published a set of guidelines for law enforcement, policy experts, and others with respect to law and policy focused on those with past convictions …
Posted: March 28, 2020Reason — After He Found California’s Indefinite Detention of Sex Offenders Wasn’t Working, the State Shut Him Down and Destroyed His Research
By Steven Yoder | From the April 2020 Issue In late 2006, a public defender went before a Napa County judge to argue for his client’s freedom. Rex McCurdy, a 49-year-old man, had been detained for seven years at Atascadero State Hospital under a 1995 C …
Posted: March 6, 2020Reason — Sex Offender Laws Are Broken. These Women Are Working to Fix Them.
By Hallie Lieberman | Feb. 2020 Sandy Rozek is the polar opposite of what comes to mind when you hear the word activist. A 78-year-old great-grandmother and retired high school English teacher who lives in Houston, Rozek is not woke, doesn’t post on Tw …
Posted: January 25, 2020The Outline: What Follows Punishment?
When people convicted of sex offenses in the United States finish their criminal sentences, they generally face a slew of regulations and restrictions — from offender registries to residency restrictions to the possibility of lifelong civil commitment — that leave them isolated, stigmatized, and surveilled. But while Richard knew that living in the free world as a convicted sex offender wouldn’t be easy, nothing prepared him for the reality. …
Posted: September 27, 2019WaPo: In Arlington, a judge must decide if a nonviolent sex offender should stay incarcerated after serving his sentence
On Monday, the Circuit Court in liberal Arlington County will be the scene of a heavy-handed morality play, with prosecutors seeking lifelong incarceration for a young gay man who has already paid an extraordinary price for youthful, nonviolent sexual indiscretions. Virginia, like 19 other states and the federal government, has a Sexually Violent Predators Act (SVPA). Under these laws, people who have completed their criminal sentences under any of a large number of sex-related offenses can be indefinitely detained in a high-security facility until the state determines that they no longer present a risk, typically never. …
Posted: August 25, 2019[The Appeal] — The Struggle to Be Trans in Minnesota’s Sex Offender Program
By Sessi Blanchard | July 15th, 2019 On July 7, 2018, Kendra Michelle Lovejoy did to herself what no one else would: surgery. Wielding a disposable razor, she made incisions into her testicles. She was rushed to the hospital where physicians performed …
Posted: July 15, 2019[Washington Spectator] – Modern-Day Gulag in the Golden State
By Barbara Koeppel | June 4th, 2019 Back in 1997, the Supreme Court ruled that the practice known as civil commitment was legal. This meant that 20 states—which had passed laws permitting the ongoing incarceration of sex offenders—could continue to kee …
Posted: June 12, 2019Sex Offender Civil Commitment to Prison Post-Kinglsey
Arielle W. Tolman, Sex Offender Civil Commitment to Prison Post-Kingsley, 113 Nw. U. L. Rev. 155 (2018) [Ed Note: This article is published as Arielle W. Tolman, Sex Offender Civil Commitment Post-Kingsley, 113 Nw. U. L. Rev. 155 (2018). The abs …
[The Appeal] The Endless Punishment of Civil Commitment
In January, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge James Bianco ruled that after spending nearly two decades detained by the state of California without trial, George Vasquez was a free man. Unlike the 536,000 people held pretrial in the criminal justice system in America, Vasquez, 44, was not being held because he was accused of a crime. Instead, Vasquez was locked up for 17 years out of fear that he might commit a crime.
Posted: September 5, 2018The Legal Fight Over Minnesota’s Sex Offender Program Could Have Ramifications Throughout the Country
MinnPost- The Legal Fight Over Minnesota’s Sex Offender Program Could Have Ramifications Throughout the Country (September 28, 2017).