Kare 11's Botched Investigation Into Sex Offenders

To anyone living in Minnesota, Kare 11 is a household name in news. They are largely a reputable company with many investigations and news articles under their belt. However, a recent investigation into sex offenders, and the follow-up to that investigation, should appall you. Why? Because their investigation not only was extremely incomplete, but touts a single example as the legal norm in Minnesota for sex offenders, and argues that all sex offenders are dangerous. In fact, their opening headline for the primary investigation reads:

KARE 11 Investigates: Minnesota's Secret Sex Offenders

A LITTLE-KNOWN LEGAL LOOPHOLE IS ALLOWING HUNDREDS OF CHILD SEXUAL PREDATORS IN MINNESOTA TO SLIDE UNDER THE RADAR, LEAVING PARENTS IN THE DARK ABOUT THE DANGER THEY MAY POSE.

Hundreds Of Predators?

If you read very far into their report, however, you see that "hundreds of child sexual predators" includes a fair amount of juveniles who received a stay of adjudication and 210 other adults 22 years old and older. A stay of adjudication means that an offender must complete a series of requirements, and their crime is not available in public databases unless they do not complete the requirements.

Some of the requirements, for example, are to complete a lengthy probation sentence and complete sex offender treatment (treatment which usually requires at least two years to complete). Standard probation requirements for sex offenders typically involves no contact with anyone under 18 years old, and no pornography. 

What their investigation completely ignores is that Minnesota is home to 17,654 registered sex offenders as of December 6th, 2016. The ability to find out just how many of those 17,654 offenders are considered "high-risk" by the state is challenging at best. To the best of my recall, the amount of level 3 sex offenders in the state does not exceed 2,000 people. 210 people, compared with these numbers, is miniscule. The worst thing about risk level in Minnesota is that it is not determined by an actual risk-assessment administered by a trained psychologist: It is determined based entirely on Minnesota's own criteria, which was developed by studying sex offenders released from prison.

To the average person, that may sound like a good thing... until you realize that many low-level sex offenders, including those convicted of child sexual abuse and sexual abuse material crimes, are frequently given probation if they are a first-time offender. The screening tool that Minnesota uses to determine the risk level of its sex offenders does not have as much reliability as other screening tools, like the Static-99R. More work is needed.

What About Recidivism And Megan's Law?

To make these matters worse, Minnesota's Department of Corrections has done two "recent" studies on sex offenders that would matter to the average person: The 2007 report on recidivism, and the report on Megan's Law in 2008. Both of these reports are as flawed as the system they use to assign risk level: The 2007 report on recidivism looks at 3,166 sex offenders released from a correctional facility (read: prison) between 1990 and 2002, which means their report does not look at the vast majority of sex offenders, only those released from prison. 

The report discussing Megan's Law is also extremely narrow in its scope, and contains methodological errors that would shame any statistician: They conclude, based on their study of recidivism rates of 155 level three offenders subject to notification and 125 who were not, that notification has a strong deterrent effect and reduces recidivism. They essentially claim that correlation proves causation, with no control methods used to distinguish  between the results of these groups. 

Overall Sex Offender Statistics

The statistics discussed in the aforementioned reports are shockingly incomplete, and give the public just enough data to shut up. However, a plethora of other studies have also been done on sex offenders. You have heard me mention them here numerous times: A study done in New York on 21 years of arrest data found that 95% of new sexual crimes were committed not by registered sex offenders, but first-time offenders new to the criminal justice system. Other studies have yielded similar results, usually finding that at least 90% of sex crimes are committed by first-time offenders. This means that the numerous processes we have to address sex offenders attempts to answer approximately 5-10% of new sex crime. 

That study, combined with the numerous meta-analyses done on sex offender recidivism, point to the idea that sex offenders are not nearly as dangerous as people believe: Around 12% of sex offenders will re-offend with a sexual crime, and around 30-40% will reoffend with any crime. That contrasts to the national average for criminal recidivism being around 60-75%. It has been said in media articles on the subject that the only crime with a lower recidivism rate is murder. 

