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Overhaul could drop thousands from sex offender registry
Some argue putting label on sex offenders has little public benefit.
Two decades after Ohio began labeling sex offenders on a public database and setting restrictions on where they can live, a major overhaul to the law is being proposed that could drop thousands of lower-level offenders off the list
Some critics are even calling for doing away with the registry entirely, saying it’s been an expensive effort with little benefit to the public.
The Ohio Criminal Justice Recodification Committee — tasked with overhauling Ohio’s criminal code — delivered recommendations to the state Senate last month that they say will save local sheriffs’ departments money on administration while ensuring the most serious offenders are still monitored.
The committee, in its notes on the changes, says the goal was to give judges more discretion on whether to put low-level offenders on the registry and, “to prioritize registration for those who remain a danger to the community and not to dilute the registry with offenders who no longer remain a danger to reoffend.”
Opponents of registration have long argued that it does more harm than good to keep those who have served their time from re-integrating into society, and they say the registry unfairly labels people who commit low-level, non-violent crimes.
“It’s the greatest reform we’ve seen in Ohio since registration originally came to be,” Barb Wright, founder of Families and Individuals for Reform, said of the committee’s report.
Residency restrictions, which currently bar sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of a school or day care, have been a particularly hot button issue and the committee recommends getting rid of them.
“Empirical data shows there is no evidence to support that residency restrictions impact public safety,” the committee’s notes say.
In 2015 state supreme courts in California and Massachusetts struck down local residency laws that cities and counties had imposed. Texas also does not have a statewide residency rule, but numerous cities that enacted limits later withdrew them after challenges from reform groups.
“It poses huge hurdles for offenders, especially in the cities,” Wright said. “There’s literally no place that they can live.”
The Ohio ACLU called the recommendations an improvement, but said the committee fell far short of the sweeping reforms promised when it was formed by then Senate President Keith Faber.
“Should we have a registry at all?” said ACLU Chief Lobbyist Gary Daniels. “We should be having that discussion.”
The 24-member, bi-partisan committee included prosecutors, defense attorneys, judges, prison officials and others and met for two years before submitting its final set of recommendations. The plan maintains the current three-tier registration system, but allows for low-level offenders to avoid registration at a judge’s discretion, allows offenders to petition to get off the registry after a set amount of time, and moves some crimes to lower tiers.
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By Katie Wedell – Staff Writer
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