I just find it funny that we as a group of RSO's and families of RSO's talk about "all those police shootings". I cannot believe that this group of people couldn't see the lie that is being perpetrated on them, that they all reoffend and using that same line of BS and applying it to police. Yes there are a lot of bad apples in the police department, but they are not going around shooting people all the time. We only believe that is the case due to the sensationalized media. The same media that in Florida said RSO's that were released from state custody went on to commit 600 more sex offenses and used that as justification for civil commitment! Those 600 represent around 6% of the total people released. If any journalist was doing their job they would've realized hey that is only 6% of the people released, maybe the statistics that were put out on recidivism are right? Not a chance, they fed the public and all the public heard was 600 more victims PROTECT US, LOCK'EM UP AND THROW AWAY THE KEY.

If anything we should be able to see how a few bad apples taints all of us. The very fact that we cannot see that in another group gives me pause to think anyone else will ever see it in our own.

Maybe it is just a plain lack of integrity in all employment types. Certain personality types are drawn to particular professions and behaviors.

As for all those police shootings... Are there more of them OR are they more adequately advertised and reported on? Just as all the sex offenses that have been happening for centuries but until there was adequate media coverage the witch hunt hadn't begun. (I'm talking about the 1980's when this started gaining momentum)

If we believe that people can and will eventually think for themselves, given enough time, then yes people will see it on their own. Mostly because the country will become saturated with sex offenders. I think about how many felons I know. There was a time that someone that was a felon was OMG bad NEWS! Now, there are so many things that you can get a felony for, that it isn't all that hard to become a felon. With our incarceration rates too, we are producing handfuls of felons a day and releasing as many, like a manufacturer.

To be honest with you Wisconsin I can't find great statistics anywhere for police shootings back from 30 years ago. They just didn't track it very well (they still don't do a great job). However, all crime is down from 30 years ago, yet the media reporting of the crime is WAY up. We have a 25 hour news cycle now that just doesn't quit-- ever. It has gotten to the point where I open up the paper and expect to and see a story about a sex offender every day. What the media covers and how they cover it gives us all a bias one way or the other.

People here ignore the bias against sex offenders in the media but are buying into the bias against the police. It is just interesting to see the group think mentality and how the media influences that.

Well if a human touches or speaks it, there will be bias, that is the nature of it.

I don't believe many statistics mostly because they can say almost whatever a statistician wants. Because if crime is down, then why are incarceration rates up? It's rhetorical so I don't expect answers because I know there are none.

Also, being influenced by bias is also part of the human nature that we all share. If we couldn't be influenced the media and entertainment industries would go broke.

So what do we do when when know we are going to be influenced and drawn one direction or another. Some times it'll even feel like we have little to no control over this influence. So what do we do? I know what I try to do, sometimes it works better than others, but I try to just think about it more, question the whys and look for that ulterior motive that would cause a person to want me to be influenced one way or another. It's the best anyone can do, since we can not change human nature. Right?

"""People here ignore the bias against sex offenders in the media but are buying into the bias against the police. It is just interesting to see the group think mentality and how the media influences that."""

In any group attempting to survive in a difficult situation, there is usually a type of group mentality present which aids in the survival attempt. I saw this in prison with the inmates vs COs and you will see it out here with the disenfranchised and downtrodden of society-----and sex offenders and registrants are certainly in that category.

The problem with law enforcement is that not only do we expect better from them than to kill and abuse citizens, they are also paid to "protect and serve." They, meaning law enforcement, is supposed to be "better than us."

Sex offenders are not paid to protect anyone and the general public more or less expects them to do ornery things.

Ninety percent of the folks here have had a bad experience with law enforcement at one time or another. It may have been a PO or the officer at the registration office----or the detectives in the investigation-----but the folks here have a valid reason for not particularly liking the men in blue.

You cannot expect the decent people here and those I deal with everyday to sing the praises of policemen.

But in sort of a limited defense in favor of law enforcement, some of the people who get shot and killed put themselves in that position by acting with complete foolishness. Michael Brown of Ferguson would be alive today if he had not tried to act like a gangsta and attack the policeman. Although this was not LE-related, Trayvon Martin would still be here with us if he had not tried to act like a "tough guy" and attack Zimmerman.

I saw this in prison with the young blacks who would walk around in groups, pants pulled down so far you could see half the crack of their butt, singing rap songs, and generally making a nuisance of themselves. They just dared COs to say anything to them and they pushed the envelope to such a degree that they could not stay out of trouble in there.

Not to say that the police are always justified when they shoot someone, but I have often thought what I would have done if I had been the policeman in Ferguson when Michael Brown initially attacked me and then allegedly charged toward him. I know one thing-----I would not have wanted to make the split second decision that any policeman would have to make.

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I had had many bad experiences with ahole cops when registering. I've also had some very good experiences with cops when registering.

I am not saying cops shouldn't be better, I'm saying they are human too. I was just pointing out for a group that gets painted with a broad brush, that we all reoffend, it seems like a hasty generalization for us to do the same to another group of people.

And Wisconsin crime actually has gone down with all measures of criminality, look at the UCR, NIBRS, the NCVS, it's commonly accepted among anyone in the field crime has gone down. While at the same time media reporting of crime has gone up. We are left with people fearing crime more but they actually have less to fear than 30 years ago when they let their kids play outside all day long.

More statistics? I think I was clear about my trust in statistics, I have none. Which always leads me back to the other question, if crime has gone down, why have incarceration rates gone up?

So do you believe in the statistics that say sex offenders have the 2nd lowest recidivism rate?

