Tales From the Registry

originally posted 9/5/2009 After having sex in my home (1979) with my friend she demanded money from me, to purchase drugs. When I refused, she cried rape. My attorney informed me if �I prefer a trial and lost, I was looking at 3 to 5 years in state prison. �If i pleaded guilty �the court would sentenced me to 8 months home confinement or working as a janitor(no pay) at the local Police Dept. �I opted for the no pay job. Moreover I would �no longer have to register in 7 more years. The girl friend moved to out of state where she was found guilty of killing her drug dealer in a hotel room. At that time �I never had more than traffic ticket at the age of 39 in 1979 when this happened. In 1998, �I was shocked when police arrested me for not registering as SO. �I was sentenced to 1 year in county jail for not…

originally posted 9/5/2009 I am a 72 yr old mother of a grown son who was falsely accused by his step-daughter, when her mother wanted a divorce. My daughter-in- law would call me up and demand money, several thousand dollars, and she would say, “If I don’t get it, I’ll have (my daughter) accuse of “so and so” (and it would be worse accusations than the girl had already made.) I told the law, but they didn’t believe me. Nobody believed my son, or me, or his son. My son’s son now lives with me. I support him and myself on my social security. He is persecuted at school by some of the kids and some of the teachers. He suffers depression and is in mental health treatment. He recently changed schools. I have to drive him 20 miles to school, which comes to 40 miles a day. I wish there were some way to end this hysteria, but, then…

originally posted 9/4/2009 I am 31 years old, and have been living for the past 8 years with this “sex offender” title over my head. In 2000 I was a manager (22 yr old) at a fast food restaurant in a small town in TN. I was new to the town and was not well liked. I was brought there to rebuild this restaurant as it had basically fallen apart. My efforts were commended by most everyone as the place got cleaned up and business picked up. Everything was going great, until one day, a Friday night, I had two no-call, no-shows ( two 17 year old male students) not show up for work. This was the third time. They were close friends and were always together. Well when employees saw them come through via the drive through, I decided to call their parents and inform them that their kids were not at work where they were supposed to be and instead told…

originally posted 8/28/2009 My son has now been on probation 4 weeks. His emotions are up and down, as would be expected with any and all charged with these crimes and then completely losing their privacy. To further complicate, he also suffers from bi-polar disorder so I worry alot about him, having dealt with multiple suicide attempts since he was eleven. He’s also a self injurer and has often felt that he *needs* to die. The years have been hard, and it’s taken a lot of work and support to have him stabilized and then, his world, our world, came crashing down with this conviction. But, even with distance between us and family and friends, he has a strong support network which is helping and giving him some time to heal. When I told him about getting involved with RSOL, at first he was elated. And then he began to worry, not wanting any exposure or attention drawn to him, fearing for personal vendettas from…

originally posted 8/27/2009 It seems no matter how hard we try to change some of these laws we will not be able to. �Once a law is made it is forever on the books and rarely ever changed. �I was 19 years old and met a girl who was 14 years old at the mall. �well we ended up having sex and dated for just a few weeks and than we stopped seeing each other ..Almost 2 years went by and I was called down town and asked about how I knew this girl…..Long story short – her parents found an old letter that she wrote to one of her girl friends about me and her parents read it and went down town to file a complaint. �This was 2 years later. � By that time, I have a fiance and she is 4 months pregnant with our baby! �I go to court for the having sex with a girl…

originally posted 8/25/2009 The registry, more than the original offense, is why my son is incarcerated today.  False accusations exist more than most people would believe. In 1998,  my son K pleaded guilty to sexually abusing an 8-year-old girl.  It was an Alford plea, meaning that while  he maintained his innocence, it was believed that the state had enough evidence to convict him at a trial.  The plea was agreed to during a 15-minute meeting with K’s- then-attorney, Warren Brown, as the trial deadline loomed.  K had terrible legal representation. The nature and consequences of taking an Alford plea were not explained to us or understood by us.  When I suggested “maybe we should think about it…”, the lawyer got up from his seat very angrily and said in a belligerent way “well, alright then, we’ll go to trial”.    This was, believe me, very frightening.    He also never told my son or me that it was the same as…

originally posted 8/23/2009 My son went to register for college today and of course, he had to go to the security office.  Now they have real cops there and he told them,  he is a registered SO.  They asked him, what was the offense?  He told them he had asked some girls if they needed a ride;  he never got out of the car, never touched or promised anything.  So he got sentenced for luring of a minor.  The cops at the college looked at each other and said they had never heard of anything like that and this should never have been a registrable offense . My son came to my job and to see in his face all the pain of the last 8 years, the frustration and the health issues due to all this crap; I cried all the way home! I am 55 years old and I cried for the pain of my son!   In the afternoon I had…

originally posted 8/20/2009 I was convicted several years ago of three counts of possession of child pornography.  Sentenced to three months of home confinement, I opted for jail time instead.  In the state where I was convicted,  I am registered as a Level 1 offender and, in seven years, will no longer have to register.   I live within several blocks of a school, live on the same block as a Level Three offender, and contact the local authorities every six months to keep them informed of my residence.  I am definitely not at risk to re-offend. My home state lists me on their registry as a predator, and my picture appears on their site.  I am unable to go home.  I could not live with my parents, whose home is a few blocks from an elementary school. This situation is embarrassing and distressing for my family and friends.   My predicament illustrates how destructive our current views on “sex offenses” really are.

originally posted 8/17/2009 Falsely accused by a woman with an incredible history of falsely accusing other doctors and wrongfully convicted by a judge who felt her background of previous false claims of assault, felony convictions, psychiatric hospitalizations, and prostitution were irrelevant. I have done more than 60 professional presentations, and am willing to help.

originally posted 8/17/2009 My husband and I are victims of the Commonwealth.   At the age of 15-16 he was accused of rape by a classmate whose family filed charges but never followed through in court.  The case was dropped due to the victim’s failure to appear.   This followed him approximately two years later when another offense was committed in our area and he was immediately arrested.   A young, single mother of three boys, with no legal or moral support at the time, was coerced by detectives in hopes of affording her middle son a chance in court. My husband was was charged, convicted and sentenced to 37 years.  Seven years to be served, 10 years  suspended sentence and 20 years on probation. With my lack of full understanding of the law it would stand to reason that the Grandfather Law would be applicable to his recent circumstance;  he was subject to sentencing guidelines before 1995.   My husband was released in 1992 to…