The government on Thursday tabled in Parliament a number of amendment Bills, one of which, once passed into law, would allow the police to “supervise” persons convicted of sex crimes and kidnapping. According to the explanatory memorandum on Prevention of Crimes (Amendment) Bill the police supervision of sex offences convicts would be in addition to any sentence handed down by the court on conviction. The expectation is that this Bill as well as several others read for the first time on Thursday would be debated ahead of the Parliament’s annual two-month recess, which runs from August to October.
Quite possibly then, unless there are major objections to it, the Prevention of Crimes (Amendment) Bill should be ready to be made law very shortly. It has not yet been made clear exactly how the police supervision of sex crimes offenders would be carried out. But one supposes that it might take a similar form to the current monitoring of certain deportees. While this is highly desirable, as one supposes that the knowledge that the police are dogging their footsteps could be a deterrent to perpetrators of certain sex crimes, it will not work in all cases, particularly among paedophiles.
Paedophilia involves sexual attraction towards children and is usually a male phenomenon; it only very rarely involves females. It is characterised by recurrent intense sexual-arousing fantasies, sexual urges, or behaviours involving sexual activity with a prepubescent child or children. It is a mental disease. Research has shown that it tends to run in families – men who are paedophiles were more often than not sexually molested as children. Some psychiatrists even believe that there is genetic predisposition in paedophilia and that it could be caused by abnormal brain chemistry.
Because paedophilia is a mental illness for which there is no cure, supervision of such persons could prove to be onerous, especially given the already stretched resources of the Guyana Police Force and its current record in tackling crime.
Treatment with drugs indicated for use among the mentally ill, while difficult to enforce, is also necessary in controlling paedophilia. The law, therefore, must also allow for collaboration between the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Ministry of Health with regard to this. It should be legally mandated that persons convicted of sexually molesting children see a mental health practitioner and be placed on a treatment regimen, which should begin while they are serving their sentence. This could also be part of their rehabilitation for re-entry to society as they would become used to taking the treatment and might be more encouraged to continue once they would have left prison.
While the rate of success of these drugs in curbing this behaviour is not known, evidence suggests that like drug addicts, paedophiles are prone to “falling off the wagon.” It might therefore be useful to also legally provide for collaboration with the Probation and Welfare Department, specifically to allow for paedophiles to be visited at home by social workers/welfare officers as part of their supervision.
In the United States, sexual predators are placed on a database that is available online. Once someone is convicted of a sex crime, the Federal Bureau of Investigations registers that person by inputting his/her name, current photograph, last known address and date of parole or end of sentence in the database. There is a national database as well as state listings. Sex offenders are required to inform the authorities of any change of address so that this information can be updated. Failure to do so can result in charges being filed against that person.
Anyone in the US who wants to know whether there are registered sex offenders living in their neighbourhood only needs to enter their zip code number in the search box provided on the website and the information is available in about ten seconds. This allows parents to be on the alert.
However, it is not meant to allow them to feel safe if the search turns up no results, since this would only mean that there are no ‘registered’ sex offenders in the area, not that there aren’t any at all.
The technology is available here, which means that a national database of sex offenders, which is accessible online, should not be beyond our reach. What is needed is forward thinking that would allow for these measures to be put in place in order for them to be activated as soon as the law receives presidential assent or very shortly after.
