Low-Risk Sex Offender Harassed

2-15-2010 Nebraska:

"This is just more than any person can take" A man says his neighbors have turned on him after Nebraska's state law changed. The new law requires information about all sex offenders to be made public online, not just those considered high-risk to re-offend.

A man says his neighbors have turned on him after Nebraska's state law changed. The new law requires information about all sex offenders to be made public online, not just those considered high-risk to re-offend.

Has he ever thought about suicide? “Yes, several times and I'll honest, if it wasn't for my supportive family I wouldn't be talking to you right now. This is just more than any person can take."

From the darkness of a shadow, it's easier for Jeff to talk about his past. He'll own up to a time when he traded porn with other men, but he denies that a handful of images containing child pornography found in his possession in 1997 were images he ever wanted.

“Somebody sent me some garbage. That doesn't mean I wanted the garbage. I had the garbage, yes.”

Jeff's past includes two convictions for possessing child porn, both of which he says stem from the same time in the early 1990s. Last year, he says he successfully completed 10 years of probation and doctors consider him a low risk to re-offend.

All of that is a distant memory and that's how Jeff hoped it would stay. “I completely turned my life around and now this law comes out to destroy me.”

A change in Nebraska law January 4th put Jeff's face on a Web site and it didn't take long for neighbors to notice. “I have a friendly neighbor in the neighborhood and she calls me up and says people are passing your picture around the neighborhood.”

That was just the beginning. In the 45 days since the law has changed, Jeff has come home and found threatening notes taped to his front door. The message was move or suffer.

“A couple of other ones were really vulgar, talking about what people would like to do to me, removing body parts.”

His teenage children have also found them. “There's my picture off the Internet with a message that's too vulgar to say on TV of what this person wants to do to me because I'm a pedophile in their mind and it's taped to my son's truck."

His situation sums up arguments on both sides of the debate. Some say exposing people like Jeff makes neighborhoods safer. Jeff says the law just makes it difficult to find the most dangerous and he is not one of them.

Jeff has notified the police. He does not know who made the threats and so at this point no charges have been filed. It's illegal to retaliate against individuals on the registry, their family members or employers. The law is very clear about that. Vandalism or threats are illegal and will be prosecuted. ..Source.. Justin Joseph