"Through Wisdom and Knowledge, We Rise From the Ashes!" -- This is Once Fallen's blog for sex offense commentaries, OpEds and assorted elucidations. For sex offense research, support, and advocacy, visit www.oncefallen.com today.
On April 1st, 2003, I was released from an Alabama State Prison for an offense that requires me to register for inclusion on a publicly accessible registry. Within a year I was homeless on the streets of Cincinnati, Ohio.
It was a struggle to find a way off of the streets. I stayed in a temporary shelter and had even gotten approved to stay six weeks in a seedy hotel while I spent each weekday morning searching for a job. When the funding ran out, I spent a night sleeping on a service road just off I-75, but a member of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church who had been ministering to the homeless allowed me to stay at his place until I got back on my feet.
Despite graduating with honors and having a Bachelor’s degree, I only managed to find a job stocking shelves at a grocery store for barely above minimum wage. I found a sleeping room on the “wrong side of Victory Parkway” but it was better than sleeping on a service road. But that sleeping room was within 1000 feet of a program called the “Life Skills Center”, what was then a GED program for people ages 16 to 22 to get a GED, so I was forced to move again.
Once I found a new apartment, the city of Cincinnati was considering passing a local residency restriction ordinance that would force me out of my new apartment, so I challenged them and they altered the ordinance so I would not be forced to move. Today, I live in the home of a former activist and I collect SSI and SNAP.
I have never forgotten about my experiences living on the streets in the early years of my release. In that time, I’ve become an outspoken critic of the US sex offense registry. That is why Executive Order entitled “Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets” bothers me. There are two provisions in the Executive Order that targets persons forced to register on the public sex offense registry.
First, the order demands law enforcement increase monitoring and mapping of transient registrants. I was required to register weekly when I was homeless and if I was to stay in a different location, I had 72 hours to report it. That was precious time taken away for seeking housing and employment since that required an in-person visit to the registration office, where I would sit upwards of an hour just to say I’m still homeless.
Second, it requires police to take those arrested for a federal offense and screen them for possible civil commitment. In 2019, I was falsely accused of theft in Florida. The charges against me were dropped due to actual innocence, but in the meantime I was detained for 24 days including six days on the road for extradition to Florida. Arrest is not the same as conviction, yet I was still forced to post bond then go about proving I was innocent. I believed that Florida would also try to have me civilly committed due to my past criticism of their draconian residency restriction laws.
As an anti-registry activist, I am familiar with the use of “civil commitment” as an extension of prison. For over 15 years, I’ve been in contact with multiple persons confined in the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP). The MSOP is like the Hotel California—you can check out any time but you can never leave. In fact, for the first 20 years, no one left the MSOP shadow prison except through death. In fact, at least 95 people have died inside the MSOP, while less than two dozen have been released, and it took years of lawsuits to allow even a single release. It costs Minnesota taxpayers around $100 million annually to house only around 770 people beyond their prison sentences.
The US Supreme Court upheld the terrible practice of civil commitment in the 1997 Kansas v. Hendricks decision. The decision that claimed that civil commitment is regulatory or civil and not punitive or punishment was later used to uphold the practice of forcing persons convicted of sex offenses to register in the 2003 Smith v. Doe decision. In turn, these rulings have been used to justify restrictions on where persons forced to register can live, work, and even visit.
Currently, at least 31 states apply residency restrictions to at least some Registered Persons, while at least nine states allow municipalities to make their own rules and regulations on where a Registrant can live, work, or visit. In Florida and Texas, nearly half of all communities have municipal ordinances that include residency and proximity laws, Halloween bans, or even “anti-clustering” laws prohibiting more than one registrant in a particular area. In Wisconsin, some communities adopted an “Original Domicile” rule that bans a Registered Person from residing in the community unless that Registrant previously resided in the community.
The end result is a harrowing experience for a Registered Person seeking to reintegrate after serving a sentence. When seeking housing for myself, I find few people willing to rent to me regardless of any existing law. Some are very proud of telling me no. But even when I find someone willing to rent to me, I have to take the added step of taking the address to the local registration office to see if the address meets the residency restriction requirements. The only other way to speculate is through access to plat maps, which often require a visit to the county clerk’s office.
This is why Registered Person experience homelessness far more often than the average American.
According to Housing and Urban Development, 18 out of 10000 (or 0.18%) Americans experienced homelessness at some point in time in the year 2022. By contrast, about 3.5% of Registered Persons were currently unhoused and nearly twice as many reported being friendly homeless at some point in the past year. In some parts of the US where local restrictions are particularly onerous, like Broward and Miami-Dade Counties in Florida, about one out of three Registered Persons are unhoused. And the Cicero Institute found that one out of ten unhoused persons was on the public registry.