Cost

I know from previous experience with the Minnesota legislature that Minnesota spends a few hundred thousand on preventing sexual assault, and I learned recently that we spend $93 million on managing and tracking sexual offenders. I believe this is very imbalanced, and makes it clear that our focus is not on preventing sexual crimes, but on reacting where they do occur.

The Take-Away

Kare 11 focuses on a miniscule fraction of 5% of new sex criminals in the making. Already, some of Minnesota's legislators, including Gov. Mark Dayton and Rep. Tony Cornish are promising to fix how stays of adjudication are used. But nothing is being promised to address and prevent 95% of new sex crime, which is not committed by sex offenders, but by those new to the criminal justice system. Minnesota, like so many other states, is focusing its efforts on endlessly punishing those who pose the smallest amount of risk in terms of future sex crimes, and focusing next to nothing on preventing sexual crimes before they can happen. Indeed, Minnesota spends $93 million a year on SORN policies, and only $300,000 on sexual assault prevention. Our priorities are not on keeping the public safe.

As an advocate pushing the end of child sexual abuse before it can happen, I am outraged that not only Minnesota's leaders, but also its major media outlets, are doing nothing about the majority of sexual crimes in Minnesota. We are weak: The only statement worth supporting in Kare 11's investigation is that Minnesota has created an atmosphere of legal tolerance of sexual violence. While that statement was intended to address how sex offenders are treated in the legal system, I think that statement is used far too narrowly. 

I am ashamed to call myself a Minnesotan.

Alternative Solutions

There are several solutions that many of my readers may already be familiar with, like knowing the facts and the warning behaviors in potential abusers, and many of my other suggestions center around reforming sexual offender laws to be more effective at protecting the public. Some of them concern educating families, and educating children.

Sex offender registration needs reform, primarily because it lumps low-risk and no-risk offenders in with high-risk and recidivist sex offenders, which means law enforcement has a harder job investigating sex crimes. Instead, it would be best to use the money currently allocated to the sex offender registry in each state to perform psychological risk assessments on each offender. These risk assessments would divide only into low and high risk. These assessments would be done by an independent board of expert psychologists in each state, and only those who score as high-risk will be registered with law enforcement. The specific statute being charged and convicted should have no bearing on risk level, and the circumstances of the offense and risk assessments should be used as the determining factor for risk. As risk level and offender registration are not punitive measures, they could only be used as a factor when determining a criminal sentence. 

The trend in research identifies several issues with publicly identifying sex offenders in the community, commonly known as sex offender notifications. Many of these issues can be solved by only notifying the community in certain special circumstances: Multiple sex crimes, a high-risk score on risk assessment, release from prison, and two or more psychological disorders could be some of the criteria. The compliance patrols that are currently aimed at low-risk and no-risk offenders could instead be aimed at those who meet enough criteria to warrant public notification. Not all high-risk offenders would warrant public notification, only those who meet enough criteria would qualify. Anyone subject to sex offender notifications would be incarcerated for life if they commit another offense of any kind.

The research surrounding residency restrictions is nearly unanimous in saying that they do not keep the public safer, and in some cases, can lead to increased homelessness. This increased homelessness has been shown to increase risk factors for further offending, as well as making it more difficult for offenders to reestablish themselves as productive members of society. Therefore, residency restrictions should be completely abolished except for those warranting community notification, as covered in the heading "sex offender notifications". As such, any such offender committing another offense of any kind would be subject to a life sentence.

In many states, sex offenders are restricted from random things that do not have any effect on public safety. For example, sex offenders in some states cannot use the internet, or cannot use certain aspects of the internet, such as for gaming, social media, or even commenting on the news. In other places, sex offenders cannot participate in Halloween or attend the state fair. As 95% of new sex crime is perpetrated by those without criminal convictions, these restrictions do nothing to keep the public safer and put onerous enforcement requirements on supervising corrections officers and law enforcement that could be better spent detecting new sex crimes or educating the community regarding safety and prevention. 

