Worm can I know...Sarah's law?

thats how i understand it. sara payne's arguement being if she knew roy whiting lived nearby she wouldn't have let her children out to play alone

i think she's a decent woman and have a lot of respect for her...but i don't agree it will do any good

Deep.

I think the first thing that you need to work out, is exactly how you view paedophilia.

(Now there's a can of worms)

Sara Payne has shown nothing but dignity when I've seen her on the television, I have a lot of respect for her.

As a mother, I think I would like to know of any convicted paedophiles that live in my area, but again, I don't know if it would make any difference to the way we live our lives.

Thank you.

And I agree. I thoroughly respect how she's tried to make sure 'good' (if there can be) comes from the loss of her daughter.

I just thought I must have missed a clause or something...don't all paedophiles start somewhere? It would only highlight convicted ones so surely kids are still at risk from the 'not yet caught' ones? And not wanting to sound flippant, but I guess some of them do drive, and might go and pick up children from elsewhere?

I thought there must be another element not so broadly publicised.

I guess what KtC said but I don't want to live my life constantly thinking well, I'd let R do this but there are X number of sex offenders in the area so I better not..

<shudder>

The only thing I can agree with is that parents should be able to check with the police whether a new partner is a registered offender (I think the law allows this now?). Given it's family and close friends who are the biggest risks, I can see this as being reassuring for a parent.

Hmmm...not even gonna start with that one. Was planning to be in bed by 10.30 and have a feeling that would be a long one.

Thanks kay-bee. I'm a parent too, but not sure I'd want to.

I honestly don't think it would work - the system would be relient on sex offenders either staying in one place, or registering when they moved. If they knew they would be 'outed' as a sex offender the minute they registered, I am convinced they would not register. So it would be worse than useless.

Probably.

The crux, I believe is whether or not it's something that can 'be helped'.... Which leaves open a wide range of paths to go down.

I suppose looking at "Megan's Law" in the States would be a kick off.

Gah. The ironing can wait.

What's the difference between Megan's and Sarah's law then?

AFAIK (and I stand to be corrected) only the country of origin.

Megan's Law obligates the authorities in the USA to make information abou sex offenders (particularly, but not limited to paedophiles) available to the public.

Varies from State to State what level of information is available.

Offenders arerequired to inform authorities of changes to address/employment etc. and default is a crime which carries a custodial sentence.

And I couldn't really blame them for not doing so, to be honest; whatever their past crime they are entitled to be left in peace as long as they are not committing an offence and this law would put them at risk. I know some people would say they don't deserve peace but that's neither here nor there. Who gets what they really deserve?

Not to mention I'm not sure how much detail such a law would give - that there was a sex offender or a specific type of sex offender. It's just that there are some (IMO) fairly dodgy entries on the sex offence list. The cases that stick out in my mind are of a 15 year old boy who is on the list for having sex with a 15 year old girl (underage sex, the fact there's no age difference wasn't accounted for) and I think the social worker who was blamed for Victoria Climbe's death (I think? I never quite understood this).

Megan's Law is a law in the states.

Sarah's Law is a proposal for this country

Lisa Arthur??? - she's not on the sex offenders register, but she is banned from working with children.

And you can get put on the SexOffenders register for getting off a coach and pissing in an A road layby in Scotland.

No. It wasn't me. Although I might have been there.

The first issue to deal with, I believe. Is whether or not paedophilia is a sexuality.

Go for it.

I think so, maybe? She was on R4 Today recently discussing the outcome of her appeal - I thought she was on the sex offenders register and barred from working with children but you know, it's on when I'm still in bed so it's possible I've dreamt it all up!

Is there a separate child safety register for adults with nonsex offences?

Right.

And does anyone know what the effect has been in the States?

Zeb...really?! I don't think it had dawned on me that the line could be that fine really.

There's several sources of info around people who shouldn't work with kids or vulnerable adults - most of which have questionable legality!

The Sex Offenders Register is one.

Then there are

• Schedule One Offenders (details kept by the home local authority)
• List 99 - people who really shouldn't work with kids, but have no convictions
• depending on the LA, a dirty old mans list.

And no doubt various other records that the Information Commissioner would be moooost interested in!

Put the spoon down and step away from the worm can please.

Way past my bedtime...and sadly my Dad is visiting tomorrowand I highly doubt he'd appreciate me sitting at the pc debating paedophillia after he's driven up here

Feel free to discuss in my absence and I'll head in tomorrow when he's gone to see if it fizzled or kept going.

