Dutch Mayors Press for Right to Bar Sex Offenders From Their Cities

Released from jail after spending half a lifetime behind bars, the convicted child molester thought he was finally free. Then his new neighbors found out about his dark past--and his home became another prison.

Furious that the former sex offender had moved into the low-income neighborhood, they broke the windows of his house and smashed furniture, terrorizing him into living like a virtual hermit for weeks behind barricaded doors and windows. In the end, the Amsterdam housing authority was forced to relocate him.

Hoping to head off such vigilantism, Dutch mayors are pressing for the right to be told when child rapists are freed from prison and for the authority to bar some ex-convicts from their cities.

Unlike in the United States, where laws are common requiring the public to be notified when a molester lives nearby, the mayors are seeking only for officials to receive such information.

But in privacy-conscious Holland, where even criminals enjoy a measure of anonymity, the proposal has ignited debate over how much people are entitled to know about the man or woman next door.

“Victims often ask for removal of perpetrators from their surroundings, and in principle we support the measure. But there are dangerous side effects, especially with regard to privacy,” said Rineke Cordes of the Amsterdam Victims Aid Bureau.

“We believe that if a mayor gets the information, it will leak. Convicts also have a right to start their lives anew.”

The nation’s mayors, who are responsible for maintaining law and order, say barring freed sex criminals may be the only way to keep citizens from resorting to vigilante violence.

Just recently:

* Locals in the Delfshaven district of Rotterdam put up hundreds of posters warning about a blond woman, who supposedly preyed on children, returning to the neighborhood after a jail stint. Dozens of blondes complained that the vague nature of the campaign made them all suspect.

* Residents in the northern town of Bolsward collected 250 signatures to protest a decision to house a man suspected of having molested two boys in a neighborhood still suffering from an extended child-rape case five years ago. The suspect, whose alleged crimes were committed in a nearby village, lives next door to one of the 10 victims of the 1994 case.

* Officials in Urk, a close-knit, religious fishing village, gave in after weeks of sometimes violent agitation by youths against a suspected pedophile and moved him to a nearby city.

“When an ex-convict suddenly appears in a neighborhood, the whole community becomes agitated,” said Henk Zomerdijk, mayor of a small town where residents violently ran out a returning child molester last year. “Panic sets in, and the situation becomes uncontrollable.”

A national mayoral commission led by Zomerdijk recommended that prisons and psychiatric institutions warn mayors and social workers about inmates’ impending release. That way, the panel said, local officials could find former convicts suitable places to live and prepare their communities.

Although the commission said cities should play a role in helping convicts reintegrate into society, it cautioned that some people simply shouldn’t be allowed to return to their old neighborhoods.

“We are talking about people who pose a risk for society,” Zomerdijk said. “Barring them from town is a therapeutic measure sparing victims a confrontation” with their former tormentors.

He emphasized that such orders would apply only to a small number of former convicts.

Notifying the public about sex offenders has become common in the United States. Such procedures were inspired by the 1994 murder of 7-year-old Megan Kanka, who was slain by a convicted child molester who had moved into her New Jersey neighborhood after his release from prison.

The concept is unheard of in the Netherlands, where strict privacy laws mean criminals are usually identified only by their initials. Lawyers have accused the mayors of trying to usurp powers that belong to district attorneys, and there are fears that publicly branding convicts will lead to more vigilante violence.

Even Zomerdijk concedes it’s a moral dilemma: How do you warn citizens about the presence of a convicted sex offender while protecting the rights of someone who has paid his debt to society?

“We want to know about their return,” he said, but added: “We want to avoid ‘American situations’ where people put up billboards with culprits’ names and take the law into their own hands. We are mayors for both victim and perpetrator.”