Title: $175,000 per offender? Get-tough sex predator 'treatment' busts state budgets - cleveland.com
Headings: $175,000 per offender? Get-tough sex predator 'treatment' busts state budgets
$175,000 per offender? Get-tough sex predator 'treatment' busts state budgets
'Lock everybody up'
No idea of the costs
Treatment only slightly lowers risk
Recommitting Dennis Linehan
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Content: The programs have created a political quandary for lawmakers who desperately need to cut spending in the midst of a recession but don't want to be seen as soft on rapists and child molesters. More about crime
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"I've heard people in a lot of the states quietly say, 'Oh, my God, I wish we'd never gotten this law,'" said W. Lawrence Fitch, a professor at the University of Maryland School of Law. " No one would ever dare offer repeal because it's just untenable." The laws target sex offenders who are considered likely to strike again. When one of them is close to finishing a prison sentence, prosecutors file a civil case to prove that person still threatens the public and needs treatment. If the court agrees, the prisoner is committed in much the same way that someone with a serious mental illness would be sent to an institution. The heavy financial burden of treating confined sex offenders has left lawmakers with less money as they make agonizing cuts to areas like education and health care. Politicians who spent years cracking down on sex crimes now struggle to pay for their tougher laws. 'Lock everybody up'
"It's easy to say, 'Lock everybody up and throw away the key,'" said State Rep. Michael Paymar, a St. Paul, Minnesota, Democrat who heads a public safety budget panel. "