Monday, September 8, 2008

Why I'm Doing what I do

It's late at night and I can't sleep. My husband, who is a CDL driver has just left on a run. So, I decided to go into why I took the position of Chairperson for Maryland Citizens For Sex Offender Justice.

Did you know that earlier this summer, Ocean City, MD passed a law stating that any Maryland Sex Offender that comes into their town must register with the police department first? That's right. Suppose your husband and you decided you wanted to dine at one of Ocean City's Seafood restaurants and your reservations were at 6 p.m. You would have to go to Ocean City 2 hours early just so your husband could check into the police station, tell them who he is (and depending on his risk level would have to get finger printed), where he is going and for how long. (Of course, the cops could play dirty and keep him longer for some asinine reason just so you miss your reservation).Talk about the most idiotic law I have ever heard of. Just shows you how far this witch hunt is going. But get this...its only for Maryland Registered Sex Offenders. One from New Jersey could waltz right in and spend a whole week if he/she wanted to.

Other states are trying to pass laws where a sex offender must register his computer and give them his password and list of sites he goes to.

Maryland, earlier, had tried to pass the residency law. This would restrict any Maryland Sex offender from living within one mile of any school, daycare, sports/recreation places. Do you know how many schools, daycares, sport arenas are in Salisbury alone?

One state, sorry, this late at night I can't remember names, won't allow sex offenders to go to church unless he receives permission from the pastor and congregation. (No, I'm not making these up!)

And you know the Equal Housing and Fairness Act? In several states it doesn't apply to sex offenders.

As far as the current Maryland Sex Offender restrictions, my husband is not restricted on where he lives, just where he goes. He can't go onto school property(not even for work), he can't go to a college(without first going through a lot of BS and then he still could be denied), he can't go to any sport/recreation area, he can't go to a daycare...you get the idea.

If you've looked on the Maryland Sex Offender Registry, it has only one category "Child Sex Offenders". Everyone is placed there(doesn't matter if the offense was with a child or not). If you look closer, and pay attention to the conviction dates...you would see several who were convicted 20-30 years ago, with no record of re-offense.

So tell me, when are we going to say "ENOUGH IS ENOUGH"? Not only do these idiotic laws restrict the sex offender, they restrict his/her family. A father can not go see his child play sports nor pick his child up from school or daycare. He/she probably won't be able to further their education or train for a new career.

It is time for the public and those un-educated people in state/government legislature to become more educated on the facts pertaining to sex offenders. All this fiction that you see on the news is just a scare tactic to keep the public in a panic.

So, are you ready to say "ENOUGH IS ENOUGH"? I know I am. That is why I'm doing what I do.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm glad you're doin what you're doing.
I am an RSO. My charge was "attempted" and when I plead the registration was to run for "only" 10 years; now, with the stroke of a pen, I'm considered "violent" and registration is for life!
My wife and I, both degreed professionals, had planned to expatriate in a few years when we retire, but there's (yet another) new law coming down the pike, the International Megan's Law (H.R. 5722) which will make it impossible for RSO's to even travel to foreign countries. Your government hates us so much it doesn't want us to leave!

I guess it feels like your children should have as many opportunities as possible to be molested! Way to go Congress!

I'm ready to say "Enough is enough!" But I've lost the right to use the ballot box.
What box is left?

Dee said...

The box that takes you to my web site. We'll challenge laws, bills and fight for your rights.

http://supportforwivesofsexoffenders.webs.com.

Our Maryland group is in the early stages but with people like you to help change things. Go to the national group and get an idea of what we are doing

http://www.reformsexoffenderlaws.org

Above all, keep your spirit and keep on saying "ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!"

Anonymous said...

Glad to see every day more and more people realizing that these laws are getting out of hand. United we can win!

www.sexoffendersagainstpersecution.com

Anonymous said...

Your husband, being an ex-soldier, will know the other box I had in mind: a cartridge box.

Enough is more than enough, and I for one am sick of paying over and over when my debt has already been paid!

(I'm too much of a goody-two shoes to have the tools needed to use said box, but I think about it nonetheless.)

Matthew said...

