MEGAN'S LAW

Megan's Law & Its Impact on Community

Megan's Law & Its Impact on Community

Introduction

The main purpose of this paper is to discuss the Meagan's law and describe its impact on society. Few policies have created such public discourse or caused such controversy as those passed in the 1990s that increased social controls over sex offenders, child molesters, and sexual deviants. Concerns about a growing sex offender population, inconsistent recidivism studies, and national media attention about a few highly publicize brutal crimes have led to this recent surge in new policies at both the state and federal level.' As a result, states have created sex offender registrations, community notification, and involuntary civil commitments laws. While these laws exhibit multiple purposes, a common thread has been enacting policies which protect the public.

Megan's Law

Megan's Law, sometimes referred to as community notification or sex offender notification, has been the most costly and controversial of these laws to implement. Currently, all 50 states have passed some type of notification law. Because the guidelines established by the Department of Justice were minimum standards and offered significant discretion, these laws have varied greatly in how states have implemented them - such that no two states are identical States have chosen to “release relevant information” in a variety of methods. “Some statutes mandate proactive notification, others merely authorize it, while still others permit notification only in response to community requests.” Methods of notification have included: (1) providing access through the Internet, an 800-phone number, or by written request, (2) by actively notifying specific communities through the mail, community meetings, or in-person, or (3) by notifying individuals or groups considered being at risk (e.g., day care centers, schools, hospitals, etc.).

Understanding the overview of Sex Offender Registration laws and Community Notification laws is important. Chapter II includes the history, intent of the laws, and policy weaknesses of both the Wetterling Act and Megan's Law. Since the federal regulations on Megan's Law failed to provide a policy model, implementation has varied greatly from one state to another.

In recent years, media attention has focused on a few, highly publicized, brutal crimes against children by released sex offenders (e.g., Polly Kiass, Me'n Kanka, and Jacob Wetterling). One result of this publicity has been for state legislatures to ratify laws that increased social controls on repeat sex offenders, child molesters, and sexual deviants. These new laws focused on community safety by either registering released sex offenders, providing public access to information about certain registered sex offenders, or notifying a community concerning the presence of a sex offender in their neighborhood. Megan's Law remains one of the most controversial pieces of legislation in recent history.

As of October 1999, the Wetterling Act had been amended three times. These amendments are Megan's Law (May 19%), Pam Lychner Sexual Offender Tracking and Identilication Act (October 19%), and the Commerce, Justice, and State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act (1998) which added registration for federal and military sex ...