It's actually a pretty simple answer. Incarceration has gone up because politicians get elected on getting tough on crime, and people are more scared of crime because off the media so they they cite for politicians to be tough on crime. It's s vicious circle of incarceration.

It's true there are lies, dammed lies and statistics. A lot of people can juggle stats to say what they want when they have limited sample sizes or a bad methodology. But if you have ever taken a college stats class you can tell when a statistic should be questioned. For example, a lot of qualitative studies do not have a large enough not random enough sample size to be able to speak to the majority of America.

I have taken a college stats course, it is why I don't believe any of them... Cause I learned how they can say whatever a person wants them to say.

How do you know it is all about the politicians? It is the judges that hand down sentences, and when they have the ability they don't always hand out less than any mandatory minimum. Again, I fear this comes back to the numbers and if someone presented them in a way that was the least flattering cause.

I still remember one of my tests in college stats class was the professor writing the methodologies of bad surveys and we had to say why they were flawed and how we would improve them. Essays in a math class!

What I've taken from this is that stats can be manipulated. I agree with you there Wisconsin. However, just because they can be manipulated does not mean that they all are. The first thing I'm interested in when someone gives me a statistic is where does that come from. Is it a reputable source? What was their methodology for how they came to their conclusions. What is the error rate and standard deviation? How big is the sample size, is it a random sample? If the answer is positive to all of these questions you can trust those statistics. Numbers don't lie, people do.

And yes you are also correct that judges hand down the sentence. However most of the time now in almost all jurisdictions, the crimes have a statuary scheme for punishment and the judges hands are tied when it comes to giving leniency. So it is the politicians who are deciding the punishments for people convicted of crimes. And to make matters worse, 95% of crimes are now plea bargained (I know another stat lol), which means that the judge doesn't even get to play much of a role. Yes, they can technically decide to impose a different punishment than what was agreed upon by the DA and the defense but that almost never happens.

I'm curious why you are skeptical of the crime statistics. What would be the reason for researchers to fake such statistics? If they did they are doing a terrible job at advertising it because people are more scared now than ever before.

And I'm also curious if you believe the statistics that show sex offenders have the lowest recidivism rates besides murderers.

Murderers have the lowest recidivism rates, because when they get out of prison after doing there 50 year sentence, they aren't looking to commit more crimes. As low as the numbers for SO's, I doubt the FBI and DOJ would fudge the numbers to make us look better. Just make sure the stats don't include probation violations (missing curfew, leaving your district, dirty urine, ect.), I think SO's have been hit over the head so hard with punishment and restrictions, most try their hardest to avoid criminal activity.
Also the SO's that have committed truly terrible crimes, get sentences so long that they rarely make it back out to the streets. Remember all of the politicians calling for tougher laws after the Sandusky trial... they are never going to affect him. He will die in prison.

Hank is right, the government that wants to be tough on crime isn't going to go out of their way to lie about a recidivism statistic. And even those when you look at them are essentially "rounded up" when you look at what they include in their sample for their recidivism hits. It isn't just sex crimes. So while their stat is low and is in our favor, it isn't truthful either. So to answer your question, no, I don't believe the DOJ either.

But you are right the numbers don't lie. The raw data won't lie either, it is after someone goes in there and manipulates it do things start to show the bias of the person preparing the statistic.

Now the reasons why someone that has committed a sex crime is unlikely to do it again are based on a number of factors. Mainly though, the people that are caught for sex crimes are not hardened criminals with rap sheets and priors. They are family folk, teenagers and trusted community members, people that would never dream of ever having to deal with life behind bars. When they go to prison it scares the hell outta them and their loved ones who were just as upstanding citizens as they were. They are 'good people' that now are sucked into a legal web that is stickier than Gorilla glue and even less likely to let go of you once they have you. Because now you are on the 'radar' with them and a 'goto' person when bad things happen. With all that hanging over a 'good person's' head, do you think they would ever screw up like that agian? UNlikely, in fact so unlikely that most of the recidivism rates that are reported by the DOJ are really about survival, because they aren't sex crimes but petty theft, proximity violations, robbery, assault, etc. From what I have seen these other crimes come about because of the utter destruction of the support systems that SOs would have had in place had the legal system not only chewed him up but his entire family and friend circle too.

Then there is treatment, maybe the better term is cognitive reprogramming and recognition of behavior. Because of the kind of treatment given to SOs these days, they learn to control urges and recognize risky behavior. Making people safer, yet they still rip apart the family piece by piece, why? because it looks good in the media.

So I'm confused, you think the numbers are correct in regards to SO's and their low recidivism rate but you doubt the rest of the statistics that show crime has dropped in the last 30 years?

I doubt the statisticians and their method that is determining that crime has dropped in the last 30 years. And since I have never seen the raw numbers and the samples and how they were randomized and compared to historical numbers, etc I won't trust them.

I also believe that they have an agenda of their own, budgets they want to keep the same size, job security, and a myriad of other motivators that can influence a person to seek numbers to their favor. Maybe crime has gone down per capita, but that doesn't mean the shear number of crimes have gone down. That is just one example of how the numbers can be made to look one way or another.

Because I know the DOJ is not out to do any SO any favors, the fact that they report that the recidivism rates are so low, even with all the manipulation in the world from them, they were still low. That had to be a blow to the nuts for them... LOL

See I basically don't trust the species, homosapien (that's us), the basic nature of the species is that they are not nice in general and on top of that they are opportunists, not really caring many times who gets rolled over in the process. Yes I know the individuals within the species are not necessarily always so horrible and rigidly cruel. But in my experience people are generally out for themselves and those they care about and be damned anyone who gets in their way.

I realize it sounds rather cold, but people have proven to me over and over again that they are just that, not nice and that they are opportunists.