Some funding originally directed at sex offender registration in the past must be directed to educating families about appropriate safety plans, facts around child sexual abuse and sexual assault, warning behaviors in potential abusers, resources for individualized help on a variety of topics, and normative vs. atypical sexual behavior in children and teenagers. This education plan would be created using accurate terminology, research-based factoids, and produced by experts in these areas. 

In line with the aforementioned education of families, schools and families should have access to age-appropriate sexual education covering a wide variety of topics to prepare each child for life in the adult world. Such education should be covered both at school and at home, and the standards for this education should be a principled skeleton of topics. It would then be decided on the local level how to cover each principle, so that each community has a say in practicing this education. These principles should include:

• Legal and ethical specifics on the subject of consent
• Anatomical health practices including STD's, safe sex, and physical boundaries
• How to form and keep social and emotional boundaries
• Resources that a child can use for a variety of situations including but not limited to, sexual abuse, mental health disorders, physical health concerns, and relationship health.

Primary Prevention in 2017

I do have some goals for 2017 in regards to primary prevention. This list has no bearing on any future projects, I mean, the whole tone of New Year's resolutions and the like.
I would like to break them down into several categories:

1. Educating The Public
2. Sex Offender Registration
3. Sex Offender Notifications
4. Sex Offender Residency Restrictions
5. Educating Families
6. Sexual Education
7. Miscellaneous Sex Offender Restrictions

These categories are distinct from the mission statement I have, as these are unique to 2017 and are based on what was accomplished last year. Each goal, in detail:

Educating The Public

The public has a right to know basic and counter-intuitive information about sex crimes. In 2017, it would be ideal if the average person knew what I would say are the top three facts about child sexual abuse: 95% of sex offenses are from first-time offenders (not sex offenders), 90% of abuse is perpetrated by those known and trusted by the victim, and child sexual abuse affects 1 in 6 boys and 1 in 4 girls by the time they turn 18. Will you help the facts about child sexual abuse be known in 2017?

Sex Offender Registration

Sex offender registration has become onerous in the political realm, as well as a financial burden. The trend in 2016 was that the registration requirements of sex offenders do not align with the biggest risks to the general public. Seeing more judicial wins in 2017 that strike down onerous requirements that distract from real public safety threats would be a plus.

Sex Offender Notifications

Sex offender notification has become, to some people (like the vigilante Donna Zink in Washington State, who refuses to read studies on the subject), a way of preventing sex crime. However, many studies and articles surfaced in 2016 (like this one and this one, and this Quartz article and this one for honorable mentions) showing that these notifications only do well under certain circumstances. Therefore, it would be helpful in 2017 if the notification requirements in some areas (similar to the judicial wins on registration) would be lessened.

Sex Offender Residency Restrictions

This is perhaps one of the biggest areas that needs addressing: States and cities that believe that by restricting where sex offenders can live, when they have been shown to have the opposite effect of increasing recidivism and homelessness. More judicial wins that strike down sex offender residency restrictions would be a fantastic win in 2017 (Michigan gets honorable mentions here for their recent supreme court win, which among other things, struck down residency requirements for some offenders).

Educating Families

Families knowing how to prevent child sexual abuse, before it happens, by knowing the warning behaviors in potential abusers is nothing but positive. The more families are aware in 2017 that a potential abuser can look very much like a great mentor for children, the better. Also, the more resources that are available to the general public, the better. I may or may not have something in the works in that regard, but of course, I cannot confirm or deny that as of yet.

Sexual Education

As with educating families, the more children and teens know the facts about sex and sexuality, the more prepared they will be to make informed decisions about sexual behavior. The more prepared they are, the more they will be able to ask for help if they need it. If more states pass legislation requiring sexual education (or sexual abuse education), primary prevention will be furthered in 2017.

