As California softens on crime, thousands of convicted pedophiles in the state are being released early. How could this happen?

From Daily Mail. Pedophiles are getting less than a year prison time after a range of horrific acts, including raping kids under 14, a DailyMail.com investigation reveals.

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Analysis of a California database of sex offenders shows thousands of child molesters are being let out after just a few months, despite sentencing guidelines.

Current and former sex crime prosecutors said the figures are ‘terrifying’ and ‘shameful’.

More than 7,000 sex offenders were convicted of ‘lewd or lascivious acts with a child under 14 years of age’ but were let out of prison the same year they were incarcerated, data from the California Megan’s Law database says.

Others who committed some of the worst child sex crimes on the statute books served similarly short sentences, including 365 pedophiles convicted of continuous sexual abuse of a child who spent less than 12 months in prison, 39 cases of sodomy with a child under 16, and three cases of kidnapping a child under 14 ‘with intent to commit lewd or lascivious acts’, according to the data.

Former Los Angeles sex crimes prosecutor Samuel Dordulian told DailyMail.com he was ‘shocked’ by the statistics and described them as ‘frightening for society’.

‘Statistics clearly show that pedophiles don’t get reformed. They’re going to come out and they’re going to commit again,’ Dordulian said.

‘Letting these people out early, we’re allowing for a lot more victimization. And that’s terrifying.’

It is unclear whether the Megan’s Law database prison time statistics are similar for other states, as DailyMail.com was only able to obtain detailed sex offender data for California. …

Like most states, California has a law requiring sex offenders to register their address with the Department of Justice, and to provide updates if they move house.

In 1996 the Clinton administration passed a law, named after a pedophile murder victim Megan Kanka, to require their information be published.

California’s Megan’s Law website, www.meganslaw.ca.gov, allows anyone to search for sex offenders, with details including name, age, residence, offenses, their mugshot, and the dates they were last convicted and released from prison.

DailyMail.com compiled the data of the 54,986 sex offenders who were listed on the website in July 2019 and analyzed the results.

It showed 41,794 (76%) committed offenses involving children.

DailyMail.com compared the published dates of these pedophiles’ convictions versus the year they were released from prison according to the Megan’s Law database.

The results showed that the average pedophile served two years and 10 months in prison.

LA attorney Dordulian said that was ‘surprisingly very low.’

‘In my days [in the LA DA’s office], we made every effort to get as long of a prison sentence as we could, because we knew that the minute they’re going to come out, they’re more likely to reoffend and another child’s gonna get harmed,’ he told DailyMail.com

The lawyer, who now represents victims of sexual abuse, pointed to policies backed by California Governor Gavin Newsom allowing for shortening of sentences to reduce the prison population.

‘With Newsom, they’ve passed a lot of legislation where they are allowing for resentencing, they’re allowing for people to come back and there’s a push to have less time spent in prison,’ Dordulian said. …

‘But these types of individuals, they’re not amenable to rehabilitation, and studies have shown that,’ he added. ‘They’re gonna harm another child. …

According the US Justice Department, sex offenders are at least four times more likely than other criminals to be rearrested for a sex crime. …

The most common offense in the database was ‘lewd or lascivious acts with a child under 14 years of age’, committed 19,441 times. Despite its severity, the average time served for this crime was just two years and 11 months.

And 7,152 pedophiles who committed this crime served less than a year.

Some 114 men who committed the even worse version of this offense, where the act against the under-14 child was ‘by force or fear’, ended up serving less than a year in prison, according to the data.

Others serving less than 12 months included 13 counts of aggravated sexual assault of an under-14 with intent to rape, three counts of kidnapping a child under 14 with intent to commit lewd or lascivious acts, five counts of assault with intent to rape an under-18, and two counts of pimping minors.

One child abuse prosecutor in the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office told DailyMail.com the situation was ‘a disgrace’.

Deputy District Attorney Jon Hatami added that the problem of short prison time for pedophiles was getting worse, not better. He blamed Proposition 57, a 2016 bill allowing early parole for nonviolent felons which was supported by his boss, LA DA George Gascón.

‘Thousands of child victims are being denied justice and George Gascón and his group of radical prosecutors can care less,’ Hatami said. …

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(Excerpt from Daily Mail. Photo Credit: Emiliano Bar on Unsplash)