No, I agreed with that. My question was concening people being placed on lists for sex crimes.
I was going to drop it as I took this thread off course slightly, but since you asked, I'll be happy to explain.
Sex offender registries increase the punishment for a crime. When the Adam Walsh Act passed, it went back over 50 years and put people on the registry who had been off for 20 years, sometimes 30 or more, or never were on the registry as their crime was decades prior to the enactment of any kind of registry. That is a direct violation of the ex post facto clause of the constitution, which states that you cannot increase the punishment for a crime after the fact. They are passing these laws preventing sex offenders from going on sites like facebook, etc 20 years after the crime was committed. That's illegal. You can't do that. Because the offender could easily claim that had they known all these new laws and punishments would be in effect 20 years from now, they would not have pled guilty and would have forced the courts into a trial which may or may not have convicted them.
People are also being uprooted out of their homes who have been living there for years. A new law banning a sex offender from living with 2500 feet of a school, when the prior law was 1000 feet, uproots an offender and his family and forces them to find a new place to live. The living restrictions of sex offender laws are unconstitutional in and of themselves, as that is banishment, which is against the law.
People's severe dislike of anything "sex offender" related results in easy votes for legislators that appear to be "tough on sex offenders" by passing these new laws. The problem is, they apply retroactively, that means to people already convicted and sentenced. After the Adam Walsh Act passed, some people went from 10 years on the registry to life. 9 years after registering so they were 1 year from getting off and an illegal, unconstitutional law was passed increasing their punishment by keeping them on the list for life, or sometimes for 15 more years, up to 25, depending on the crime. Now keep in mind, these people did not commit a new crime and were never examined by any professional as to the risk they posed, they simply went off of the crime committed. If 10 years was good enough 9 years ago, it's good enough now. The registry is slowly being found to be unconstitutional in many states, it's just taking a while.
Think about this, someone can murder someone and do a few years in jail (as few as 8 years for first degree murder as "life" in many states is 25 years, and inmates do 30% of their time before being eligible for parole), and get out on parole. They do not have to notify neighbors, they can live anywhere they want including next to a school, they can do what they want, go about their business as usual. A sex offender, no matter if it's an 18yo with his 16yo gf, someone who clicked on a bad website with child porn photos or a repeat rapist must notify neighbors, can't go near a school or attend their child's school functions, they can't live in many apartments, they can't live in many places at all. The problem is......our "christian" society of second chances doesn't apply to people who are sex offenders. Keep in mind, you can get this label for life by doing nothing more than peeing in a park, flashing someone when drunk, etc etc. People think sex offenders are all child molesters and rapists, that is very far from the truth. I personally know a guy who received a child porn email and upon opening it his IP address was forwarded to the FBI who in turn prosecuted him for possession of child porn. This guy never touched anyone, was a college grad struggling to make it on a low paying job, just like anyone else would. He had a decent life. Now his life is ruined. He can't find a place to live, nobody wants to hire him, etc etc. He was recently at least semi-popular on facebook, now with the new law passed he must cut his only real means of communicating with society and being active in the community off. He is now a recluse that is scared for his life because vigilantes with weapons can find his face, address and a description of his car readily on the internet.
Think about it this way. Ever got a traffic ticket? If so, imagine receiving a letter in the mail 5 years later that says a new law was passed saying everyone that has ever been convicted of "XYZ" violation must now have a bumper sticker that says "Warning, Dangerous Driver" on their vehicles. That's only the tip of the iceberg, but gives you an idea of what it's like with all these new sex offender laws. There are laws literally like that that society is completely ok with, but don't stop and think what that does to the offenders families, kids, etc.
If you don't think THIS is unconstitutional, you are a lost cause.
