Sex-Offender Data Going National On The Web
A new federally operated Web site announced by Attorney General Alberto Gonzales in a speech at the National Press Club is scheduled to come online this month.
The site will offer information on sex offenders for each state, and enable users to carry out national searches to ascertain whether a person convicted of a sex crime in one state has moved to another.
Law enforcement personnel and residents will have access to the site, which will vary in information offered based on each state’s rule. However, information on sex offenders in Oregon will not be accessible because the state does not publish information about people convicted of sex crimes.
Privacy proponents have cautiously approached the issue of disclosing the identities of sex offenders who have already served their sentence, but demands for wider access to such data have picked up in light of recent kidnappings and murders committed by convicted sex offenders.
Abstracted by the National Law Enforcement and Corrections Technology Center(NLECTC) from the Associated Press (05/20/05) .