Ramifications Of Employment Restrictions For People In The Sex Offender Registry


 After serving their sentence, many registered sex offenders try their best to put their lives back in order. Many of them claim that their prison term turned out to be a blessing for they were able to understand the pain and suffering they’ve inflicted on their victims, forgive themselves in the process, find faith, and completely reform. Therefore, it’s understandable why many of them go out, intending to find employment as soon as they can, because it’s often the first step to establishing a normal life.
Inasmuch as they want to have the most normal life possible, there are aspects about their past that cannot be erased; there are restrictions set upon them by the law because of the offense they had committed. These restrictions, claim lawmakers, were created not “really” to limit options, but rather to prevent them from going back to the ways they have already left behind bars — much like a preventive method.

When it comes to employment, the restriction is that a sex offender must never apply for a job that will have him interacting with children. Failure to comply will have him back behind bars for as long as two years. Examples of child-related employment that he is not allowed to apply for include the following:

- Any position in educational institutions (even gardener or janitorial positions are off-limits)
- All aspects of community services, YTC, or youth supervision units
- Paediatric wards of public hospitals
- Clubs, associations, or movements (including those of a cultural, recreational or sporting nature)
- Religious organisations (although most of these always welcome those who wish for a new start, regardless of their past)
- Baby-sitting or child-care
- Coaching or private tuition

These restrictions are for life and not just for a particular period of the reporting condition, claim authorities.

Legal professionals are debating over the various policies of the Sex Offender Registry. Many believe that the stringent conditions basically puts former sex offenders back in a “prison” where they have no freedom of choice, except that there are no physical bars around them.

The thing is, practically every employment opportunity these days will require them to interact with other people; even plumbers, garbage collectors, construction workers will at one point or another have to deal with women and children. So should they just live as hermits and live off the people they have in their lives, because even if they want to earn money and be self-sufficient to create a brand new start, the SORA prevents them from doing so? Behavioural experts state that with limited “legal” employment opportunities, many of these former offenders will likely explore “unconventional” and “unsafe” means of earning a living or will be reduced to welfare cases who burden the government.
If the government truly wants to push for positive change in the lives of these individuals, the SORA remains a questionable method of doing so because, for the time being, it’s a persistent reminder that there’s no way for these people to break away from their past.

About the author: Calvin John Mcphee is an educational consultant and a part-time writer. He reads many books relating to laws and even visits sites like http://www.criminal-lawyers.com.au/criminal-law/offences/failing-comply-with-reporting-conditions-sex-offender-registry. He shares what he learned through writing and sharing articles.

2 comments:

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