Fla. Gov. Jeb Bush Signs Lunsford Act

[emad]

Fla. Gov. Jeb Bush Signs Lunsford Act
Monday, May 02, 2005

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — With the father of a slain 9-year-old looking on, Gov. Jeb Bush (search) signed legislation Monday that strengthens punishment and monitoring of child sex abusers.

The Jessica Lunsford Act (search) requires those who prey on children under 12 to be sentenced to at least 25 years in prison and, if they get out, to be tracked for life.

The bill was quickly drafted after March, and sped through the legislative process, pushed by outraged lawmakers.

Bush said Florida's sex offender laws are already tough, and "this bill will make our laws even tougher. It think it is right and just."

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,155208,00.html

[bunkerbuster1]

1. Great. Legislating by reacting to one FoxNews story after another

Add this to the "We are so fucked" file.

[Egalitariat]

3. Why? What's wrong with it? I live in FL and have a young daughter

This is one particular law I'm happy with.

[bunkerbuster1]

9. I have a young daughter as well.

I want my elected officials to legislate responsibly, and not to base their activities on the crap story of the week.

[Egalitariat]

17. Regardless of motivation, it's a good law

if you're arguing this should have been on the books years ago (instead of waiting on something to go horribly wrong), then I agree.

[bunkerbuster1]

20. Nowhere in the story does it indicate what the penalties used to be.

I suspect they were very stiff, and that this newly cobbled-together law does diddly to ensure safety.

There's also the troubling question of why it is we need to track a specific kind of violent offender and yet not another type. I don't believe that FL subjects those who've been released from prison on murder or manslaughter charges to lifetime monitoring and tracking. Why is that?

How about those who've "merely" beaten or maimed children, or adults, for that matter?

Sorry, this law stinks. I didn't care for its granddaddy (Megan's law, in NJ, passed under similar circumstances) either.

[Double T]

2. One Law That Makes Sense, There Is No Way To Rehabilitate a......

Sex Offender, So You Are Left With No Other Choice

[Itsthetruth]

5. Be Careful !!!!!

It won't stop with sex offenders. The door has now been opened to the government using GPS to track for life other "criminals, terrorists and subversives". They used the easiest ones to attack, the ones who would offer the least resistance to GPS, sex offenders.

Next will come rapists and other violent criminals. Will it stop with them? No. If you can support the use of GPS on them, how in the world could you object to using GPS to track the activities of people who are called terrorists, or perhaps communists and other "un-American subversives"?

Be careful about what you wish for. Remember who is doing the surveillance!

[Double T]

8. You Can Not Rehabilitate A Psychopath..............

.......Therefore, Violent Criminals Would Also Be Candidates For The Same Tracking Method. I Am Not Planning On The Current Administration, That Is Filled With Psychos, To Be In Power After The Next Election.

[TahitiNut]

10. So, the 18-year-old with a 16-year-old girlfriend ...

... can be scared to death of what her family might do if they don't like him?

[Double T]

13. That Is Not What We Are Talking About Here......

....Let's Not Take This To The Absurd

[Dogmudgeon]

14. It's a LAW

Of Course It Will Be Taken To The Absurd. ALL Laws Are Used "Discretionarily".

Almost All Of The Provisions In These Pedo Panic Laws Are Already Law -- The Laws In Question Are Just Not Used.

Tyranny Will Come To America In The Guise of "Protecting the Children". Who, As Usual, Will NOT Be Protected At All.

--P!

[jmowreader]

27. That's not absurd

I really expect this to happen:

Jack, 17 and born on April 5, enters into a relationship with Diane, 17 and born on July 30. On April 5, Diane gives Jack a lovely birthday present: She breaks curfew and screws Jack's brains out.

When Diane walks in the house the next morning, she is subjected to the kind of interrogation that would make Lynndie England blanch. During this little screamfest, Diane lets slip that she had sex with Jack.

Diane's parents never liked Jack because he's a goddam hippie (his hair brushes his collar) and he listens to that Devil-worshipping rock and roll music. And now he's raped their little girl. A quick call to 911 gets Jack locked up for statutory rape.

