Blunt calls sex-offender ruling an ‘outrage’

By Jedd Rosche

Published Feb. 22, 2008

Gov. Matt Blunt has called a Tuesday ruling from the Missouri Supreme Court regarding sex offenders an “outrage.”

The ruling concerned a 2006 law that states sex offenders cannot live within 1,000 feet of a school or child care facility. It stated sex offenders can continue to live in those areas if they were living there before 2006.

Blunt reaffirmed his “aggressive steps” to strengthen laws against sex offenders and that he disagrees with the court’s decision.

“Every decent society should be judged by how it treats its most vulnerable citizens, and it is an outrage that our state’s highest court has ruled in favor of sex offenders who want to continue living near schools and child care facilities,” Blunt said in the release.

Blunt ended by calling on state legislators to pass laws that allow the death penalty for convicted child rapists.

Neither Blunt nor a spokesman were available for comment on Thursday.

Judge Richard Teitelman handed down the unanimous decision.

Beth Riggert, communications counsel for the Missouri Supreme Court, said the ruling showed how this law violated the state’s constitutional prohibition against retrospective laws.

“You can’t go back in time and attach a new restriction on something that happened before the new law took effect,” Riggert said.

According to court documents, the case concerned a St. Louis man who pleaded guilty to attempted enticement of a child in December 2005. He registered as a sex offender and received five years of probation, three of those on a suspended sentence.

In June 2006, a new statute made it a felony for any registered sex offender to live within 1,000 feet of a child care facility or school. Since the offender had lived in his residence since 1997, his counsel argued in circuit court that it was unfair to make him move, who ruled in his favor. The Missouri Department of Corrections appealed the case to the Missouri Supreme Court.