Ce’Cile Resumes Call For Sex Offenders Registry To Be Made Public
Singjay Ce’cile has resumed her call for Jamaica’s Sex Offender Registry to be made available to the public.
Her calls came against the background of the recent abduction of two girls in the Bath community on St Thomas, reportedly by a man who was out on bail for rape and illegal possession of a firearm.
“I’m hearing that some of these offenders are usually sent to another community, nobody knows they are there… these people don’t have gated communities so di predators dem just calmly do what they do and go report to station like nothing happening,” the I’m Waiting singer noted on her Instagram page recently.
“I think:
- We need the registry (we need to march and fight for this)
- Assist the Police: It is not up to Government /Police alone (we see what happens when people actually assist the police)
- mentality and personal responsibilty need to shift”
The Manchester native also criticized people who were quick to disbelieve victims and extend support abusers, especially the ones who are famous.
“Some of us on social media all we do is cuss and disrespect people everyday causing more harm than good, dem cuss if a man try to expose someone, they cuss or disbelieve the victim of attacks or rape, they victim blame and shame. They automatically take up for alleged perpetrators because of fame,” Cecile declared.
“Do you know how good it makes a sexual predator feel when he sees John Public on the side of someone like him. Isn’t it time to get up and be a decent human being? Let the victims know that the support will be there and their voices will be heard so that they feel better about reporting these things and let EVERY SEXUAL PREDATOR know that u are AGAINST what they do WHOEVER THEY ARE,” she added.
Her sentiments about the registry are similar to that of Attorney General Marlene Malahoo Forte, who, in March last 2020, supported a call by the Child Protection and Family Services Agency (CPFSA) for a more transparent sex offenders’ registry, as the restriction on who can access the registry could defeat its purpose.
At present, the registry which is managed by the Department of Correctional Services, is not open to public scrutiny and all information in the register is “secret and confidential”.
Access to information in the register or registry is only accessible by persons or organisations who are deemed to have legitimate interest, such as the police, persons engaged in professional counselling of sex offenders, persons managing educational institutions where they are enrolled or seeking to be enrolled, persons managing facilities that treat vulnerable persons, and prospective employers and employees of sex offenders.
Last year the Attorney General in an interview with The Gleaner newspaper, said that while there were issues with having the sex offenders’ registry accessible to the public, people should know who pose a threat to them.
“The whole purpose of registering people is to ensure that the others know. So if access is not readily available in order to inform persons, it may defeat the goals of keeping the register in the first place,” Malahoo-Forte said at the time.
Pointing out that the keeping of a sex offenders’ register was not unique to Jamaica, the AG had also reasoned that the registry’s function is to ensure that those who are likely to harm others by past behavior are known, so that potential victims can be protected, and persons who had been convicted of a sexual offence “could not retreat to the right of privacy while there was a sex offenders’ registry”.
In contrast, her political compatriot Justice Minister Delroy Chuck, had said that while making the register public was “a matter than can be considered’, care has to be taken, where persons who have served their time and are no longer offending are concerned, as this “opens them up to further abuse or exposure might indeed be a breach of their fundamental rights”.
In explaining further, Chuck had said that if past offenders had been rehabilitated, and are not engaged in any sort of wrongdoing, they should be protected, but if persons constitute a danger on the sex registry, then people should know that these are persons who constitute a danger to the public.
In 2019, the CPFSA reported that there were 2,623 cases of sexual abuse against children, representing an increase of 276, or 12 per cent, over the previous year, when 2,347 cases were reported.
In late August this year, The Gleaner reported that the number of convicted sex offenders registered in Jamaica had almost doubled over the last three years.
However, officials had concerns about under-reporting of incidences and contended that the figures seemed “incredibly low” given the number of sexual offences recorded in Jamaica annually. They also expressed fears that the low rate of conviction for sex-related crimes has resulted in many predators falling outside the regulatory framework which was established to monitor them.
According to the Gleaner report, at the time, there were 331 persons on the Sex Offender Registry, which was an almost a 100 percent increase when compared with the 168 that were listed in February 2018.
Up to August this year, only 25 convicted sex offenders were added to the register, while a total of 40 were added in 2020, 59 in 2019, and 39 in 2018.
Between January 1 and August, 267 cases of rape were recorded across the island.
In September, the Home Circuit Court, which covers Kingston and St Andrew, had 267 sex-related cases listed including 160 for rape and 71 for persons accused of having sex with minors.
The Sex Offender Registry was established in October 2009, as a by-product of the Sexual Offences Act. Under the legislation, persons convicted for specified offences who have not been exempted by a judge, should be registered as sex offenders.
Among the specified offences are incest, rape, sexual touching or interference, sexual grooming of a child, sexual intercourse with a person under 16 years old, grievous sexual assault, and indecent assault.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CVIxkfCAdQp/
https://www.instagram.com/p/CVHPvsjsqHs/