Sex Offenders Pose Dilemma; Readers’ Viewpoints Wanted

Tue., May 2, 1995

Doug Floyd Interactive Editor

If you think putting a sex offender behind bars for a few years affords a good opportunity to reform him, think again.

A recent study by the Washington state Institute for Public Policy says the treatment program now in place for inmates convicted of sex crimes makes no appreciable difference in their cure rates.

Disappointing findings, those, but they didn’t stop state Corrections Director Chase Riveland from criticizing legislative budget negotiators who want to eliminate the program. Premature and unwise, Riveland maintains.

However, by eliminating the program at Twin Rivers Corrections Center at Monroe, the Legislature will save an estimated $814,000 in the coming two years. About 200 of the 2,400 sex criminals locked up in Washington’s prisons are affected.

This story raises two questions for readers to ponder: Do we merely warehouse sex offenders, then turn them out on the streets without having done everything we could think of to correct their behavior? Or do we continue spending money on a treatment plan - even when we have evidence that it’s ineffective?

Please share your thoughts by noon Wednesday for inclusion in Thursday’s “Bagpipes” column.

Put a trigger lock on Liddy, or let him blast away?

G. Gordon Liddy’s intemperate remarks on national talk radio have him in the middle of a boiling controversy - probably just where he wants to be.

Liddy has offered his listeners tips on how to shoot federal officers. Such comments do not sit well with President Clinton and other critics of the talk-radio medium, especially in the wake of the Oklahoma City bombing, but Liddy’s followers have risen to his defense.

Radio station KGA, which carries Liddy’s show in Spokane, has no plans to drop him.

A fundamental dilemma arises from this dispute.

How much protection does inflammatory rhetoric enjoy in the spirit of freedom of expression? Where is the boundary that separates a criminal act from the belief that kindled it?

And what blame, if any, belongs not to the criminal but to whoever planted incendiary ideas in the criminal’s mind?

To contribute your outlook, call or send a fax or e-mail by noon Wednesday. The information below explains how.

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