Sex Predator Law’s Backers Are Relieved Supporters Are Surprised Law Was Upheld, Had Feared Consequences Of Freeing Inmates
Backers of Washington’s landmark law to indefinitely confine the state’s most incorrigible sex offenders said they were surprised but relieved that such laws survived a U.S. Supreme Court test.
“I’m dumbfounded, really,” said House Minority Leader Marlin Appelwick, a Seattle lawyer who played a big role in writing the nation’s first such law in 1990.
“I hope Washingtonians see this as the legal system working to make sure they’re protected,” said Attorney General Christine Gregoire, whose lawyers successfully defended the law all the way to the nation’s highest court.
Appelwick and Gregoire spoke minutes after the Supreme Court ruled that Kansas and five other states, including Washington, could keep violent sexual predators locked up after they serve their prison sentences even if they are not mentally ill.
Currently, 50 men and one woman are confined under Washington’s law. Had the court ruled the other way, all might have been released, triggering a legal and public relations nightmare. Gov. Gary Locke and the Legislature were gearing up for a possible special session to search for other ways to confine dangerous sex predators who had served their criminal sentences.
Ruling 5-4 in the case of an admitted pedophile from Kansas, the justices said such people can be held if they are considered mentally abnormal and are likely to commit new crimes.
Such confinement - intended to protect society - does not violate the constitutional right to due process and is not double punishment for the same crime, the court said. Justice Clarence Thomas’ opinion was joined by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices Sandra Day O’Connor, Antonin Scalia and Anthony M. Kennedy.
xxxx AREA OFFENDERS These Spokane and Whitman county offenders are in custody under the 1990 state law that allows indefinite confinement of people with a history of serious and violent sex offenses: Committed to the Special Commitment Center at Monroe: Franklin T. Sperrazzo, 27, Spokane County. Record: attempted rape, assault, statutory rape, indecent liberties.
Inmates under evaluation at the center: Mark F. Broer, 38, Whitman County. Record: attempted rape, sexual assault, reckless endangerment, disorderly conduct, first-degree rape. Herman Paschke, 49, Spokane County. Record: first-degree rape, abduction/ carnal knowledge, parole violation.
Awaiting transfer from jail to center for evaluation: Robin Albrecht, 49, Spokane County. Record: sexual liberties, child molestation.