Tag: Minnesota

MN: Locked Up For Good—Or Forgotten?

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Source: minnesotamonthly.com 4/19/21 Minnesota has the highest per-capita commitment rate of sex offenders nationwide, and one of the lowest release rates The Minnesota Sex Offender Program housed at Moose Lake is tucked away in the woods, off State Highway 73, about 120 miles north of Minneapolis. The high-security facility surrounded by fences topped with razor wire is out of sight and out of mind for most Minnesotans, which leads those locked inside—some who already have served time and others who haven’t even been charged of a crime—to call it a…

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MN: Group pushes to take children off Minnesota’s Predatory Offender Registry

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Source: msn.com 3/5/22 MINNEAPOLIS — Patty Wetterling just wanted the person who kidnapped her son to be caught. She never imagined her pursuit would lead to the creation of a list of more than 18,000 predatory offenders in Minnesota that could include children as young as 10 years old. “It was never intended to have 10-year-olds on the sex offender registry,” said Wetterling, whose son Jacob was abducted and murdered in 1989 when he was 11. “It would be laughable if it wasn’t so devastating.” Wetterling was one of more…

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MN: Long Weekend Protest Rocks Minnesota’s Shadow Prisons

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Source: texansagainstcivilcommitment.com 8/29/21 MOOSE LAKE MN. Behind barbed wire fences a protest movement is swelling for an end to Minnesota’s Shadow Prisons, “treatment facilities” that detainees say are an unconstitutional death sentence. Nearly 800 people are held indefinitely outside of any criminal proceedings, after finishing prison sentences or without being convicted of a crime on civil allegations of being “mental ill” and “sexually dangerous”. Since Friday, and culminating in a protest led by detainees in walkers and wheelchairs this Monday, over a hundred detainees across racial lines have staged four…

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MN: Psychologist at Minnesota sex offender program charged with sexually assaulting two clients

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[startribune.com – 4/23/21] The psychologist, Michelle D. _______, 38, of Duluth, was charged with two counts of third-degree criminal sexual conduct involving the men, who were undergoing treatment for sexual offenses. A warrant covering Minnesota and its border states has been issued for her arrest. The assaults occurred between 2016 and early 2018 on the campus of the state’s secure treatment facility in Moose Lake, including in rooms where clients undergo psychological assessments and polygraph tests, according to a criminal complaint filed Wednesday in Carlton County District Court. The charges…

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MN: Minnesota House committee hears sex offender program’s request for funding

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[msn.com – 4/6/21] The Minnesota House Capital Investment Committee learned more Tuesday about the proposed $17.8 million contained in Gov. Tim Walz’s bonding request for the Minnesota Sex Offender Program in St. Peter. The funding would renovate two buildings on the program’s campus, adding 30 beds to Community Preparation Services, as well as provide more programming and administrative space. Clients transferred to CPS continue treatment in a less restrictive setting that prepares them to integrate back into the community. Right now, all 89 beds at CPS are full, with about…

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MN: Apple Valley settles lawsuit over sex offender residency

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[hometownsource.com – 4/1/21] The city of Apple Valley has agreed to settle a class action federal lawsuit filed in 2020 that challenges the constitutionality of a 2017 city ordinance that limits where some sex offenders can live in the community. The Apple Valley City Council, without discussion, approved a settlement agreement as part of the consent agenda during its March 25 meeting. According to the agreement, one payment of $70,000 will be made to “resolve all claims for damages, fees and costs.” Of that total, two plaintiffs will reach receive…

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MN: What last week’s Supreme Court ruling actually said — and didn’t say — about sexual assault and drinking in Minnesota

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[minnpost.com – 4/1/21] A 20-year-old woman was standing outside a Dinkytown bar in May 2017 when a man, along with his male cousin and another male friend, invited her and her friend to a party. They agreed, and the man drove them to a house. But when they arrived, there was no party. After arriving at the house, the woman — who had been denied entrance from the bar earlier for being overly intoxicated — passed out on a couch. She later woke up to the man, Francois Monulu Khalil,…

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MN: Upcoming sex offense bills

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[leg.mn.gov] Minnesota State Legislature bill search by “Crimes and Criminals-Sexual Offenses” The following is a partial list of proposed bills / laws regarding sex offenses that could possibly be up for a vote this legislative session. Use the link above to do a current search. 1. SF1730 / No HR introduced – Sex trafficking of a child added to the definition of “Substantial Child Endangerment” 2. SF1466 / HF409 – Terminating parental rights of the perpetrator for any child conceived due to the commission of a sexual conduct crime. This…