Miscellaneous Sex Offender Restrictions

There are many sex offender restrictions that have no bearing on public safety, like social media use. Other restrictions have included registering any and all internet accounts, avoiding libraries (because the children), and avoiding the state fair (because sex offenders lurk in the shadows waiting to kidnap your children, apparently). Can it just be said that the more restrictions are based in factual information, like studies and such, the better? 

Let us all make 2017 a safe place for children, and do what we can to stop child sexual abuse... before it happens. Let us ring in the new year, remembering our most vulnerable people: Children.

Oh, and there are some hints in this post for something big that might be coming in 2017, in case you missed them. Enjoy the New Year, 2017.

Criminology Myths Debunked

Today, I ran across a rather unfortunate article discussing the prevention of child sexual abuse. While a very small amount of the information in the article is accurate, the majority of it is not. This will serve as a review of the information presented in the article, as well as a rally cry to protect our children. Not with myths, not with misinformation, but with facts.

Part One: What Is Pedophilia? Who Are Pedophiles?

This article is wrong from the very first sentence, which has to be some kind of achievement somewhere. Obviously, anyone with internet access (and the ability to read English) can look on the side of this blog and click the "Wiki: Pedophilia" link on the side, and read that pedophilia refers to an attraction to children that meets very specific criteria. You can also see my recent post on pedophilia. Why does this matter? Well, the title of the article is not "Pedophilia From The Perspective Of Criminology", but "Do more to prevent child sexual abuse". Sexual abuse is a choice. Our best information from the DSM-V is that pedophilia is not a choice. It is described as a sexual orientation:

Page 698 of the DSM-V, first paragraph

Obviously, pedophilia cannot be both a condition and a crime. It cannot be a noun and a verb at the same time. That is a logical fallacy of ambiguity called equivocation: Using the same word to mean multiple things so as to make a fallacious argument sound solid. A student of critical thinking could easily see where I am going with this. The article is supposedly written by a criminologist who studied at the University of Detroit in 1989 for a masters in criminal justice. If someone who is smart enough to get a masters and direct a university in Malaysia, but cannot do a simple Wikipedia search to use words properly, I question his credentials and his ability to lead properly in preventing child sexual abuse.

So far, that covers just the first sentence. The second paragraph is equally poor. Pedophiles are not people whom prefer to have sex with children, they are people who find children who have not yet hit puberty attractive. Many pedophiles would prefer not to have such a sexual attraction at all. Where this man gets the idea that he somehow knows how all people with the condition of pedophilia think, I have no clue, but I very much doubt that they teach mind-reading in the criminal justice master's programs in Detroit. And as far as I know, pedophiles do not prefer to taste children, nor do they achieve sexual pleasure from children. That would imply that all pedophiles sexually abuse children, and given that around a third of those who abuse children are pedophiles, well, that implication would not hold true under any expert's analysis.

Also, the DSM-V discusses pedophiles as exclusive (only attracted to children) or non-exclusive (attracted to children, but also to other age groups). So the last sentence, that they desire sexual relations only with children, is demonstrably false.

Part Two: Grooming, Profiling, And Abuse Facts

Some of the information here is okay, like the last sentence: A well-known abuse statistic is that 90% of sexual abuse victims know and trust their abuser, though I am not sure how exactly the victims' mothers factor into that well-known statistic. The point is that people generally trust those who abuse children. Pedophiles do in fact come from all backgrounds, and pedophiles only share one thing in common: An attraction to prepubescent children. There is no way to identify a pedophile. Nor, by the way, is there any way to identify someone who sexually abuses children, short of catching them in the act or the child disclosing the abuse, which was probably his point: There is no profile of someone who sexually abuses a child.

