A 17-year old high school student from Walnut Creek, an affluent San Francisco/Oakland suburb, was arrested for harassing several local sex offenders he found on the public registry and shooting at them with his BB gun. Later investigation showed that he was also dealing drugs to his fellow students, and one girl was hospitalized after ingesting the drugs that had unknowingly been put in her food. It is unclear whether the boy had himself ever been molested or whether he will be charged by the district attorney, due to confidentiality protections the youth is accorded as a minor.
In a similar story, the family of a Tennessee teen posted a Go Fund Me page to raise $30,000 for his defense after he was charged with the murder of a local sex offender. The teen had reportedly boasted of the murder to another student and confessed to police. Complaints led to the page being removed, as it violated Go Fund Me’s policy of not allowing fund-raising on behalf of those charged with felonies.
As long as states continue to maintain online sex offender registries, they invite self-styled vigilantes and disturbed teens to demonize this class as irredeemably evil and thus legitimate targets for unleashing violent tendencies. We hear of too many cases where these murders are under-prosecuted and even celebrated.
