Bettison: Is Minnesota’s Sex Offender Registry Helping or Hurting?

Minnesota’s Predatory Offender Registry was first passed in 1991. It was intended to assist law enforcement in quickly locating and clearing suspects in child predator and kidnapping cases. 28 years later, the registry covers 21,000+ individuals and requires registration for many more crimes, including “crimes against the person” — 27 of them. It costs over $1m to implement every year.

Stacy Bettison recently published an article in Minnesota Bench and Bar entitled “The New Scarlet Letter – Is Minnesota’s Predatory Offender Registry Helping or Hurting?” Bettison has a strong interest in criminal sexual conduct laws, how they are prosecuted, the policies behind them, and the real-life, day-to-day impact of those laws on people accused and convicted of a sex crime.

The full article is available here.

Special thanks to editor Steve Perry and Professor Eric Janus for helping me write about a complex and difficult topic.

SLB