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MN: Case challenging constitutionality of the Minnesota Sex Offender Program can move forward

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[yahoo.com – 2/24/21] A protracted case challenging the constitutionality of Minnesota’s system for treating sex offenders outside prison has gained new life after a federal appeals court in St. Louis ruled that claims contesting the program’s unusual conditions of confinement can move forward. In a decision released Wednesday, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit determined that allegations that clients of the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP) were subjected to improper punishment and inadequate treatment should proceed. The decision sets the stage for another…

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MN: Civil Commitment of Sex Offenders Pretends Prisoners Are Patients

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[reason.com – 2/10/21] The practice evades constitutional constraints by casting punishment and preventive detention as treatment. Jacob Sullum | 2.10.2021 12:01 AM “It was my understanding that I was to do the treatment, then be released,” says Mike Whipple, who recently participated in a 14-day hunger strike at the Minnesota Sex Offender Program’s facility in Moose Lake. “Twelve years later, I’m still here, doing the same thing, over and over and over.” So far the civil commitment program has incarcerated Whipple three times longer than the prison sentence he served.…

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MN: Sex offenders at Moose Lake end 14-day hunger strike after reaching deal with state officials

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[bringmethenews.com – 2/5/21] A group of men at the Minnesota Sex Offender Program’s Moose Lake facility have ended their hunger strike after nearly two weeks. The group went on strike Jan. 21, demanding a “clear path” for release from the program, which has facilities in Moose Lake and St. Peter, where “treatment is a death sentence” because despite serving their prison sentences, they’re remanded to the facilities for an unspecified amount of time, a news release says. The group of about a dozen men called off their hunger strike Wednesday…

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MN: Sex offenders at Moose Lake protest harsh conditions after deaths from COVID-19

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[startribune.com – 1/18/21] Outbreak fuels long-simmering tensions over civil commitment after sentences. A group of sex offenders at a northern Minnesota treatment center is refusing to attend therapy sessions, while others are wearing black clothing as a show of solidarity, amid growing unrest after three men housed there died and scores more were sickened by the novel coronavirus. The acts of defiance were organized to call attention to what offenders see as poor infection-control practices and the historically low rate of release from the state’s prisonlike treatment centers in Moose…

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MN: Third COVID death at Moose Lake sex offender facility

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A client housed in a Minnesota sex offender treatment facility has died from COVID-19, state officials said Monday. Friday’s death at the Moose Lake facility is the third COVID-related fatality in the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP) since the pandemic surfaced early last year in Minnesota. “We mourn his passing and extend our deepest sympathy to those who loved him and called him friend,” according to a statement from Human Services Commissioner Jodi Harpstead, whose agency runs the program. “The toll the pandemic continues to take in human lives is…

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MN: Minnesota sex offenders sue over residency restrictions in Apple Valley

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[startribune.com – 2/13/20] A group of convicted sex offenders has filed a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of a far-reaching ordinance in Apple Valley that severely restricts where they can live, alleging that the ordinance effectively bars them from living anywhere in the city. In a federal class action lawsuit filed Wednesday, three sex offenders seek an injunction preventing the city of Apple Valley from enforcing the ordinance, which prohibits people convicted of certain sex offenses from living within 1,500 feet of schools, parks, playgrounds, churches and child care centers.…

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MN: What’s the Deal with Hibbing’s Sex Offender Population

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HIBBING — ”Why are so many sexual offenders moving here?” If you think there is a compounding number of registered sex offenders moving to Hibbing, you’re not alone. There is a common pattern that emerges each time law enforcement notifies the public that a person with a level 3 sexual offense is relocating to the city: concerned community members share online posts to raise awareness and comment, wanting to know why “so many” are coming here. Others wonder aloud if the city or police department somehow benefit. After all, it…

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

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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 Hurting or Hurting?” Bettison has a strong interest…

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MN: Judge strikes down city ordinance restricting sex offender housing

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[startribune.com – 12/18/18] A Hennepin County judge has struck down an ordinance in Dayton, Minn. that restricts where sex offenders can live in the community, saying the measure is trumped by state law. The far-reaching ordinance barred convicted sex offenders from living within 2,000 feet of any school, day care provider, park, playground or public bus stop — even a pumpkin patch or apple orchard — within the city of Dayton, a rural community of about 5,000 residents northwest of the Twin Cities. The measure was hastily passed by the…

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