Criminal Law - New York State

Pedophilia and Sexual Offending Against Children: Theory, Assessment, and Intervention










Assault on children
Of all the situations I have come into contact with, this is the most disturbing. It became even more disturbing when the defendant would have been found to have had prior arrests and even jail sentences for this crime, yet, was released in a very short time. If you look further into the criminal careers of pedophiles, some will end up murdering their tiny victim. They may not start out that way, but after repeated jail sentences and arrests, they become murderers as well.


After doing research on the subject, I came to find that this crime against children isn't taken as seriously as drinking and driving is. This finding, using the jail or prison sentences as evidence, disturbed me and my sense of right and wrong to the core.


When I picked up a newspaper or read the local news on the internet and see that a fatal DWI (Driving while intoxicated) got the driver LIFE in prison, I would think, a life for a life. Read further down the page, and see that a pedophile who murdered his victim got 20 (twenty years) to life. Why is this innocent child’s life, worth less, legally, than the life of the innocent passenger or another driver? Life without parole should be mandatory for murders such as these, but for some oddity, the law hasn't been updated to hold the child’s life with that much regard.


To criticise law is not my intention. There have been many changes to the laws for children, for example, one in Florida (New York, should take notice)


“Jessica’s Law”
Jessica's Law is the informal name given to a 2005 Florida law, as well as laws in several other states, designed to punish sex offenders and reduce their ability to re-offend. A version of Jessica's Law, known as the Jessica Lunsford Act, was introduced at the federal level in 2005 but was never enacted into law by Congress.


The name is also used by the media to designate all legislation and potential legislation in other states modeled after the Florida law. Forty-two states have introduced such legislation since Florida's law was passed.


The law is named after Jessica Lunsford, a young Florida girl who was raped and murdered in February 2005, by John Couey, a previously convicted sex offender. Public outrage over this case spurred Florida officials to introduce this legislation. Among the key provisions of the law is a mandatory minimum sentence of 25 years in prison and lifetime electronic monitoring of adults convicted of lewd or lascivious acts against a victim less than 12 years old. In Florida, sexual battery or rape of a child less than twelve years old is punishable only by life imprisonment with no chance of parole. Her story is below;


Jessica Marie Lunsford (October 6, 1995 – February 27, 2005) was a nine-year-old girl who was abducted from her home in Homosassa, Florida in the early morning of February 24, 2005. Believed held captive over the weekend, she was raped and later murdered by 47-year-old John Couey who was living nearby. The media covered the investigation and trial of her killer extensively. On August 24, 2007 a judge in Inverness, Florida sentenced Couey, a convicted sex offender, to death for kidnapping, raping, and murdering Jessica. Jessica was buried alive with her stuffed toy.


There is also the


“Amber Alert”
An AMBER Alert is a child abduction alert bulletin in the United States and Canada, as well as other countries, issued upon the suspected abduction of a child. AMBER is officially a backronym for "America's Missing: Broadcasting Emergency Response" but was originally named for Amber Hagerman, a 9-year-old child who was abducted and murdered in Arlington, Texas in 1996. Exceptions are in Georgia, where it is called "Levi's Call", Hawaii, where it is called a "Maile Amber Alert", and Arkansas, where it is called a "Morgan Nick Amber Alert". Those plans were named after children who went missing in those states.


AMBER Alerts are distributed via commercial radio stations, satellite radio, television stations, and cable TV by the Emergency Alert System (where they are termed "Child Abduction Emergency" or "Amber Alerts"), as well as via e-mail, electronic traffic-condition signs, the LED billboards which are located outside of newer Walgreens locations, along with the LED/LCD signs of billboard companies such as Clear Channel Outdoor, CBS Outdoor and Lamar, and wireless device SMS text messages. Those interested in subscribing to receive AMBER Alerts in their area via SMS messages can visit Wireless Amber Alerts, which are offered by law as free messages. In some states, the display scroll boards in front of lottery terminals are also used. The decision to declare an AMBER Alert is made by the police organization investigating the abduction. Public information in an AMBER Alert usually consists of the name and description of the abductee, a description of the suspected abductor, and a description and license plate number of the abductor's vehicle, if available.


I have limited this to crimes that have taken place in the USA because I am more familiar with these crimes and of the sentences received. Though, I did recently hear on the news here that a father, who beat up the man who molested his son received more jail time than the offender.


There is work to be done, and this is one area of the law that desperately needs an overhaul.


Thank you for reading my blog on this matter, and if you have any comments or suggestions, please feel free to offer them to me.
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