Really…Is it that Difficult to Enforce a Sex Offender Ban from SNS?
I just read an article quoting a prosecutor about how difficult it is to enforce a ban on social networking site (SNS) use by sex offenders on probation. (http://www.live5news.com/Global/story.asp?S=13606071). The rationale is the same that we seen before. Those “crafty” sex offenders use computers in the privacy of their homes. They often use different screen names and they don’t put their pictures on the account. What is a poor law enforcement or corrections official suppose to do to catch them?
Funny, this same argument can be made for probationers’ drug use. You know it is really hard to stop offenders from using drugs. They do it in the privacy of their homes. Hardly ever do they do it in front of law enforcement or their officers. We drug test them but still they do it.
PLEASE, give me break. Why is a sex offender on probation given free access to the Internet without monitoring by their supervision officer? Monitoring or even periodic searches would prevent them and/or catch them with a social networking presence. Even if they don’t access the account with a monitored computer, they can be caught. I know. I have done it. Even offenders without monitoring leave traces of their presence. For instance, many sex offenders are using their REAL NAME, with accurate biographical information. Others are recycling old names. I have seen sex offenders get text messages or long distance calls on their cell phone, which when traced back, reveal they had a social networking profile. Law enforcement all over the country have caught sex offenders at local libraries accessing SNS (so much for argument they only do it in the privacy of their own homes).
The other argument is it takes a court order to get access to the account for prosecution. And? What is the point there? The only one I can see is for those “crafty” sex offenders who are using bogus information. How important is it for law enforcement or corrections to detect the ones lying and hiding in social networking locations? These are the ones you really want to go after and get locked up.
Think of it as you have two sex offenders at a playground. Both are not suppose to be there. One, is not wearing a disguise and sitting on a park bench, in the plain open. The other is hiding in the bushes, with a disguise on. Both need to go, but which one is a serious threat to kids? Are officers not suppose to look causes it is hard?
By the way, a court order is really just the start of the process. Once the court order is obtained law enforcement is not really done. The information provided will provide names and addresses, all of which could be made up (or real). Law enforcement wants the Internet Service Providers Address (ISP), which they can use to trace back to the sex offender’s location and computer. So do you really think the only thing law enforcement is going to find on a crafty sex offender’s computer is their Facebook® friends? I would guess you might find child pornography or information of future or actual VICTIMS.
Additionally, sex offenders in many jurisdictions have a requirement to disclose all Internet Identifiers. Not disclosing this information is failure to maintain sex offender registration, a felony. So there is more than just a social networking prohibition violation in many of these cases, depending upon the jurisdiction and what is found on the computer. And of course you have the supervision violation issues. How important is it to remove a non-compliant sex offender from the community? You know the one caught in the playground, with a disguise, hiding in the bushes.
Finally, social networking sites will terminate a sex offenders’ profile post haste. Facebook® is very clear on their user agreement that sex offender’s are not allowed access and they will terminate the account. More SNS need to follow their lead on this point, particularly those which allow minors access. Even MySpace®, which was purported in the article to be dragging there feet, has removed thousands of sex offenders from their site. Gee, how were they and Facebook® able to find all those sex offenders on their sites and remove them if it ws so difficult?
I gave a comparison earlier about how hard it is to stop drug use. Well consider this for a moment. Drugs only stay in an individual’s system so long. So if they use once, depending upon when you test them, you might not catch them. It will be out of their system. The more they use, coupled with frequent testing, the better the chance of catching them. The same holds for Internet use. They might get on once and get missed. However, the more they do it the better the chances of catching them. Oh and computer use, particularly posted online, (unlike drug use) can be detected for a very long time. It might be there months, even years, after it was done. Same holds for data found on a computer. (It can also be very fragile but that is another story).
It is really about managing the risk and using all the tools at one’s disposal. This is also resource and training issue. Officers need resources and training. In also may be that corrections and law enforcement need to educate prosecutors, the public, press, and politicians about the differences between difficult and impossible. Difficult maybe..but not impossible.