However, we do know why people abuse children. They abuse children because they are available, because of unmanaged mental health needs, out of mishandling difficult emotions, and yes, sometimes being sexually attracted is a factor. However, the sexual attraction is not the reason they abused, but the fact that they did not properly manage or get support for the attraction that they have. They abused a child because they made the decision to do so. The main point here is that sexual abuse is a choice, and pedophilia is not.

Huckle made decisions to seek out children, and to write a manual on how people can sexually abuse children and get away with it. You have likely seen news articles referring to Huckle as a pedophile who wrote a pedophilia manual. He is a sexual abuser who wrote a sexual abuse manual. Pedophilia had little to do with his choices. I also very much doubt that Western privelege factored much into his decision to abuse children, as there are many people with Western privelege that use it to help people rather than exploit children. You might as well mention that he had a beard, therefore all people who have beards might sexually abuse children.

He alludes to grooming in the first sentence by saying that abuse "can be a small act in everyday life". I say he alluded to it, because he does not actually name it as grooming, or go into detail about what grooming is. Grooming is the intentional or unintentional progression of earning the victim and the trust of those close to the victim so that the perpetrator can spend time with the victim alone without arousing suspicion. Grooming is a real thing, though grooming is not, of itself, abuse. Nor, I might add, is abuse a "small act in everyday life". This man is a professional at minimizing child sexual abuse, as abuse is neither a small act, nor should it ever be part of everyday life for a child.

Part Three: Criminal Behavior, Pedophilia, And Victims

The theory mentioned in the first sentence may have been a popular notion in 1989, but I very much doubt that you will find many criminologists (no, that is not my field) that believe that all criminal behavior is learned from other criminals who hold criminal attitudes and values. You might as well say that all crime is the result of mafias, we just have to identify who taught whom. I have no idea what most criminologists actually believe in regards to theories and what causes behavior, but I am very familiar with psychology and psychologists. Most experts in sex crime that I have either spoken with or read a peer-reviewed study from would say that child sexual abuse is a choice. That choice may be influenced by environmental factors, or by biological factors, but it does not negate the fact that behavior is the end result of a decision. It is controllable. This is yet another example of the man minimizing child sexual abuse.

And again, he uses the term "pedophiles" to refer to those who have abused children. The number of abusers who were abused themselves is around 30-40%, last I checked that statistic. You can look it up if you do not believe me, but 30-40% hardly qualifies as "most pedophiles", or rather, most abusers. And while pedophilia is certainly the result of some complex biological and environmental process, the condition of being sexually attracted to young children does not automatically lead to criminal behavior any more than depression automatically leads to suicide. This man is clearly speaking outside his area of expertise, and is attempting to blame mental illnesses and psychological conditions as the cause of criminal behavior. Can I get a show of hands for those who think that such blame casting towards mentally ill people is completely inappropriate?

Part Four: What Makes Someone A Pedophile, Cure For Pedophilia

While I did not look up the 2014 Korean report on twins with pedophilia (I hesitate to believe it even exists, after what I have read so far), I am quite familiar with James Cantor's work on pedophilia and what he says about the subject: That pedophilia acts as a sexual orientation and is developed very, very early and is likely the result of biological processes far more than it is the result of an environmental factor such as child sexual abuse. None of that, of course, is at all relevant to child sexual abuse and how it could be prevented, unless he were asserting that pedophiles do not choose their condition and should receive help and not stigma (this is obviously not his argument).

He claims there is no agreement about what makes an individual a pedophile. This is almost laughable. Pedophilia is a word that describes the condition of having an ongoing sexual attraction to prepubescent children, so obviously people who have such an ongoing sexual attraction would be a pedophile. While there is certainly disagreement over the nuances of pedophilia and how pedophiles should be treated, there is no academic disagreement about what makes someone a pedophile to my knowledge. It is a narrow term with a narrow definition, and the term itself does not have disagreement, the concepts surrounding it do. Should it be called a disorder? Should it be called an orientation? What about mandatory reporting? These concepts rage ongoing debates.

