To Protect the Innocent
Learning to keep sexual predators at bay
Few fears are greater or more widely shared than the terrifying proposition that one's children will be tricked by a stranger or lured away by someone they trust--and sexually molested. A February Gallup Poll showed that almost 66 percent of adults surveyed said they were "very concerned" about the possibility of sexual molestation of children in their community. In reaction to a recent series of sexual crimes against children, lawmakers have been scrambling to increase penalties and shore up the sex offender registry system. Among the offenses (all, coincidentally, in Florida): the abduction of an 8-year-old girl, who was sexually assaulted, dropped in a recycling bin, and pinned down with chunks of concrete, allegedly by a 17-year-old boy; the murder of 13-year-old Sarah Lunde by a registered sex offender who had once dated her mother; the murder of 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford, abducted by a registered sex offender who had failed to give the police a current address; and the kidnapping of a 17-year-old girl by a man she met on the Internet. Ongoing news stories, including reports of court testimony alleging sexual molestation of children by pop star Michael Jackson and continued discussion of the long-hidden child sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests, have some parents fearing that in their own neighborhood, a child molester lurks.
And he very well might. More than 500,000 registered sex offenders live in the United States. Most are male. Many have been convicted of molesting one or more children, completed their sentences, and re-entered society. In checking out neighborhoods in or near big cities, a state registry search often turns up a dozen in a single ZIP code. But suburbs and rural areas have their share, too. Overall, the nonprofit National Center for Missing and Exploited Children estimates that 1 in 5 girls and 1 in 10 boys will be sexually exploited before they reach adulthood.
Unless the state is one in which neighbors are notified by E-mail, a flier, or a notice in the newspaper or in person by a police officer, online registries are one of the few ways to tell if the new neighbor has a history. The registries--which were launched in 1994, after 7-year-old Megan Kanka of Hamilton Township, N.J., was killed by a neighbor who had two previous convictions for sexual assaults on children--post names and, usually, pictures of paroled sex offenders. "There isn't a profile of a typical sex offender," says Scott Matson, research associate for the Center for Sex Offender Management. "They come in all shapes and sizes--they can be a wealthy neighbor; they can be a professional; they can be unemployed and homeless." Education is not a defining indicator--17 percent of prisoners who committed crimes against children never went further than eighth grade, while 18 percent went to college. Scrolling through registries, it appears that less-affluent neighborhoods have more offenders, but they also turned up on New York's Central Park West and in other high-end ZIP codes. Ninety-one percent are heterosexual. Anecdotal evidence aside, most abusers are not strangers. According to a 1998 study, 60 percent of boys and 80 percent of girls who are sexually victimized are abused by someone they know, whether a friendly neighbor or a doting uncle.
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