Lisa L. Sample

Are Sex Offenders Different? An Examination of Rearrest Patterns

Sex offender registration and community notification requirements are universally applied to all sex offenders irrespective of their type. In this way, these policies treat sex offenders as a homogenous group, assuming that they exhibit similar reoffending patterns regardless of the age of their victims or the nature of their crimes. In this article, the authors highlight the assumption of homogeneity underlying sex offender laws and reviewit in light of current empirical evidence. They also offer a case study of recidivism rates for sex offenders in Illinois. The authors find that sex offenders are not the homogenous group that our policies assume, and they discuss the implication of this finding for the application of sex offender laws.

Public Awareness and Action Resulting From Sex Offender Community Notification Laws

Few studies have examined the degree to which citizens access registry information or take preventative action in response. Survey responses from a representative sample of Nebraska residents were used to examine the degree to which people access registration information, the feelings this information invokes, and if preventative measures are subsequently taken by citizens. The results suggest that the majority of citizens had not accessed registry information, although the majority of people knew the registry existed, and few respondents took any preventative measures as a result of learning sex offender information. The implications of the results on notification laws are discussed.

Disparity based on sex: Is gender-specific treatment warranted?

This paper addresses gender-specific treatment in juvenile justice processing, an important topic in view of new funding opportunities to develop female-specific programs. This topic is controversial and includes many unresolved issues. To provide context, we relate this study to lessons from the initiative to address disproportionate minority confinement: that it is impossible to understand confinement without understanding the process by which youths are confined, that structural and demographic traits facilitate the process, and that benevolent interventions can have unintended negative consequences. We present empirical findings that juvenile justice cases are “gendered,” but that court treatment of those cases shows more gender similarities than differences. In contrast, interviews with officials suggest large gender gaps in opportunities for services, and indicate some gender biases. Bias and disparity also are themes among delinquent and “at-risk” girls who participated in focus groups; in addition, girls expressed preferences for treatment comparable to that given to boys. Finally, we evaluate what has been advocated as female-specific programming and recommend how best to proceed.

Have Federal Sentencing Guidelines Reduced Severity? An Examination of One Circuit

Congress intended to make the sentencing process less discretionary and more equitable for similarly situated defendants when it passed the U.S. Sentencing Reform Act of 1984. Sentencing guidelines were devised to promote these changes. After more than a decade of implementation, however, little is known about the impact of the new policy. This paper examines sentences given between 1993 and 1994 in one federal circuit in an effort to determine whether this policy instrument has achieved success. The theoretical model of a rational case processing system (Gottfredson and Gottfredson, 1980) is used to guide the interpretation of our findings and the recommendations we offer for improvements.

Sex Offender Community Notification Laws: Are Their Effects Symbolic or Instrumental in Nature?

Researchers interested in public policy have noted that laws may have a symbolic or an instrumental function. The example of sex offender legislation is used to look for both instrumental and symbolic effects of this legislation. Although the symbolic effects of sex offender legislation have been examined by prior research, less is known about the instrumental effects of this legislation. This research examines the instrumental functions of sex offender legislation using survey data that asked about whether members of the public have checked the sex offender registry and the reasons behind their answer. The findings of this study suggest largely symbolic effects of sex offender registry legislation, and implications of this finding are discussed.

An Examination of the Degree to Which Sex Offenders Kill

It seems clear that most of our current sex offender policies and those being proposed for the future are the result of sexually related homicides against children committed by previously convicted sex offenders. Given the enactment of these laws, one implicit legislative assumption emerges: that many, if not most, sex offenders go on to kill. This study explores the assumption that sex offenders often kill their victims. Specifically, criminal history information from Illinois from 1990 to 1997 is analyzed to examine the degree to which sex offenders are charged with murder in conjunction with a sex crime and the likelihood of arrested sex offenders experiencing a future arrest for homicide. These results are compared to those found for other types of nonsexual offenders. Findings indicate that sex offenders do not frequently commit murder, nor do they commit homicide at higher rates than other types of offenders.

The Dangerous Drug Offender in Federal Court: Intersections of Race, Ethnicity, and Culpability

This study examines the complex relationships among stereotypes about crime, the offender’s race/ethnicity, and sentencing decisions. Using data on White, Black, and Hispanic male drug offenders sentenced in three U.S. district courts and a definition of the dangerous drug offender appropriate to the federal sentence system, the authors explore the degree to which stereotypes about dangerous drug offenders influence sentence length. The results reveal that fitting the stereotype of a dangerous federal drug offender (i.e., a male drug trafficker with a prior trafficking conviction who used a weapon to commit the current offense) affected the length of the prison sentence for Black offenders but not for White or Hispanic offenders. Further analysis revealed that this effect was confined to Black offenders convicted of drug offenses involving crack cocaine. The results provide further evidence that the focal concerns guiding judicial decision making may vary depending on the offender’s race or ethnicity.

Residency Restrictions for Sex Offenders Public Opinion on Appropriate Distances

Although many states have enacted statewide residency restriction laws, others have left the need for, and content of, these laws to local municipalities. To better understand within-state variation in residency restriction laws, this study investigates the public’s desire for these laws and the distances they feel restrictions should be from public spaces populated by children. We review both quantitative and qualitative data from a statewide survey to determine where the public feels sex offenders can live without threatening children. Our results are interpreted using the “dikes” perspective of public opinion to predict the passage and content of future of residency restriction laws.

Who accesses the sex offender registries? A look at legislative intent and citizen action in Nebraska

States are required to maintain an Internet‐based sex offender registry in order to comply with community notification laws. Such legislation, however, relies on citizens to proactively access information regarding sex offenders’ whereabouts in order to take precautions to protect themselves and their families. This study examines the legislative intent, in terms of the target audience for sex offender community notification laws, and whether this audience is in fact using the online community notification tools available to the public. Survey responses from a representative sample of Nebraska residents and logistic regression are used to examine who is likely to access the registry information and also who is likely to take preventative action in response. Our findings and the implications of the results on notification laws are discussed.

The influence of sex offender registration and notification laws on fostering collective identity among offenders

Abstract A collective identity has been ascribed to sex offenders by law, in which everyone on the registry are presumed to be dangerous, at equal risk for reoffending, and deserve extra scrutiny and prohibitions beyond what other types of convicted offenders experience. As a result, sex offenders often experience harassment, social isolation, stigmatization, loss of employment, and homelessness. Such negative experiences may affect their identities or how they come to view themselves. It is then important to determine if sex offenders accept the structurally and culturally collective identity placed upon them and what, if any, methods have been found to mitigate social effects on their identity. This study explored if and how the consequences of registration and notification (RN) laws affected notions of person and perhaps created a collective identity among sex offenders. We conducted interviews with 112 sex offenders and found that they did see themselves part of a collective group, one that was formed over time, exhibited a group level consciousness, and practiced negotiations within the group to change the thoughts and daily lives of members. We believe the results of this study can be used to highlight the need to recognize these identities when planning treatment modalities and determine the future of sex offender laws.