Midwest SAFE Summit Works to Tighten the Net Around Sex Offenders

MADISON… Wisconsin and other Midwest states are tightening the net around sex offenders who move in and out of their states as a result of the first-ever Midwest Sex Offender Apprehension and Felony Enforcement (SAFE) Summit held in Madison this week. Earlier this year, Governor Jim Doyle directed the Department of Corrections to hold a regional summit as part of the Governor’s ongoing SAFE Initiative.

The Midwest SAFE Summit was an opportunity for state law enforcement entities, state Departments of Corrections, and other representatives from Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, and Michigan to meet to share ideas and best practices on effective sex offender tracking and registry management, as well as strategies for location and apprehension of noncompliant sex offenders.

“As the agencies and law enforcement entities charged with management and oversight of state sex offender registries, we are always looking for ways to improve our registries, reduce noncompliance, and make our communities safer,” Wisconsin Department of Corrections Secretary Matt Frank said. “As partners in this ongoing effort to keep our children and communities safe from sex offenders, our five states have agreed to a series of steps that will help promote greater accountability for sex offenders who move among our states and will ultimately promote greater public safety for all of our citizens.”

It is first and foremost the responsibility of the sex offender registrant to keep his or her information up to date and to know the laws of the state in which he or she is living, working, or attending school. However, each state currently has a process in place for notifying other states when registrants are moving from one state to another, though the method and means of this notification differ from state to state.

States participating in the SAFE Summit agreed to improve information sharing by ensuring that all information on sex offenders moving across state lines is forwarded to a single point of contact with the state agency responsible for operating the sex offender registry. Participants also agreed to share with each other a uniform minimum amount of information about each registrant when a registrant moves from one state to the next. These processes will ensure that states will have prompt information about who is moving into their area, and agencies operating the sex offender registries can ensure that those individuals are properly registered.

The SAFE Summit states agreed to provide on a monthly basis a full listing of all sex offender registrants who have moved between the states, who are working or attending school in one of the SAFE Summit states, and the compliance status of those registrants. The states are working to make this information available to each other beginning July 1, 2006. These updates will allow each state to match the information collected by one state against information collected in their own registry on a regular basis to ensure that those sex offenders who have moved are properly registered, to promptly identify and investigate any instances of noncompliance, and to pursue prosecution where noncompliance is identified.

The Midwest SAFE Summit is the first step in a new interstate public safety partnership launched by Governor Doyle this year. In addition to the improved information sharing and the new partnerships that have been developed, the SAFE Summit participants agreed to continue the collaborative work through at least annual meetings, with the goal of expanding the participants to include other states. The next meeting will be held in Spring 2007 in Springfield, Illinois.

“The steps we have identified through the SAFE Summit will help us ensure that we are sharing the best information on who is living, working, and going to school in our states, and help us to better protect communities by preventing sex offenders from going undetected when they cross our borders,” Secretary Frank said. “We look forward to continuing this work with our fellow Midwestern states in the future, and expanding this grassroots movement to include other states.”

Governor Doyle’s SAFE Initiative involves state, local, and federal law enforcement partners in a series of innovative strategies focused on keeping kids safe by holding sex offenders accountable for their actions, preventing them from becoming anonymous in our communities, and apprehending and prosecuting those sex offenders who fail to notify authorities of their whereabouts, as required by law. As part of the SAFE Initiative, teams of retired law enforcement officers at the Office of Justice Assistance and Department of Corrections sex offender registry specialists are tracking down noncompliant registrants, securing warrants for their arrest, and bringing them to the attention local law enforcement.

To date, the SAFE Teams have tracked down 587 noncompliant registrants, and Wisconsin’s compliance rate has increased six percent – from 82% to 88% - in the past year. As a result of these and other efforts, Wisconsin was one of two states awarded a grade of A or higher by the national children’s advocacy group Parent’s for Megan’s Law.

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