By Robert MacMillan
washingtonpost.com Staff Writer
Thursday, May 26, 2005; 9:30 AM

The Justice Department's decision to establish a nationwide sex offender database is an important move considering the grim parade of children abused and sometimes killed by registered sex offenders.

The online database will not contain a whole new list. Rather, it will connect state databases for easier searching. That solves the problem of what to do when offenders cross state lines, but does nothing to change the fact that many sex criminals simply don't register. That's a problem that no technology can fix.

The problem is gaining plenty of media attention. In a story today, The Washington Post quoted the chairman of the Virginia State Crime Commission on how the system relies on the honesty of convicted sex offenders for its effectiveness: "What has alarmed me is that the compliance rates seem to be getting worse instead of better," said state Sen. Kenneth W. Stolle (R-Virginia Beach). "The central registry is not performing at the level we would like." That story follows an article that ran in the Richmond Times-Dispatch in April reporting that the Virginia commission could not locate 41 of the 218 sex offenders living near downtown Richmond because their addresses weren't valid. Lt. T.W. Turner, who oversees the registry's day-to-day operations with 10 staff members, told the Times-Dispatch that the state requires offenders to fill out a form once a year to verify their addresses. Why? It costs less than sending out a trooper to check on the offender. At least it makes sense from a money standpoint.

It's not just a Virginia problem. Eric Flack, a reporter at NBC affiliate WAVE in Louisville, Ky., investigated the problem and discovered that many sex offenders living across the Ohio River in Indiana use false addresses: Paul Cox "was sent away for felony fondling, and was released in 1999. He's registered to a house in New Albany, but Delpha Elswick, who answered the door, knew nothing about it. ... Elswick told us he hasn't lived there for four years, and the last she heard he was living near Vidalia, Georgia."

Here's another case out of Florida: "Among the 537 offenders found in violation during the roundup, authorities arrested 203 for failing to follow registration requirements. The 334 others were registered, deported, in jail or dead."

Florida, of course, is the home to 35,000 registered sex offenders. It also is where John Couey was recently charged with the sexual assault and murder of 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford of Homosassa. He lived 150 yards from Lunsford's home, though he was supposed to be living five miles away -- according to the registry. The state also gained unwanted attention after registered offender David Onstott was charged last month with killing 13-year-old Sarah Michelle Lunde in Ruskin.

The state's Web site, the Miami Herald pointed out, lists this disclaimer: "[The Florida Department of Law Enforcement] merely compiles and provides this information for public access, and does not independently confirm the accuracy of the information compiled and provided."

This is the information, mind you, that U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales says will protect our children if it's incorporated into a national database. It will help for sure, but it cannot compensate for problems inherent in the system. Jeff Gamso, a Toledo attorney and legal director of ACLU of Ohio, summed it up for the Toledo Blade: "Compounding errors doesn't strike me as a terribly good idea."

The Justice Dept. might think the nationwide registry is a pretty cool idea, but it also recruited Miami Heat center Shaquille O'Neal to the online sex offender team, the AP reported. "The 7-foot-1, 325-pound center was recently sworn in as a U.S. deputy marshal," the AP reported. "Miami Beach Police Chief Don De Lucca says O'Neal is becoming familiar with the techniques and software the officers use to track down the predators." Shaq reportedly contacted Miami Beach police about becoming a reserve officer after being traded to the Heat. The AP says he is "a few training hours shy of being certified to make arrests, conduct search warrants and carry a .40-caliber pistol."

Where are you seeing ads for "FREE IPODS" and other gadgets? Anywhere unusual? For example, I found an ad in The Washington Post yesterday offering a free Blackberry if you spend $50 on Dockers at a local department store. Please let me know what offers you're seeing so I can share your experiences with other readers.

Want to know how much destruction a nuclear bomb can unleash on your major metropolitan area? Check out this handy-dandy map on the Federation of American Scientists's Web site. Congressional Quarterly reporter Sean Madigan wrote a little story about this macabre new way to enjoy the Web: "The map uses red, blue and yellow concentric circles to illustrate the path of the blast. The outermost yellow circle signifies the areas that would suffer 'moderate' damage caused by flying debris, whereas the middle blue circle shows areas where most homes would be destroyed and commercial buildings severely damaged. The innermost red circle represents 'intense heat from the explosion,' which would cause widespread fires." And don't forget to have a nice day.

I spent many summers as a child in Maine where, as a native of New Jersey, I was shocked to discover that people rarely locked their car doors at the mall. This led to some confusion when I was 8 years old and clambered into the wrong station wagon to take a nap while my parents were inside shopping. But that's another story.

I don't know if they lock their doors nowadays, but apparently that trusting sense is leading to trouble with Internet thieves. Here's more from the Bangor News: "One Pittsfield woman was informed she had won a large share of a $1.8 million lottery in Great Britain. 'They made it look like they randomly drew her e-mail address,' [Police Sgt. Timothy Roussin] said. Red flags should have gone up, he said, when the 'lottery officials' asked for confidentiality, asked for her bank account number and wanted $2,852 wired to an Oregon address within 48 hours. Roussin said that victim tried to cash 10 postal money orders for $850 each -- her supposed winnings -- and the local bank realized they were bogus." The article said this is a growing trend among the elderly and rural residents in Maine where people are more isolated than their counterparts elsewhere in the United States.

The head of Tennessee's $25 billion budget got stuck in an elevator for 13 hours over the weekend and couldn't use the emergency phone because someone neglected to pay the phone bill, the AP reported: "At about 4 a.m. the next morning, the cleaning crew heard Adams stirring and rescue crews finally freed him. 'It was not the way I wanted to spend a Sunday evening,' said [Jerry] Adams."

Paperless voting on electronic touch-screens raised more controversy than anyone expected last year, but what elections officials say is a more convenient way for people to cast their ballots turns out to cost more too. The Miami Herald reported that its paperless machines cost $6.6 million to operate during last November's presidential election -- twice what was budgeted.

"With a newly appointed elections supervisor set to weigh in by the end of this week on whether Miami-Dade should jettison its highly touted, $24.5 million iVotronic touch-screen system, the expenses it generates for each election -- which include programming, setting up and securing the machines and printing backup ballots -- will be a major factor in the decision," the Herald story said. "'The cost is something that we're looking at very closely,' said [county Supervisor] Lester Sola, who is expected to give his official recommendation by the end of the week. 'That, and voter confidence.'"

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