Megan's Law 10 Year Case Study

Megan's Law 10 Year Case Study

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The research that follows concerns the various impacts of community notification and registration laws (Megan’s Law) in New Jersey. Although this report includes a variety of interesting findings and many ideas that will be explored upon post grant period, this research was embarked upon, in general, to investigate: 1) the effect of Megan’s Law on the overall rate of sexual offending over time; 2) its specific deterrence effect on re-offending, including the level of general and sexual offense recidivism, the nature of sexual re-offenses, and time to first re-arrest for sexual and non-sexual re-offenses (i.e., community tenure); and 3) the costs of implementation and annual expenditures of Megan’s Law. These three primary foci were investigated using three different methodologies and samples.

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Megan's Law as a case study in Political Stasis

INTRODUCTION

Sex offender registration and community notification laws constitute a remarkable political success story.  While only a handful of state had registration law of any kind as of the late 1980's both registration and notification laws, focusing almost exclusively on convicted sex offenders, were in effect nationwide.  To students of the field, the laws--often enacted unanimously and without meaningful debate--serve as object lessons in legislative panic.  Unlike earlier panics, however, including those relative to sex offenders, the panic has not dissipated. Indeed, registration and community notification laws have endured and been significantly expanded upon during the past decade, despite research findings casting considerable doubt on their utility and public safety efficacy.