Lewisville Faces Federal Lawsuit Over Sex Offender Ordinance

Thank you so much for posting this very common-sense opinion. Not everyone who is required to register on the Texas registry is a violent, dangerous monster. Currently, there are over 67,000 people on the registry here in Texas and according to DPS, approximately 111 are added WEEKLY! Feel free to visit our website at www.texasvoices.org.

When policies and laws are created based on fear, ignorance, and or politics no one is served. The enactment of policies and laws should always be research based decisions, popular or not.

Richard Gladden, the plaintiff's lawyer in this case, is no stranger to representing plaintiffs against unconstitutional actions against alleged sex offenders. He has already won several cases in the Federal Courts in Austin. This current issue is a problem that has already been successfully attacked in other jurisdictions. It is time the local areas stopped trying to "out do" what the legislature has already established as acceptable law in this state.

After 40 years of practicing criminal law it is very clear to me that a majority of sex offenders are mislabeled as dangerious. In fact, in Texas the Parole Board labels as sex offenders many (they testified about 7,000 in federal court in Austin) who do not even have a sex offense conviction. I know because I tried several of those cases with Mr. Gladden, and he knows what he is doing.

This article and writer are DEAD ON POINT...except for one sentence...."Sex offender registration and monitoring, or court-imposed supervision - those are things that have public-safety goals, and are not merely punitive." That is simply not the case. The whole point of the registry is additional punishment not public safety. If public safety indeed was the goal, we would have registries for murderers, home invasion robbers, car jackers and those other crimes that are a threat to EVERYONE. We don't. Thus the registry is just additional punishment that allows the falsely accused, the teenage lover, the internet big mouth to be punished up to lifetime with being unable to work or live anywhere. Shunning is the punishment and it is severe...and it affects entire families not just the accused. Many wind up committing suicide so some polititian can convince the uneducated they are PROTECTING them. (God save me from PROTECTING polititians) Not only do the residency restrictions need to be changed, the Registry needs to be eliminated. It also does absolutely nothing to protect the public. Would you rather live next door to a teenage lover or a murderer? With our current system, you will not know about the bigger threat. (PS. recidivism of those on the Registry is 8.5% so we are brutally damaging 91 FAMILIES out of 100 to promote a politician...is that really worth it?)

I appreciate those who are concerned of an RSO who lives so close to a school, playground, park, etc.. I'm a parent of 3 children and am very concerned of pedophiles who prey, lure, and abuse children. And before you start "yahooing" at my first comment, please understand that not only am I a parent of three children, I also have to register as a sex offender. I was 26, my victim was almost 18yo, and this in NO WAY makes what I did right....it was 100% wrong, and I deserved the punishment that I received. But I am not, was not a child molester nor have I ever preyed upon children. Unfortunately, people think all sex offenders are pedophiles or looking to molest their children. Without knowing their situation everyone jumps to judgment. The ONLY reason that we have as many on the registry is because Texas will lose money and politicians want to keep their jobs! It's on their websites, it has NOTHING to do with the safety of my or your children. The Colonel of the Texas DPS even stated when asked by our legislature "out of the 64,000 people on the registry how many people truly do we need on there?" His reply, "maybe 8,900...the ones who are truly a threat." Even he knows that everyone on the registry does not pose a threat. The same laws that entrapped those of us on the registry AFTER we had done our time are the same laws that will affect your children if they (which I know you are shouting out "my children will never do that!!") are even caught in a "boyfriend/girlfriend fling." Just wait until your neighbors want YOU and YOUR CHILDREN to leave the neighborhood not because of your children getting hot/heavy before or after prom, but because they are listed as a sex offender. Your neighbors will NOT come over and ask what happened, they will treat you as a leper just because you or yours are on the same registry as child molesters, pedophiles, murderers who committed a sex crime. Yes, I know your children were "just playing doctor" or "doing what teenagers do because of hormones...." but now they will be sex offenders and it will affect your children. Of course, this will NEVER happen to you or your children, but what if it does? Where will you live? Where will you work? Where will you go to church? Where will you eat? Where will you go for friends? HOW will you live?? If you aren't faced with our situation, be blessed. And if you truly want to get rid of us all, please come meet with us and help us find the answers to the questions I asked above. If you can't help, don't hurt!

The real truth about sex offenders and the sex offender registry: IT WILL BE CALLED THE BIGGEST SCAM IN AMERICAN HISTORY. Have you ever seen such hysteria over a lie. Have you ever asked yourself, Is there or could there be 1 million sick people in the United States that have the disease to molest children? The simple answer is NO there is not that many sick people in the world. The problem is within our justice system. Americans can no longer expect to be protected by the "best" justice system in the world, because it does not exist. We are all at the mercy of some yuppy law school kid who is starting their career at any local DA's office. They will prosecute any case that comes across their desk because their student loans and future career depend upon convictions and prosecutions. Scary, you bet it is. Most who are accused of a sex crime against a child are innocent. Once that false allegation gets to a prosecutor, that innocent person is 95% likely to take a plea before ever even thinking about going in front of a jury. The other 5% stand a 99.8% chance that a jury will find them guilty as charged with zero evidence except for what a kid says they did to them. Kids lie, and they lie very well. Prosecutors do not care, they want convictions.

The discussion seems to be getting off-track here. My primary concern is the same as most people's: If the justice system believes that someone is likely to commit a crime again, why are they being released? But the major conflict for the city is not really whether there should be a list of offenders. It's a discussion worth having, but the city has to have one, even if these kind of things don't really work; rather, this is about the "setback" ordinances for sex offenders that many cities and states have adopted.

My perspective is from a practical perspective, not a legal one: regardless of whether they are legal, these distance laws don't work. A study in Florida showed that all they do make it difficult for offenders, and they don't make residents feel safer. Another study showed that "although sex offenders residing in city areas tend to live closer to schools than randomly selected community members, offenders with child victims in the same area live further from schools than offenders with no child victims." A number of other studies indicate basically the same findings. The ordinances are just not thought out very well at the municipal level.

Plenty of people love "common sense" laws and governance, and this sounds like that at first. But it doesn't really help anyone: children, parents (other than to give them a false peace of mind that they shouldn't have), or offenders. I'm definitely agreeing with the editorial comments and yes, even with Councilman Gorena (my goodness).

The City of Lewisville filed a motion to dismiss the case, stating that the plaintiffs have no standing to sue. Since they don't live within 1,500 feet, the ordinance doesn't apply to them is what they seem to be saying.

Just as an update, since I know some folks are monitoring this thread. Here's the story we posted tonight about Duarte's case being allowed to proceed against the City of Lewisville.