Bad public policy has always stemmed from past knee-jerk reactions to high-profile cases. Minnesota’s expansion of the MSOP was a response to the Dru Sjodin case in 2003; the National Sex Offender Public Website was also named after her. Municipal sex offense restriction ordinances were passed following the Jessica Lunsford case in 2005.
This Executive Order is partly a response to a current high-profile case, except the intent here is to distract from Donald Trump’s alleged connection to Jeffrey Epstein. What better way to deflect allegations of sexual abuse than by compelling law enforcement to round up persons made unhoused by a myriad of laws and ship them off to shadow prisons? Maybe then we’ll forget the whole Epstein thing, right?
Civil commitment is not a solution to a housing crisis created by bad laws and policies. Minnesota could do a lot better spending that $100 million on housing the 9200 unhoused persons in that state. This country can do better than waste billions on harassing the unhoused.
In reviewing the sheer size of my website, I have found it difficult to keep such a large repository of useful info up-to-date and accurate while providing assistance for hundreds of Registered Persions and creating new material for the page.
I created my book, Your Life on The List, back in 2020. It is hard to believe it has been 5 years ago now.
The purpose of making the book was to compile the topics from this site (and elsewhere) that are of use to prisoners and those new to life on the registry in a convenient book form.
The book contains a number of pages from my own website. However, while I regularly update the book, I neglect to update the corresponding pages. Therefore, I have decided that it is redunant to have both my book AND the webspages up, with the book being updated while web pages are not being updated.
Therefore, the following pages from my website are scheduled for deletion on 6/30/2025. I am trying to give ample warning to those who link to specific paes of my book.
LET ME BE CLEAR, this is ONLY because the topics in these pages can be found in Your Life on The List and it is redundant to have both a webpage and a chapter or segment in my book covering this.
Here are the pages subject to deletion:
Under "Resources for Registered Persons":
REGISTRY COMPLIANCE CHECKS AND CPS INVESTIGATIONS: WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
And the page below will remain but it will be modified to remove info on the state statutes:
STATE ID CARD/ DRIVER’S LICENSE LAWS
Page Link: https://oncefallen.com/state-id-laws/
Reason: The info with corresponding state statutes are found in YLOTL APPENDIX 2: Summary of State/Territory Sex Offense Laws
I am keeping these pages up until 6/30/2025 for the few that still link yo them. HOWEVER, these pages contain much of the same info mentioned in my book and are merely being deleted for redundancy. This will only change where you must go to in order to find that info.
My book, Your Life on The List, is a free download. Just go to oncefallen.com and you'll find it by scrolling down past the introduction. There is a big bold statement that says "YOUR LIFE ON THE LIST: 4TH EDITION", A REGISTRY SURVIVAL GUIDE, NOW AVAILABLE, right under that is a big green button that says, CLICK HERE TO GET THE YLOTL4 FREE PDF VERSION
The year 2024 was among the worst years for OnceFallen since we started making reports. There have been numerous hindrances to our brand, including the following:
The federal Bureau of Prisons had increased the number of facilities that censored our correspondence with prisoners. In September, the BOP changed how Corrlinks handles emails, effectively preventing us from continuing the Informational Corrlinks Newsletter (ICoN), which has negatively impacted our ability to get valuable info to prisoners.
The Wisconsin prison system is switching to a different email network which also limits the ability to get info to prisoners.
A dispute with the distributor of our book, Your Life on The List, has led to the decision to distribute the 4th edition of the book solely as a PDF file on OnceFallen.com and through the Fair Shake app for prisoners.
A fundraising attempt to replace aging equipment fell far short of the goal.
Aside from a single OpEd in the Delaware Cape-Gazette, I had no other media inquiries, though I was interviewed twice by researchers as part of upcoming papers.
Needless to say, this has been a down year for Once Fallen. Both donations and requests for information fell this year.
