Posted on August 31st, 2009 at 11:38 am by GregM
Today my criminal law class was talking about a case from Lafayette, IN, where a man was banned from a public park. Ten years prior, he was convicted of a sex-crime involving children and had since been released from prison, completed his probation, and was still in counseling and in a support group. To put it simply, he did something wrong, paid the price, and was working to make sure he didn’t do it again. One day, he went to a park in Lafayette and saw children playing. He had an urge to commit a crime but ended up leaving the park, telling his counselor, and talking about the situation in his support group. Someone told the parks department about what happened and the parks department banned him from entering any public park in Lafayette, including golf courses, baseball diamonds, etc.
Here’s where my thoughts are conflicting. Yes, we want to protect the kids, but is it right to ban this one person? The park did not ban all sex offenders - just this one. Furthermore, he really didn’t commit a crime. Yes, he had an urge, but should we punish people for their urges? I’ve had an urge to punch someone - should I be charged with battery? Where is the line? Isn’t the difference between a criminal and a normal citizen the ability to distinguish between right and wrong? This man realized his urge was wrong and so he left the park. Doesn’t that show that, unlike a decade ago, he is now able to recognize what is wrong and avoid it? Yet, he was punished anyway.
This case makes me think of the movie, Minority Report, starring Tom Cruise. In the movie, the government is able to stop people from committing crimes because they are able to tell when people have the urge to commit crimes. The problem was that people were punished even when they may have later changed their mind and not committed the crime.
This is something I’m still grappling with. Yes, we should protect our children, but we should also protect individual freedom. Should we punish people for crimes they haven’t committed, just because we think they will eventually commit them?
What do you think?
More later…
G
Link Here | September 2, 2009,
I agree with you here Greg, where do we draw the line? BUT, the question that the parks department and people in charge were probably thinking was, “What will happen to us if we DON’T ban him and then he commits a crime? How do we explain to the parents of the victim that we knew that this guy was once dangerous, we knew that he had thought about committing a crime, but we didn’t do anything about it?”
I think this falls under the “just in case” gray area of public safety. Remove the temptation and you remove the threat. But you’re a) taking away the rights of an innocent man and b) not addressing the much larger problem of the criminals that you don’t know about and who don’t come clean about their criminal urges.
Its a toss up, my friend. All I can say is that I’m glad you’re studying law and not me.
L
Comment by Lauren |
Link Here | September 2, 2009,
Sex offenders are not permitted to live near schools. I think not being allowed to go places where children are is the price the sex offender has to pay for his past mistake. I think all of the sex offenders in his state should have to stay out of the parks.
Comment by Karen |