Sex offender changes

In between all the usual stuff, I have been working the past few days to get everything in our applications updated to reflect the changes in the Nebraska Sex Offender Registration Act that went into effect on January 1, 2010. Deb Moffitt and her colleagues in the Crime Analysis Unit have been working on this, too. The changes are needed so that our Threshold Alerts, our internal mapping applications, and the Omega Dashboard all work properly.

The previous law, in effect since 1997, established three categories based on a risk assessment developed by psychologists: Level 1 offenders were deemed at low risk to reoffend, Level 2 at moderate risk, and Level 3 at high risk. Who was privy to the Registry information depended on the offender’s risk level. Information on Level 1 offenders was only available to law enforcement, Level 2 information to law enforcement and child-serving organizations, and Level 3 information to the general public.

This has all changed. The risk assessment is no more, and the information on all registered sex offenders is now available to the general public on the State Patrol’s sex offender registry web site. There is, however, a new statutory scheme by which sex offenders are differentiated based on the nature of the offense. Sex offenders who have been convicted of misdemeanor offenses must register for 15 years, felony offenses for 25 years, and those who have committed aggravated offenses are subject to lifetime registration. This new scheme, however, does not translate from the old Level 1-3 risk levels.

Lincoln (and several other cities in Nebraska) had a residency restriction law that relied on the old definitions in state law, and this had to change. The restriction now applies to “sexual predators”—those convicted of aggravated offenses and whose victim was under the age of 18. Since the definitions have changed, the list of who is subject to the residency restriction is considerably different, although there is a lot of overlap, too. It appears that a total of 158 offenders have flip-flopped on their status relative to Lincoln’s residency restriction. Here’s the data on who is subject to the City ordinance:

• 238 Then


• 224 Now


• 86 Then, but not now


• 72 Now, but not then


• 152 Both then and now

Under the old law, 238 sex offenders were covered by Lincoln’s residency restriction, which prohibits them from living within 500 feet of a school. Under the new law, there are 224 offenders subject to the restriction. They are not, however, all the same people. There are 86 offenders who were subject to the restriction before January 1, 2010, but who now are no longer restricted. There are 72 offenders who were not previously restricted, but under the new law cannot take up residence within 500 feet of a school.

Since the residency restrictions cannot be enforced retroactively against those who were previously unrestricted, these 72 newbies will only be affected prospectively, as they move to a new address after the effective date of the City ordinance update: January 1, 2010.

There are 546 registered sex offenders in Lincoln. Of those, 118 are incarcerated in State and County correctional institutions, while the remainder are scattered about the City.