In Lafayette, a John Doe is seeking relief from sex offender residency restrictions imposed by the General Assembly. The restrictions prohibit certain registered sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of school property, public parks, or youth centers. I can’t talk too much about the issue, but from this Journal and Courier article, I’ll just say that Sheriff Brown’s attorney makes a heck of an argument.
All I know is that the firm would be much bigger if you added a fourth partner named “Young”.
We have a problem in Fort Wayne/Allen County since the Rescue Mission (which is on the outskirts of the downtown area) is within 1,000 feet of a portion of the Rivergreenway trail (which is technically a park). There’s beeen some coverage of this issue here, mostly along the lines of “we’d all rather see these guys at the Mission than literally wandering around with no supervision at all.”
Does the county or state provide sex offenders with a map of locations where they are specifically told not to live or do they end up moving into a house somewhere and get a county sheriff’s deputy showing up on their doorstep a week later telling them they have to move?
I’m not saying that John Doe actually “paid for his crime” (because the fact that he is a child molester and is breathing means that he is still a possible threat to others, just as any other convicted felon), but I would think that the government has a duty to provide this information since they are the ones imposing the restriction.
Seems kind of dumb that a building that hasn’t been used to teach students for 40 years is still considered a “school” by this law.
The law references “school property.”
It could get interesting if the school system buys property as an investment. Our local hospital owns several homes and much acreage throughout the county–with most of it not being used for medical care. They seem to be buying more all the time. Technically, it’s all “hospital property”, but applying any healthcare laws to most of it would be missing the point.
I “get” this law, and agree with it totally. But unless students are working in administration these days, it doesn’t seem that the proximity to the former Monticello school location endangers anyone any more than a location that isn’t near an old school.
I actually don’t know anything about the Monticello property. That’s just where he moved after he got out of Lafayette in response to the Tippecanoe County Prosecutor’s letter that prompted this lawsuit.