Now Jack gets to go to prison for 25 years all because his girlfriend (who is essentially the same age he is) had sex with him the day he turned 18. Also, if he ever gets out of jail, he gets to be tracked for the rest of his life because he is a Child Abusing Sex Offender.

[Egalitariat]

18. Only if the 16 yr old is under the age of 12

which is what the law says. In most states, and 18 year old and a 16 year old can do whatever they choose consentually, and it's not illegal.

[Mike Daniels]

23. The law only applies to victims under the age of 12 (n/t)

[TahitiNut]

24. Yep. (D'oh!) I should just read.

I'm very wary of such laws, despite sharing the extreme digust with predators.

It's especially when the alleged crime is particularly abhorrent that abuses of enforcement occur. When emotions and self-righteousness are high that the "niceties" (like innocence) are often overlooked.

[VelmaD]

25. Just because you say it in all caps...

doesn't make it true.

I work in juvenile corrections and not all "sex offenders" cannot be rehabilitated. In fact, what qualifies one as a "sex offender" varies quite widely from state to state.

[athenap]

4. I really hope they don't abuse this...

I think it's a great idea for real and true sexual predators. But I'd feel really stupid endorsing it and having it be abused. I hate the thought that someone might abuse something like this for custody battles, ex boy/girlfriends, or any number of other reasons or means to falsely accuse people and destroy their lives. I hope people and lawmakers use this as it's intended--for the real predators.

[Itsthetruth]

6. Of Course It Will Be Abused

eom

[Iowa]

12. Yep...

It will be abused.

[UCLA Dem]

7. Now they need to have similar sentences for rapists.

[Itsthetruth]

26. And after that ......

people who are "terrorists" or "subversives"?

[Fire Walk With Me]

11. Jeb Bush, man of action, Vote in '08

Time to pony out the Bush family history and nip that one in the bud.

Nothing at all wrong with justice and prevention but this has opportunism written all over it.

The sidebar has a story: "Civil Rights Pioneer Kenneth B. Clark Dies".

[maxrandb]

15. So When Does Neal Bush Go to Jail for 25 Years?

I think that anyone who preys on young children for their kicks ought to go to jail and be there for a LONG time.

I just am cynical about the hypocracy. I guess it's ok if it's a little brown Asian girl and your related to the pResident or Governor of Floriduh.

It's not a crime if your rich enough to go on an Asian sex tour, or connected enough to just have young Asian girls show up at your hotel room begging for sex.

[wakeme2008]

16. NRA 1st Children 2nd

a couple weeks ago Bush was given two bills at the same time. NRA's Force with Force Bill and this one.

Let you guess which one he signed FIRST and over a week earlier.

[paparush]

19. I used to be a Parole Officer in NC..

Once you've done your time (both incarcerated and under supervised release), you're done. The Govt has no right to TRACK you for life. If this is what FL wants, then they need to make sex crimes against children punishable by LIFE IN PRISON.

[captain crunch]

21. Anyone who disagrees with this law

is a moron. Lets face it, if a Democratic Governor signed this law, you would all be saying how wonderful it was.
Let the repukes be the hypocrites, not us.

[Lindacooks]

22. And are they going to fund it?

This is all well and good, but unless it comes with a lot of money to hire more police officers, detectives, investigators, and revamp their tracking system, it means little or nothing.

You don't get something for nothing. Each one of those tracking bracelets costs a pretty penny, and monitoring is costly too. Here's info based on tracking only 45 offenders:

"The technology will cost the Corrections Department $175,000 to $200,000 a year based on the annual release of about 45 Level 3 offenders. The daily cost of about $17 for the technology and vendor expenses is in addition to the $20 daily expense for monitoring offenders on intensive supervision."

http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/news/7730819.htm

I've heard it's going to cost at least 8 million a year for Florida alone. And are they going to do the same "caliber of job" with this that they have keeping track of foster children?????

[Name removed]

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