Does anyone have a link for Lisa Arthur? I have tried to google but no joy so far. I will look again though.

ONE I think there will be more to it if your pal got put on the Sex Offenders Register for having a piss. Otherwise there would be hundreds of men (and a few women) charged on a saturday night after a night on the town!

There honestly wasn't.... Just a slash in a layby where he could be seen from the road.....

And NO it REALLY wasn't me.

It's Lisa Arthurworry or somesuch.

Google Lord Laming, you'll find info about her. Poor scape goat.

I'm sorry, but I find that hard to believe that he was presumably convicted of Indecent Exposure for simply urinating. But we could debate it all night if we had the energy or inclination?

Oh yes, it's a blanket law on any sex offence.

There was some ridiculous case on R4 Today about some (younger end of teenage years) boy who was put on it because he got drunk and fell asleep half naked on his (parents'?) front lawn and got done for indecent exposure and put on the register.... His behaviour was stupid but it wasn't exactly a sign he was a major risk to anyone apart from a few garden gnomes...

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2006/jan/18/childrensservices.politics1

Not really. Being a paedophile isn't a crime in itself- the crime is sex with someone underage/indecent assault/possessing pornographic images of someone under age/whatever. Simply being turned on by kids is perfectly legal- it only becomes a crime when that starts affecting others. So whether or not it's a sexuality is neither here nor there for the purposes of discussing this sort of thing (by the way, I'm utterly against Sarah's Law for all sorts of reasons).

Thanks for that KJX?

It happens - also a woman could get a conviction for the same for flashing their boobs if the CPS is feeling that way out.

The interviews I've heard with her - well, it was clear that she wasn't a direct risk to children and that yes she made mistakes, but she was in a junior role and was let down badly by her supervisors and departments. Scapegoat, definitely.

I think she's allowed to be a social worker again - why she'd want to would be beyond me.

KJX, flashing is different from having a pee (presumably trying to be discreet and quick). I would charge a woman for Indecent Exposure if she was exposing her breasts if the circumstances meritied it.

I fail to see how much of a difference it would make anyway, what about all of the paedophiles who have not been caught/convicted of an offence - they're still there and no less of a threat but the law obviously wouldn't know about them.

Also it completely misses the fact that's whilst there are people out there like Roy Whitting and sadly things like what happened to Sara do happen they are (thankfully ) very few and far between, and the fact remains that the majority of children who are abused or even killed are abused or killed by someone they know - a family member or friend of the family. This law wouldn't help those children either.

On the point of the sex offenders register I think it has made some glaring errors.

I once had to ask a dad to leave his daughter on a children's ward over night because when he was 17 he slept with her mother who at the time was 15. He had been to prison I think for it and released and they had stayed together and gone on to have a child. He was flagged up to us by social services as a risk and we had to ask him to leave.

Luckily he was very understanding and accepted this but as far as I could see that information meant he was no more of a risk to any of the children than any of the other parents on the ward.

Meanwhile the paedophile who abused my older sister when she was a child is currently twisting the justice system round his finger that he's "unfit" to stand trial. Yet he goes into town every week to collect his pension etc etc. My sister is now 34 but the case also relates to a 16 year old and a 9 year old. He had no previous convictions and worked for my dad at the time, nobody suspected a thing, my sister was 4, a law like Sarah's wouldn't have helped her.

Nikki xxx

This is quite interesting

http://www.newstatesman.com/education/2007/08/young-abusers-sexual-children

My ex worked in this area (therapy for victims of childhood sexual abuse), and i remembe rhaving a conversation with her after some research her and her PhD supervisor had done, some paper or other. anyway, hshe told me that the before your average adult paedophile is caught, he will have committed over 400 seperate offences, with as many as 500 children.

I read another headline which echoed what KN said "being a danger to society is not a crime"

I don't see how it would benefit and think the bad would outweight the good.

As some people have said, often the person committing the crime is very close to the victim already (family friend, parent etc) and from what I've seen it is very often their "first offence" (the first they have been convicted of and often at a late age). I shudder to think how many other incidents a lot of them have been involved with beforehand that went unreported as I doubt they became a reported sex offender overnight.

However I do think it is worrying for partners to go unchecked but at the same time I don't know how feasible it would all be in reality. I once met a women who had been a convicted child sex offender who was back in court in relation to do with it - she attended with her boyfriend who she was living with and his children. He had no idea what she was really in court for and she asked him to stay outside for the whole thing.