The state's Council on Sexual Victims and Offenders has told lawmakers it cannot recommend civil commitment in psychiatric wards for the most dangerous of sexual predators.
So what can be done with sexual predators who, sometimes by their own admission, can't and won't stop molesting when they finish their prison sentences?
"Our concern is that we don't even know at the time of sentencing just how serious a predator they are," Rep. Loraine Pace, R-Logan, said Wednesday at a meeting of the Legislature's Judiciary Interim Committee. "Say they get a five-year sentence, and we learn while they're in prison just how serious their problem is."
Seventeen other states have adopted civil commitment as a way to keep predators under lock and key after their prison terms expire. After serving their criminal sentences, the ex-cons are re-evaluated, retried in a civil court, and if found to be a continuing danger to society can be sent to psychiatric wards for undetermined civil internment periods — perhaps for life.
But the council told lawmakers they see a limited role, if any, for civil commitment in Utah.
"For one thing, there are difficulties with putting (sexual predators) in facilities for the mentally ill, certainly a very vulnerable population," Pace said.
Then there's the question of expense. Civil commitment can cost up to five times as much as criminal incarceration.
"When we first met together, we thought (civil commitment) would be one of our top recommendations," Pace told fellow lawmakers. "What do we do with people who have a mental abnormality that makes them untreatable?"
The council quoted the Salt Lake Office of Guardian Ad Litem statistics that estimate one in three girls and one in five boys in Utah will be sexually abused before the age of 18. The National Crime Victim Survey sponsored by the U.S. Department of Justice reported that rape and sexual assault were the only violent crimes that increased in incidence in 1999.
Pace said the committee believes a more comprehensive approach to sexually violent predators is desperately needed.
The council's report said the vast majority of criminal convictions, about 80 percent, result from plea negotiations. A maximum sentence is generally determined long before the judge or Board of Pardons and Parole determines the sentence.
"It is therefore imperative that prosecutors have the best possible information and evidence when the majority of these cases are actually determined, at the early stages of the justice system, during the plea negotiation stage," the report said.
Pace also said there needs to be special attention paid to sex offenders in the juvenile system.
"And we need to develop a better partnership with mental-health professional across the board," she said.
Around the country, more prosecutors and mental-health experts are using psychological evaluations to determine who are the most dangerous sex offenders during plea negotiations, according to the council's report.
"The critical need to do this is only highlighted given Utah's indeterminate sentencing system, which has a number of lifetime maximum possibilities, several of which are specifically intended for plea negotiation purposes," the report said.
The council also recommended more funding for post-incarceration programs and treatment.
The Council on Sexual Victims and Offenders was created by the 1999 Legislature. It's made up of lawmakers, a judge, members of law enforcement and corrections agencies, ecclesiastical leaders, victim advocates, mental-health representatives, a victim of a sexual offense and a sexual offender.
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