OMG Dee this is great!! I am a RSO too, and I wrote a thing for the newspaper asking "When is Enough Enough"?, which of course they ignored, but I'd like to share it with you! All I want to do is get on with my life!! Damn Im no danger to ANYONE, I am in no way sexually interested in Children, but I'm being legislated out of a way to LIVE, work, and just exist!! It's crazy, and so totally unfair.

Anonymous said...

Ok, I emailed it to you, but here's my story for the readers, interestingly, it's titled the same as your other article, "When is Enough Enough"?:


Letter from a sex offender “When is enough enough”?

I’m a convicted sex offender, NOT a child molester, and there IS a difference, but the media and politicians don’t differentiate it. I was convicted for having sex with someone that was under the legal age of consent, but it was someone I was in a relationship with, someone that I was engaged to, and someone that lived with me as well. There was a 9 year age difference between us when I was 24. All of this was at a time when we were both abusing methamphetamines, which further numbed our moral viewpoint, making things seem as if they were almost normal.

Of course the situation was not normal, we shouldn’t have been together, we shouldn’t have been doing drugs, and we shouldn’t have been having sex, none of it was right by God, by the law, and frankly neither of us was emotionally ready for marriage or commitment. I knew both her parents, they knew where she was, and until I was busted for dealing drugs, they didn’t have a problem with us being together, and even after I was busted, it was not them that pressed charges on me, it was completely and totally the district attorney.

I think it is worth mentioning that this girl, my fiancĂ©e, was not living in a stable home, and in fact was living on the streets when I met her, and had been sexually active prior to our involvement. The point is that she was living like an adult, she was physically grown, and she didn’t appear to be a “Child”, and this whole situation had nothing to do with “molestation”. I am not a child molester, or sexually interested in children, and in fact I am celibate, I haven’t had a sexual partner since that year, 1998 when all of this went down. I made serious errors in judgement letting myself get involved in drugs like I did, and also into this situation, and I wish I could change it, but I cannot.

So I went to prison where I stayed for more than 5 years, working a production job and staying out of trouble, and reconnecting with my Christian roots, as I completely changed my life, quit all the drugs, and started the process of becoming a productive member of society.

Now I have been out for nearly four years, working a steady job, earning money, paying taxes, staying off drugs, and being a part of the ministry of my church now. All I want to do, now that I have more than “Paid my debt to society”, is live life, hopefully find a woman to marry, and have a family, as anyone else would want to do, but as a “Sex offender”, who is lumped together with child predators and child molesters, I am having an increasingly difficult time, and there are more new laws proposed that will make it nearly impossible for me to do that.

This is America, “the land of the free”, and while I made bad choices that I paid for, I am still an American citizen, and I have the right to be free to live, earn a living, and be a productive member of society. I am NOT a danger, to children, adults, or anyone. All I want is to move forward. But now due to the political times, ILLEGAL ALIENS have more rights than I do, and there are more laws in the works that will broadly blanket me and everyone else with sex offenses, taking away our constitutionally guaranteed rights and prevent us from living our lives.

Now the Megan’s law website, while I wish I wasn’t on it, I do agree that it is a good idea, but I wish that they would include the dates of convictions, and the other circumstances that were involved, because as it appears now it makes it look like it happened yesterday, and that I am a predator, which I am not in the slightest.

But the new law that passed, Jessica’s law goes WAY too far! Making it a CRIME for ANY sex offenders to live within 2000 feet of any school, park, or daycare center, “Or other place where children regularly congregate” makes just about ALL CITIES off limits!! How is one supposed to find a place to live when all the less expensive housing in town is off limits? Also, making sex offenders live out of town will not prevent them from re-offending, if they are going to! Less than 10% of sex offenses are done by strangers anyway, most by a close friend or family member, so banishing anyone with a sex offense to someplace out of town will NOT protect children, but will make it harder for sex offenders to be productive members of society, making it MORE likely that they will not follow the laws.

