Lawmakers are targeting sexual predators, pushing for measures that include barring the worst offenders from living near schools and requiring them to register their online identities.
Backers of the measures, which have advanced with little or no opposition in both chambers, said the legislation would provide parents and law enforcers with another tool against such predators.
“I think there is a need for the parents to be able to go to a source and when they want to check on the e-mails and communications that their children are making, they ought to be able to find out whether or not this is an e-mail that is obviously related to a sex offender,” said Sen. Chuck Gray, R-19.
Gray was referring to H2734, which a Senate committee of the whole approved March 29.
Sponsored by Rep. Bob Robson, R-20, H2734 would require a registered sex offender to also provide his or her online identity to authorities.
The aim of the bill is clear enough, Robson said.
“The reason for this is that we can protect homes, we can put fences around it, bars in the windows, we can do whatever,” Robson said. “But we can’t protect a child in a home that is being preyed upon by an individual who comes in through, basically, the Internet.”
Gray agreed: “It’s a protection for parents that they can provide so that their children don’t get caught up in corresponding with someone who obviously is a predator.”
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children quoted from a survey of some 1,500 Internet users ages 10 to 17, which found that approximately one in seven had received an unwanted sexual solicitation between 1999 and 2000.
Current state law requires persons convicted of sexual misconduct with a minor to register with the authorities. Failing to do so is a felony.
The Department of Public Safety maintains a Web site for high-risk offenders.
Supporters of the House bill said offenders can still prey upon minors by simply going online.
Other measures
Sen. Jim Waring, R-7, the architect of a law that permits authorities to track people convicted of dangerous crimes against children through the use of global positioning system or GPS, said current law would help track predators if they go near schools, for example.
Yet sex offenders could still prey on children “online from thousands of miles away,” he said.
“You just don’t want to have terrible incidences,” he said.
Waring has introduced a measure, S1228, to narrow the list of people to be tracked via GPS to the worst sex offenders.
“We want to make sure that we are applying this only in cases with the most dangerous folks,” he said. The monitoring system is also expensive, he added.
Meanwhile, Sen. Jay Tibshraeny, R-21, is pushing legislation that would prohibit those convicted of dangerous crimes against children from living near schools.
These crimes include attempted murder, aggravated assault, sexual molestation, prostitution, sex trafficking and kidnapping.
Tibshraeny’s bill, S1555, sailed through in a House committee, 7-0, on March 15. It was amended so it applies only to the most serious sex offenders.
“They changed the footage requirement from 1,500 to 700 feet. I would have preferred a thousand feet… I feel a little more comfortable with that,” Tibshraeny said.
“What we are trying to do with those serious sex offenders is just keep them a little farther away from schools and day care centers. They do have a rate of recidivism, and we would like to keep them away from potential victims,” he said.
By pushing this legislation, Arizona is following the lead of some 12 others states, including California, Alabama and Illinois, which have placed residency restrictions on sex offenders as of 2004.
The idea has met legal challenges but appears to be holding.
In 2002, Iowa passed a law prohibiting sex offenders from residing within 2,000 feet of a school or childcare facility.
But the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Iowa struck it down. The court said the law constituted a retroactive punishment for offenders who have already served their time, according to House research.
It also unconstitutionally infringed on privacy and travel and denied offenders procedural due process, the research unit stated.
But the U.S. Court of Appeals overturned the decision of the District Court, upholding the state law. The higher court said the law did not violate due process, infringe on basic rights nor constitute retroactive punishment.
“It’s another tool in the toolbox to protect our children,” Tibshraeny said of imposing residency restrictions. “And is it the only solution? No, but it will be part of a solution. The main focus here is the protection of our children.”
Asked about the points raised by the District Court in Iowa, Tibshraeny pointed out that that law was upheld as constitutional.
Tibshraeny said his bill is a lot different than the Iowa legislation. “It is more narrowly defined as to who is under it,” he said. “I feel good as far as the legal front.”