Many States Fall Short of Federal Sex Offender Law

Nearly three dozen states have failed to meet conditions of  The Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act including five states that have completely given up on the effort.

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- Nearly three dozen states have failed to meet conditions of a 2006 federal law that requires them to join a nationwide program to track sex offenders, including five states that have completely given up on the effort because of persistent doubts about how it works and how much it costs.  ...

The Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act, named after a boy kidnapped from a Florida mall and killed in 1981, was supposed to create a uniform system for registering and tracking sex offenders that would link all 50 states, plus U.S. territories and tribal lands. When President George W. Bush signed it into law, many states quickly realized they would have to overhaul their sex offender registration systems to comply...

California, the nation's most populous state, risked losing nearly $800,000 in funding this year...

Proponents of the law had hoped it would ease the risk that states with less-stringent registration would become havens for sex offenders.

...  "A true pedophile, if they're going to offend, they're going to offend, whether or not they live one mile or 10 miles from a school."

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