Total individual inquiries: 706 (down from 788 in 2023; -82 or a 10.5% decrease)
First contact from:
Email: 247
Corrlinks: 165
Letter/US Mail: 159
Phone: 91
Text: 30
Facebook: 9
LinkedIn: 2
Reason for Initial Contact: Of the 706 inquiries,
Housing (including housing leads or requests for housing & nursing homes, housing provider passing along their info): 197
General Inquiry (Incl. those unsure what they needed or needed clarification): 116
ICoN (newsletters): 63
State-Specific Info: 49
Information Sharing (tips, news, suggestions): 47
Other assorted categories: 47
Registry law questions: 45
Jail/Prison/Parole/Probation issues: 33
Your Life on The List Book: 33
Activism (How to join movement): 30
Legal Assistance/ Lawyer referrals: 21
Thank You messages: 10
Harassment Issues (targeted by vigilantes): 9
Treatment-related issues: 6
Inquiries by Month:
January: 77
February: 79
March: 80
April: 62
May: 55
June: 41
July: 35
August: 60
September: 66
October: 65
November: 38
December: 38
Inquiries by state (When Known): 44 states, DC, Puerto Rico, & one foreign nation (Panama)
66: IN
65: WI
35: TX
33: FL
25: IL
24: CA
20: MO
16: AL
15: UT
14: OH, PA
13: KY
12: KS
11: GA
10: MI, MN, ND, NY
9: SC, WA
7:AR, CT, OR, VA
6: CO
5: AZ, NJ, OK, TN
4: NM
3: DE, IA, NE, NV, WV
2: DC, LA, MS, SD
1: AK, ID, MD, ME, ND, NH, Panama, PR, WY
For those who are curious: Because we offer a special info pack for WI, and we have a private housing list for IN, UT, and KS, as well as being featured on the AL 211, these states have more inquiries than average compared to states of comparible size.
TOTAL NUMBER OF LETTERS BY MAIL: 269 (down from 296 from 2023, -27 or a 9.9% decrease)
Total Corrlinks Subscribers:
Federal: 952 (down from 1005 in 2023; -53, or a 5.3% decrease)
State/Other Facilities: 399 (almost all are in WI, down from 446 in 2023; -47, or 14.4% decrease)
Total: 1381 (down from 1451 in 2023; -70 or 4.8% decrease)
Donations to OnceFallen were the lowest since 2011, with a 30% decrease from 2023, which in turn was a 44.5% decrease from 2022. Contributions in 2024 were only 38% of what they were two years ago.
Once Fallen has, in response, scaled back its operations further, including refraining from traveling at all for activism events. If not for a visit to Omaha for a visit with Nebraskans Unafraid in November, Once Fallen would not have traveled at all for activism efforts at all for the first time since 2011. Fundraising efforts largely fell flat, tempered only by few needs this year.
OnceFallen is pivoting away from anti-registry activism in the next year and towards resource-gathering, including a renewed focus on housing searches.
A second tRUMP presidency is bad news for Registered Persons.
Some folks were lulled into the belief a Donald Trump presidency is good for us based on him signing the First Step Act, an act that helped expand good time for federal prisoners taking treatment/rehab courses, but SOs were excluded from the benefits of the bill, except a single offense but I'm sure that was merely an oversight they may add to the exclusion list once the bill is up for reauthorization. An equally fallacious argument is because Trump is a convicted felon & held to be liable for rape (in a civil, not criminal court), Trump will be sympathetic to our cause. But SCOTUS Justice Clarence Thomas, yet has consistently voted in favor of the state in challenges to registry laws. Trump said in a July 2024 rally that you can’t “teach a criminal not to be a criminal.” Back in 2015, Trump likened Ben Carson to an SO during a rally, stating, “If you’re pathological, there’s no cure for that, folks. There’s no cure for that… If you’re a child molester, a sick puppy, you’re a child molester, there’s no cure for that. There’s only one cure, we don’t want to talk about that cure. That’s the ultimate cure. Well, there’s death, and there’s the other thing. But if you’re a child molester, there’s no cure, they can’t stop you. Pathological, there’s no cure."
But the thing that concerns me deeply is that Trump plans on implementing the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025. P2025's chapter on reforming the DOJ mostly covers stuff directly related to ending the investigations into Trump’s criminal activities while in office & the J6 insurrectionists. BUT, this passage disturbs me: “Enforce the death penalty where appropriate & applicable. Capital punishment is a sensitive matter, as it should be, but the current crime wave makes deterrence vital at the federal, state, & local levels. However, providing this punishment without ever enforcing it provides justice neither for the victims’ families nor for the defendant. The next conservative Administration should therefore do everything possible to obtain finality for the 44 prisoners currently on federal death row. It should also pursue the death penalty for applicable crimes—particularly heinous crimes involving violence & sexual abuse of children—until Congress says otherwise through legislation.”–p.554
It sounds to me like they want to allow death penalty for ALL cases UNLESS Congress EXPLICITLY states this crime should not be punishable by death. No doubt this was thrown into the mix after FL Gov. Ron DeathSantis pushed to challenge Kennedy v Louisiana 554 US 407 (2008), which stated execution for non-murder offenses was unconstitutional, by signing a law in FL to execute folks convicted of sex offenses against those under age 13. TN passed a similar statute earlier this year & other states like MO & ID considered it. While Trump has claimed he “knows nothing” about P2025, his Agenda47 is reposting numerous suggestions from P2025 & over 200 Trump staffers worked on P2025. The Heritage Foundation sponsored the RNC. In Aug 2024, the Trump campaign announced that Trump will seek the death penalty for “child rapists & child traffickers.”
