Sex Offender Registries Often Fail Those They Are Designed To Protect
Inside the sprawling two-story tan and coral stucco building on New York Avenue in Northeast Washington, D.C., is a men's homeless shelter that once served as a halfway house run by the government.
It's a place that some 20 registered sex offenders call home — according to the city's sex offender registry. But at least one-third of them don't really live there, and D.C. authorities have no idea where they are.
The men are among the more than 25,000 convicted sex offenders and predators across the U.S. who have absconded, their whereabouts unknown to law enforcement or the victims — often children — whom they sexually assaulted or abused, an NPR investigation has found. Tens of thousands of others are out of compliance with sex offender registry laws.
"Law enforcement are losing people," says Kelly Socia, an associate professor of criminology and justice studies at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell.
Like so much else in American life, enforcement of sex offender registries across the country has been upended by the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. Many states with in-person monitoring and registration have had to search for alternatives. Some states have seemingly stopped enforcement altogether.
But most of the shortcomings predate the pandemic. NPR reviewed sex offender registry databases and records from all 50 states and the District