And it is absolutely correct that there is no cure for having the sexual orientation of pedophilia, it is absolutely incorrect that most pedophiles are sociopaths. I believe I discussed this recently. He is referring, of course, to sexual predators who are the very extreme minority of sexual abusers, which again, is completely irrelevant to pedophilia or pedophiles. While there is some comorbidity (like correlation, but for psychologists) between pedophilia and antisocial personality disorder (psychopathy, or sociopathy, if you prefer the stigmatized language), there is also comorbidity between pedophilia and substance use disorders, depressive, bipolar, and anxiety disorders, as well as other paraphilic disorders. Yes, I copied that almost word-for-word from page 700 of the DSM-5.

Conveniently ignoring the reality of pedophilic disorder to make his point that pedophiles are terrible people that have an innate drive to rape children is academically dishonest. Yet, this man is the director of a university as well as holding several affiliations and titles. He should stick to his areas of expertise and not butcher the field of psychology and pass it off as fact.

The last sentence is almost laughable. Do I even need to cite sources when I say that sexual recidivism of sexual offenders is around 10-20%? Do I need to link the two studies on the side of this page, which will tell you that sexual abusers have lower recidivism than the average sexual offender? Anyone can search "recidivism for child sexual abusers" and see the top result. The last sentence is a lie that is clearly exposed to be a lie by a simple Google search. If he had a masters degree in criminal justice, he should be able to find that information far easier than I can.

Part Five: How Abuse Happens, How Sexual Abuse Can End

Here, he begins wading into realms far outside my area of experience. What I can tell you is that law enforcement must have specific training in how to question victims of child sexual abuse so that the trauma involved is not made worse by making the victim relive the experience before they are ready. I can also tell you that law enforcement must spread far and wide the message that there is no profile for sexual abusers. I can even tell you that enforcement is a must. I also wholeheartedly agree that effective laws are a must in combating child sexual abuse. However, speaking from the perspective of an American, with all of our sex offender registration and notification laws, and all of the subsequent studies that have shown how useless they are except in maybe 5% of sexual offenders, I must say that these laws must be done with expert analysis and recommendations. Which brings me to the final part of Mr. Satar's article...

Part Six: Sexual Abuse Prevention, Responsibility, And Child Protection

I completely agree with the first two paragraphs: Preventing child sexual abuse is everyone's responsibility. The police must investigate and enforce, but parents, teachers, and others must be able to spot abuse when it is occurring, and spot the warning signs in those who may be at-risk to sexually abuse a child. The third paragraph is also brilliant: Parents must ensure the safety of their children. The fourth paragraph is golden: Parents must know the warning signs and not take someone's title for granted (oh, the irony). We must not assume that someone is reliable because they are trusted in the community, or because of a title. We must watch for the warning signs.

But that is where I stop agreeing, because the last two paragraphs scream the same precursor warning signs that America should have been hearing in the 1990's when parents began demanding laws that we now know are completely ineffective at protecting children: Put registries in place, register pedophiles and child abusers (conflating pedophilia with abuse again, I see), and do all this to protect our children! That has not worked well in the United States, and that rhetoric was formed on the assumption that recidivism is high, but that is just an erroneous assumption.

Mr. Satar, our children do need to be protected from child sexual abuse. But they do not need to be protected from pedophiles or pedophilia. They need to be protected from the bad decisions of older children and adults, and those are just that: Decisions. Our children, not just here in America, not just in Malaysia, but all of the children in the world, must be protected by facts, laws and policies that are based on those facts. America and Europe has already made the mistake of forming these policies and laws based on the emotive rally cry: Protect our children! It is time that this rally cry becomes based in fact, not just hype, so that it can be effective at actually keeping our children safe.

The first part of that, if you noticed, is fact. Verifiable, trustworthy, peer-reviewed, honest, fact. Not myths based on a misunderstanding of psychology, sexual abusers, and the dehumanization of those that abuse children. Fact.

