Woodbridge, Virginia (CNN) -- The police photograph is chilling. In grainy black and white tones, it shows 13-year-old Martin Andrews sitting in a makeshift box, his leg chained. The look in his eyes is one of fear, fatigue and disbelief. He had just been rescued from a nightmare. 

"I was abducted by a sexually violent predator by the name of Richard Ausley, who had been twice convicted for sexually assaulting young boys, and he had taken me for eight days," Andrews recalled of his ordeal 37 years ago this month. "I was left to die." 

As a survivor of a sex crime, Andrews is one face of an issue the Supreme Court will revisit Tuesday: civil commitment, which allows the government to keep sex offenders in custody even after they have served their sentences. Twenty states have such laws, including Virginia, where Andrews was held captive and repeatedly assaulted. 

CNN normally doesn't name victims of sex crimes, but Andrews, now a victims' advocate, agreed to tell his story. 

On the other side of the debate is the first sex offender released from Virginia's civil commitment program, and one of just a handful nationwide. 

"I served my time for what I did, and I didn't feel like I should be incarcerated again," said this man, who asked that his identity not be revealed for fear of retribution. "It was a scary thing to know that you could be committed to a mental institution for the rest of your life." 

The man said mandatory therapy helped him, but he thinks that could have been initiated while he was in prison. 
What did the police photograph show?
Martin Andrews sitting in a makeshift box, his leg chained.