California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger ordered state officials to make the files of sex offenders available to the press and public. The order comes after a paroled sex offender was arrested for allegedly murdering a 17-year-old girl in San Diego County and the reluctant release of the parole files of the man who allegedly kidnapped a 12-year-old girl and held her for 18 years. -db
The Sacramento Bee
March 10, 2010
By Sam Stanton
The move follows the arrest of a paroled sex offender accused of killing a 17-year-old girl near San Diego last month and under investigation in the death of a 14-year-old who disappeared in the same area more than a year ago.
It also follows The Bee’s successful lawsuit last month to force corrections officials to turn over the parole records of kidnap and rape suspect Phillip Garrido.
“The current practice of not keeping information on sex offenders in California is unacceptable,” the governor said in a statement issued Tuesday. “It is in the best interest of public safety to retain all information on these individuals and to make as much information as possible available and transparent.
“I have directed my Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to end this practice and immediately begin keeping all sex offender parolee files.”
Until Tuesday, the department routinely shredded the files of parolees one year after they had been discharged from parole.
The policy dates back to 2008. Before that, the department destroyed parolee files four to six months after discharge, depending on the severity of an offender’s background. The files typically contain parole agents’ notes regarding supervision, as well as records of any violations.
The shredding policy was common knowledge within the corrections department, but came as a shock to crime victims and their advocates.
“Wait a minute. What?” asked Marc Klaas, father of 12-year-old Polly Klaas, who was killed by parolee Richard Allen Davis in Petaluma in 1993. “That’s just wrong at every level.”
Harriet Salarno, president of Crime Victims United of California, said the news left her “in a state of shock.” Like others interviewed Tuesday, she argued that every record regarding sex offendersshould be retained, given the probability that they will reoffend.
“As far as I’m concerned they shouldn’t destroy any records unless they’re dead,” said Salarno, whose daughter was slain in 1979.
Corrections officials said destruction of parole documents for other types of offenders will continue and that the practice really boils down to the space crunch posed by storing such files. There are about 110,000 parolees in California on any given day, including 9,000 sex offenders.
Corrections Secretary Matthew Cate said sex offender files now will be kept indefinitely. “I have worked closely with the governor on this issue and share his belief that files related to sex offendersbe retained for as long as possible,” Cate said. “I have directed my parole staff to immediately retain all information related to sex offenders.”
Department spokesman Oscar Hidalgo said that before files were destroyed, some information, such as parole violations and details on convictions, were entered into a central file kept for all offenders.
But that file would not necessarily contain a parole agents’ working notes or other notations, Hidalgo said.
He added that, under the new policy, information from parolee files for other types of offenders would be transferred to the central file before shredding takes place. Hidalgo also said sex offenderfiles now will be reviewed to determine what information can be made public without endangering the privacy of victims, witnesses or, in some cases required by law, the offenders themselves.
The driving force behind the policy change was the case of John Albert Gardner III, a 30-year-old registered sex offender suspected in the deaths of 17-year-old Chelsea King and 14-year-old Amber Dubois in San Diego County.
Gardner was discharged from parole Sept. 26, 2008, and after a year “his file was not retained,” Hidalgo said.
Despite that, other records existed that raised concerns about Gardner, including a 2000 probation report the San Diego Union-Tribune obtained through a court petition this week that said Gardner “manifests significant predatory traits and is a danger to the community.”
Corrections officials have said they are limited in what information they can release on a parolee, and in the Garrido case unsuccessfully fought to keep his parole records secret. Garrido, accused in the 1991 abduction of Jaycee Lee Dugard, was still on parole and would not have had his file destroyed.
Officials said they will work to release more details on offenders as a result of the governor’s directive. But some questioned how the previous policy ever made sense.
“I almost fell off my chair when I heard this,” said Assemblyman Ted Lieu, D-Torrance. “If somebody has the time to shred, they have the time to scan it into a computer.”