Trump never got the chance to sign such sweeping legislation tied to SOR laws, he signed FOSTA-SESTA — the Allow States & Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act & Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act, an internet censorship bill. Both these laws have led to massive internet censorship & helped exacerbate the existing wave of human trafficking panic. P2025 seeks to “Ensure that (the DOJ) is agile enough to devote sufficient resources and attention to other emerging threats that involve federal interests such as increases in sextortion, ransomware, and the continued proliferation of CP.” P2025 also wants to outlaw ALL porn. “Pornography should be outlawed. The people who produce and distribute it should be imprisoned. Educators & public librarians who purvey it should be classed as RSOs. And telecommunications and technology firms that facilitate its spread should be shuttered.”–p.5
One other issue of concern—vigilante groups that harass RPs &/or engage in online entrapment operations are promoting right-wing conspiracies. Recently, the Millersville PD (in TN) worked with an online vigilante group “Veterans for Child Rescue”; the asst. chief Shawn Taylor promoted debunked conspiracies like Pizzagate (the false claim a Pizza shop in DC tied to Clinton’s campaign mgr. was a front for human trafficking). An arrestee was even sent to a jail “where it was likely that he might not come out alive.” Taylor is still on the force. Police are largely turning a blind eye to crimes against RPs. A Trump win may encourage more vigilante activity & may be sanctioned by police. Trump also told rally-goers in July he would grant immunity to police in all actions, which could lead to cops violating our rights during compliance checks or at the registration office.
Trump’s VP pick JD Vance has only been a US Senator since 2022 & none of his sponsored bills impact RPs; he has yet to give his stance on criminal justice issues since media attention is focused on his weird, authoritarian statements, but i doubt he'll do us any favors, either.
WHY IT MATTERS WHO WON: The President may not influence SO laws directly, but they can pass laws by Executive Order. (An executive order is a type of written instruction that presidents use to work their will through the executive branch of government.) SO Laws have always been passed by legislation, not by Executive Order. If a federal SO bill is placed on the desk of Trump, I doubt it would get vetoed.
The Presidential election still matters to us in one key matter—the President selects SCOTUS justices. In my article following the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, I noted that liberal justices like RGB, Sotomayor, & Kagan have voted against SO law expansion, while conservative justices like Gorsuch, Thomas, & Alito have consistently voted in favor of stricter penalties for us. Repubs accused Justice Katanji Brown-Jackson of being “soft on SOs.” Chief Justice Roberts was the state’s attorney in the 2003 Smith v. Doe, where he successfully argued the SOR was NOT punishment. We now have a 6-3 conservative supermajority, which ends any hope of revisiting that terrible ruling anytime soon.
With tRUMP reclaiming this power, we can be assured that if Alito and Thomas are ousted, they will merely be replaced with equally ultra-conservative justices, and if any of the three remaining liberal justices are ousted, the conservative supermajority will last for our lifetimes. All chances of overturning Smith v Doe is lost.
SO Laws have the support of both sides of the political aisle. Conservatives fulfil their moralistic, tough-on-crime agendas, while liberal receive their “justice” for alleged & real crime victims & the belief they are protecting the vulnerable. Senate Majority leader Mitch McConnell has a long record of rejecting criminal justice reforms, & had to be pressured by both parties just to get the First Step Act on the floor. This is why registry reform is a hard sell. It is not impossible, since some harsh laws have been scaled back, although most reforms were merely responses to lawsuits.
However, a tRUMP administration all but kills what little momentum we ever had and puts us all in danger of death.
In the meantime, this is the next potentially harmful bill on the federal level. H. R. 6382. It contains three provisions that are harmful to some of us:
1. Submit a list of persons convicted of certain offenses to the US Attorney General for potential federal charges. )The term ‘‘sexually dangerous person’’ means a person suffering from a serious mental illness, abnormality, or disorder, as a result of which the individual would have serious difficulty in refraining from sexually violent conduct or child molestation., under the AWA, i.e., those who would be eligible for civil commitment. This can be rather vague at times.)
