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Thursday, October 08, 2009
Ind. Law - "Jeff Council takes steps to revise sex offender ordinance"
The Louisville Courier Journal has this story today by Chris Quay:
The Jeffersonville City Council took preliminary steps on Wednesday night to revise the city's sex offender ordinance in order to allow those who are not currently required by state law to be on a registry of offenders to be admitted to city property and parks.David A. Mann of the Jeffersonville News & Tribune has this report:The new ordinance passed its first reading unanimously without opposition, and will now have to pass a second before the council votes on whether to approve it.
Under the old ordinance, offenders who were not required to be on a state sex offender registry had to get permission for access to public property owned by the city, including parks.
With revised ordinance, that will no longer be the case.
“The major difference is there is no appeal process” said council member Keith Fetz, who proposed the ordinance in 2006
He also said the ordinance will change the way it defines sex offenders: Only individuals required by Indiana law, or any other state's law, to register will be deemed a sex offender.
Eliminating the exemptions was prompted by an Indiana Court of Appeals decision in June that said Jeffersonville used the ordinance unconstitutionally in the case of Eric Dowdell, a Clarksville man who wanted to watch his son play baseball in the city's Little League Park.
Dowdell was convicted of sexual battery in 1996 and sentenced to three years in prison, with two years of the sentence suspended. His requirement to register as a sex offender expired in 2006.
The city was given 30 days to ask the Court of Appeals to reconsider its decision or ask the Indiana Supreme Court to review the case.
Attorney Larry Wilder — who represented Jeffersonville in the Dowdell case — filed a petition in July with the Court of Appeals to have the case transferred for review by the Indiana Supreme Court, but he said the transfer was denied.
The Supreme Court does not have to give a reason why it denies review of cases, he said.
Though Dowdell's requirement to register as a sex offender expired in 2006, appeals to the city in 2007 and 2008 to be able to attend his son's games were denied, once because he didn't have proper documents and another time when he admitted to facing other charges after his 1996 conviction.
Ken Falk — legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union and Dowdell's lawyer — said in June the city council should repeal the ordinance.
He said he still sees it as an infringement on an individual's rights, despite the changes being made.
“I still contend that a blanket prohibition is unconstitutional,” Falk said Wednesday. But he said he is pleased that his client “now has the same rights as everyone else.”
Fetz said he proposed the ordinance to protect the public, but included the exemption provision because he felt some sex offenders who were rehabilitated might not pose much of a threat.
“We wanted to have that (exemption) available, but the court is telling us it's all or none,” Fetz said.
Following more than a year of legal challenges and appeals, the Jeffersonville City Council on Wednesday updated an ordinance that bans sex offenders from entering city parks.Here are earlier ILB entries on the Jeffersonville ordinance.The update bans only those offenders currently required to register. And it removes an exemption process that had been labeled overly burdensome by the Indiana Court of Appeals.
The sex offender ordinance was first introduced in Jeffersonville in 2006, explained attorney Larry Wilder, who wrote and defended the ordinance.
Since its passage, he said, “the evolution of legislation finds itself being dictated … mandated by the courts.”
Eric Dowdell, a local resident who was convicted of sexual battery of a 13-year-old girl in 1996, applied for an exemption to the city’s ordinance so he could watch his son play Little League baseball.
He was initially denied. He challenged the denial with the help of the Indiana branch of the American Civil Liberties Union.
In June, the Court of Appeals ruled the ordinance was unconstitutional as it applies to Dowdell because he’d serve his sentence and completed his requirement to register on the sex offender list prior to ordinance’s passage.
Wilder explained that the Court of Appeals ruling — along with a few other, similar and related decisions — changed the law.
“It became clear and apparent that you as a city … need to make a decision one way or another,” he said.
The ordinance was passed unanimously by the council on only its first reading. It will still require two additional votes before becoming law. As it does, the council will have to repeal its old ordinance. It’ll also have to re-notify the county’s sex offenders of the change.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on October 8, 2009 09:28 AM
Posted to Ind. App.Ct. Decisions | Indiana Government | Indiana Law