Why does SORNA matter to primary prevention?

SORNA? What?

SORNA, the acronym for the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (a catch-all term used to describe the multiple laws that created and expanded registration, and created community notification), is a topic of much contention. Many people discuss it with varying perspectives. I often, when I comment on news articles to inform people of the facts surrounding these issues, discuss recidivism rates of sex offenders and the proportion of new sex offenses committed by first-time offenders to those on the registry. That information is also linked at the side of this blog. But why is it important?

Recidivism: What is it, what does it mean, and why is it important?

Recidivism, which is the criminal justice term for re-offending, is a device that typically refers to someone who has previously been arrested for a crime being arrested again for another crime. It does not usually refer to a reconviction, but a rearrest. As such, it is not a completely accurate measurement because it would ballpark a slightly higher number. After all, some who are arrested are not convicted. On the topic of sexual offenses, its typical inaccuracy should theoretically be compensated for because of underreporting.

There are obvious flaws to using recidivism data to accurately state how many criminals are arrested for a new crime- underreporting and the fact that the data only studies rearrests, for example. However, it is likely to be the most accurate tool for the purpose that it serves, which is to get a general understanding of how often criminals engage in further delinquency. It serves as an important tool to measure whether or not people convicted of certain crimes repeat those certain crimes, other crimes, so that corrections departments can respond accordingly.

There are a variety of studies that have been done on sex offender recidivism. The metastudy linked on the side of this blog found a sexual recidivism rate of 13%, while other meta-analyses have found 11.5%. The United States Justice Department found a 5% recidivism rate in 2002 and a 13% recidivism rate in 2012.

Who commits crimes? Why is that important?

SORNA is essentially based on the idea that sex offenders generally do commit further sex crimes, and that those arrested for new sex crimes are registered sex offenders. The original concept of sex offender registration was that by making law enforcement aware of who sex offenders are, they have tools to investigate other sex crimes, while the concept behind notification (registration is only visible to law enforcement while notification is visible to the public) is that the public can protect themselves against sex offenders by knowing who they are.

Thus, it is vitally important to the effectiveness of SORNA to know who commits new sex crimes. Are they in fact sex offenders? No. One study from New York tells us that 95% of new sex crimes are committed by first-time offenders. In criminal justice, a first-time offender is someone new to the criminal justice system. So their finding means that 5% of registered sex offenders commit new sex crimes.

Connection: What do those numbers mean for SORNA?

If 86% of sex offenders do not repeat their crimes, and 95% of new sex crimes are committed by first-time offenders, then it means that SORNA's effectiveness is extremely limited to affecting a much smaller portion of sex offenders. If Karl Hanson's meta-analyses on the subject are to be believed, and their studies firmly establish that they do know what they are doing, then we have reliable and accurate risk-assessment tools to know when a sex offender is at high risk for reoffending, and when they are not. However, SORNA on the federal level does not require the use of these assessments and treats every sex offender equally, as if they are all high-risk.

Obviously, this is a problem because it means tax money is being spent to monitor every single sex offender, when it is certain sex offenders who are in actual need of being monitored. It also means that the focus is on the wrong group of people: If 95% of new offenses are by new criminals, then the focus should not be on those who have committed sex offenses, but on those who are at risk of doing so. The focus, according to the raw numbers, should be on primary prevention and ensuring that those at risk do not commit a sexual crime.

The reason I use the 13% statistic and not the more-reliable 11.5% statistic is that recidivism rates, given underreporting, are low. Obviously, the bigger the sample pool, the more reliable the statistic because the more the sample represents the group of people it is sampling from. Some have accused me of using biased data: I would venture a guess that recidivism rates on this subject are indeed higher than those found in studies. However, short of every victim reporting it every single time, which is unrealistic for many reasons, they are the best data that is available.