Why Indeed

October 29, 2012 9:53AM

Why name and shame sex offenders, asks Tom Percy

"ANONYMOUS: Murders and drug dealers do their time and assimilate back into the community. There is no restriction on them living or working anywhere at all.

THE experience with sex offender registers in the US has included deaths and gratuitous violence, as well as payback measures

There are a couple of convicted murderers living in the same suburb as I do. I know, because I’ve seen them. There are probably a few in your suburb, too. Maybe even your street. After all, almost all of them do eventually get out, and they have to live somewhere.

Like dozens of others convicted of that crime all over Australia, they do their time, satisfy the prison authorities and the Prisoners Release Board what used to be the Parole Board that they are ready to be released, and quietly merge back into society.

Usually, you hear no more from them or about them. They don’t go on some special internet register where everyone can see what they look like, what their crimes were, or where they live.

It’s the same with convicted drug dealers. They do their time and assimilate back into the community. There is no restriction on them living or working anywhere at all. They can change their names or their appearance. And, just like the murderer, you would never know."

"But in the wrong hands this sort of information has the potential to be extremely dangerous. The potential for vigilantism is obvious, as is the potential for mistaken identity. The experience with these registers in the US has included deaths and gratuitous violence, as well as payback measures such as graffiti and molotov cocktail bombings. There is no reason to think it won’t happen here.

Given the downside of this sort of exercise in naming and shaming, and the comparatively limited benefits of it if any you have to think of it as just another cynical exercise in political opportunism by the government a gratuitous attack on those marginalised groups in the community who are universally abhorred.

The experiment is likely to be a real crowd pleaser, but it’s hardly likely to have any impact on the problems that it purports to address."

http://www.perthnow.com.au/opinion/why-name-and-shame-sex-offenders-asks-tom-percy/story-e6frg423-1226505303972