Also the Electronic monitoring for LIFE, is also ridiculous. Think of how punitive it will be to have to wear a bulky transmitter box on the ankle, that can never come off, and even having to sleep in it, attached by a cord to the wall, NEVER being able to take it off, EVER again, no matter how well behaved or law abiding one is! It will not prevent them from re-offending, but WILL make it much harder for them to find and keep jobs, or live normal lives, even harder than it already is as a convicted sex offender, and it is in everyone’s best interest to reintegrate ex-cons into society as positive, productive members of society.

But it doesn’t stop there, because “Cracking down” on sex offenders is such an easy way to score political points, there are many more restrictive ideas that are being proposed that would further take away our constitutional rights. There is also talk of requiring the Megan’s law website to list the EMPLOYERS of the sex offenders. Now what this would do is FORCE the employers to fire us, because who is gonna want to patronize a business that “Employs child molesters”, which is how they will be seen? If this happens that will make it completely impossible for anyone convicted of a sex offense to work and earn a living, completely squashing their rights and giving ILLEGAL ALIENS many more rights. It is in NO ONE’S best interest to make sex offenders outside the law again, especially law abiding, productive ones that are no danger to anyone.

They also want to make the e-mail addresses and instant message identities of all sex offenders listed on the Megan’s law website, and have them registered like physical address information, and what this would do is make it impossible for us to join many groups online, like dating sites where I might hope to find a woman to marry and start a family with. All of this is further punishment, after I have already “Done my time”, and is constitutionally prohibited as retroactive punishment.

There is also talk of making convicted sex offenders have different colored license plates on their cars, further alienating them from society, as well as making them and their cars a target for people who want to break laws themselves and dole out some “Revenge”, thinking that anyone with a different colored plate must be a child predator, and someone who should be locked up, which OFTEN is NOT the case. What’s next? Making it a FELONY for any sex offender to leave the house without wearing an orange jumpsuit that says MOLESTER on the back and front? Retroactive death sentences? Unfortunately I see no trend that will prevent laws progressing to that point, and further! There has to be a way of differentiating which people are threats and which are not, and THIS CAN ONLY BE DONE ON A CASE BY CASE BASIS, and not by any of these blanket laws that are threatening to take away the freedom and liberty that this country is founded on.

Furthermore, this whole process is the “Slippery slope”. I mean they are already making gang offenders have to register now, and making it a crime for them not to, and where will it stop? After all, paroled murderers might kill again, so we should make them live at least 2000 feet away from any other people right? Thieves might steal again, so they shouldn’t live within 2000 feet of any one else’s property. Drug dealers might sell drugs again, so we better keep them 2000 feet away from other people as well. See, the point is that even if we did pass all those laws, it wouldn’t prevent any of them from doing any of that if they CHOSE to, all it would do is take away the freedoms of this country, and make it impossible for ex-cons to live their life after changing their lives. In America, people have the right to change their life, and then live their new life, at least they did, and we need to make sure those rights are protected, for ALL of us, and the country as a whole. Please consider this when voting in the future. Thank you



An Anonymous local “sex offender”


P.S. If I had lived in Canada when this had happened I would not be a sex offender at all, as she was over the age of consent there then, as well as many other “Civilized modern countries”. Canada has just recently raised it’s age of consent to 16.

Dee said...

Like Matthew, I too, have written several articles for the newspaper and multiple letters to the editor. No one would publish them, no one would even acknowledge that they had received them. I thought America was where the right for "Freedom of Speech" was fought and won may years ago. there is no freedom of speech. You are not entitled to your own opinion. And God forbid if your speaking out on the injustice of sex offenders. And you pointed out so many truths in your article. Thank you so much for sharing!!! Keep in touch and congratulations to you and your fiancee.

Anonymous said...

My boyfriend was arrested at his job at 4:00am for giving a russian prostitute a ride. She told him she would give him sex in return for money, he said no, she cried rape 4 and a half hours later. And because he too is a registered sex offender, they feel he has no rights. He did not get to talk to a lawyer until the morning of his hearing 28 days later. He is still there. They say that they have evidence. They don't have a witness because she went back to russia. I feel so helpless and I know he does. I wish I could do more to help him. He writes me and calls me everyday. I really miss him. He served 25 years for the first offense and I feel that they are trying him again for the same thing. I tell him to stand strong.