“There’s No Murderer’s List”: Perceptions of Fairness and Equity Related to Sex Offender Management Policies

• In Event: Algorithmic Failures, Fairness, and Sex Offense Policy Implications

Abstract

Sex offender registration and notification (SORN) laws impose a degree of surveillance and control on people required to register (PRR), that far exceeds the level of restriction faced by other individuals with criminal records. This punitive paradigm and set of policies have been repeatedly shown to lack public safety benefits, while imposing significantly destabilizing material and psychosocial collateral consequences on PRR. However, these laws have been largely immune from broader criminal legal reform discourse. This study uses 45 qualitative semi-structured interviews with PRR and 20 interviews with professional stakeholders in Philadelphia to explore perspectives of fairness and equity related to SORN policies. Participants described SORN’s devastating material, social, and emotional impacts on PRR. They discussed how these impacts, and the multilevel barriers that PRR faced, were distinct from those facing other people leaving prison. Participants articulated this elevated degree of restriction as seemingly arbitrary and unfair, and many questioned why PRR were subject to such an elevated degree of restriction. Many participants recounted instances where the restrictiveness of SORN policies were counterproductive to rehabilitative goals, challenging the logic of SORN related policies. Finally, PRR and stakeholders discussed ideas for addressing the challenges posed by SORN, and suggested policy alternatives.

Author

• Ruth Shefner, Thomas Jefferson University College of Population Health