ANALYSIS OF SEX OFFENDER MANAGEMENT PRACTICES - Research Paper Example

ing of various legislations such as the Jacob Wetterling Act, which mandated sex offender registration, the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act (AWA), which elevated failure to register as a federal crime, the Megan’s Law, the collective name of state and local legislations requiring notification of communities of convicted sex offenders residing in their area, and the Jessica Lunsford Act, which introduced tighter monitoring of sex offenders through, among others, the wearing of electronic tracking device (Harris & Lobanov-Rostovsky 2009 3; Nieto & Jung 2006 7-8; Yung 120-121).

More than 100 sex laws were passed in various states all over the country to contain and deter sex offenders in 2005 alone, collectively resulting in the registration of more than half a million sex offenders, with more than 60,000 to 70,000 additional registrants, on the average, per year (Boyd 2008 220). Nevertheless, these laws and measures are not without controversy. Residency restriction laws and civil commitment of violent sexual predators currently emerged as two of the most hotly debated issues relative on anti-child sex offending measures.

Residency restriction laws imposed on sex offenders are generally of two types: Child Safety Zone, and; Distance Marker. The first type prohibits sex offenders from entering a specific radius of areas where potential victims often congregate. The second type, commonly called residency restriction law, involves total proscription of sex offenders from establishing residency within a certain radius of such protected zones (Nieto & Jung 2006 15; DeLisi & Conis 2007 281). On the other hand, civil commitment refers to the legal process by which a person, alleged to be suffering from mental disorder, may be ordered confined by the state even without consent.

The confinement may be in a hospital for psychiatric treatment, in a “secure treatment facility or in a locked unit of a nursing home.” Its legal underpinnings are: parens patriae,