2. These persons would be ineligible for Medicare Parts A and B unless they're in civil commitment.
3. More broadly, the registry info would be enhanced to include "Information about any relevant court case.'' I'm not entirely sure if it is limited only to the conviction or just sex offense accsations or any potential charge.
As a final note, I'd like to add the fact that vigilante groups I have monitored and wrote about for years are tRUMP supporters, and his reelection has emboldened these vigilantes even more.
Perhaps our future efforts should focus on helping Registrants survive in a country that has made it all but fully legal to use us for target practice.
SOSEN.org went offline earlier this week, and it was almost like losing an old friend. A few weeks before SOSEN went offline forever, I wrote a eulogy that was thankfully captured by the Internet Archive as a final message from SOSEN. It has been reposted here for those times the Internet Archive isn't working.
I spend about half of my childhood living in the small town in Moulton, AL, a community with a population about 3000 people. I moved away in 1990, and I returned for a brief visit in 2010 as I was planning to move away from that state forever. Even in a rural community like Moulton, things inevitably change. My mom worked a few months in a pizzeria; when I visited Moulton in 2010, it was a steak and seafood restaurant, and thanks to Google Maps, I can see the building is now acting as a food pantry. The skating rink across the street, however, is still in business as a skating rink. Next to it was Hill’s Auto Sales, where my stepfather worked until he finished his CDL training; by 2020, the lot had been abandoned, but the office shack and garage was still there, with the faded business sign sitting at the back of the open air garage. According to Google maps, it is still up, moved away from the road to make room for a body shop.
Just off AL Hwy 157, just a few hundred feet from these places, there was a beautiful two-story house next to a big oak tree. I had tamed a squirrel we named “Chipper.” When I returned in 2010, the house had long been abandoned; it was in disarray, with smashed windows and walls, and the process to recycle the bricks had begun. That house has since been demolished.
Change is always bittersweet. We have nostalgia for days gone by to some extent. Places die, just like people do, and we feel a bit of sadness to see a business we may have patronized or a home where we once lived altered or demolished.
It may hit slightly differently to envision the end of a website as opposed to driving past your childhood community. There are no bricks and mortar, no physical buildings, no signposts, and no physical roads to drive along to see the remnants as a monument to this nostalgia. But to those of us who patronized this virtual establishment, the bittersweet feelings are no less real. Such is the news that SOSEN will be shutting down around Mid-July 2024, just a few weeks from the day this article is posted.
It has been said. ”Necessity is the mother of invention.” From such necessity was born SOSEN. Founded in 2003, the “Sex Offender Support and Education Network” (SOSEN), as at first a Yahoo Group comprised of Registered Persons and their loved ones. There was also a sosen.org landing page which would also direct people to sign up for the Yahoo Group. There was a dispute with a group using a similar moniker; the other group known as the “Social Outcasts Support and Education Network (using the extension sosen.info). In the fall of 2007, the dispute was resolved, and sosen.org migrated to the extension sosen.us. The web extension was changed back to sosen.org in 2009, with the forums hosted separately on the sosen.us extension.
As noted in their “about us” page from 2009, “Though their numbers were small and organization loose, the group’s mission was profound. The members experienced firsthand a need for a place for the growing numbers of registered former offenders and their families to find comfort and support. They also saw firsthand that the direction legislators were taking regarding the laws being passed was counterproductive to the goals sought.
Between 2004 and 2005 the Yahoo Group was expanded and membership grew. New groups were added including creating separate state groups, among others. During this time of growth, as with any fledgling project there were differences of opinion and thus the need for strong, unbiased, committed leadership. As a step to providing a stable organization and effective leadership, discussions began on the topic of incorporation in the first quarter of 2006.
The discussions on the subject continued for the next year. Then in May/June of 2007, SOSEN was officially incorporated, making SOSEN the first among the RFSO groups to have this distinction. Also during this time bylaws were written, board positions defined, staff members recruited, and a new forum was created.
As with any great idea there were also bumps in the road. When SOSEN began to emerge as a leader in Sex Offender Issues, it caught the attention of hate groups. These groups deliberately and willfully attacked the SOSEN Yahoo group boards, so the Yahoo Groups were disbanded. The small victory of the vigilantes encouraged them to continue their attacks. Both through slander and outright attacks on the SOSEN website the vigilantes continued their illegal assaults which have included copyright infringement…
There are many stories where SOSEN has helped individuals and family members. Not to be forgotten are the many former victims among the SOSEN family who have found a loving, compassionate home among our widely varied membership.”
SOSEN racked up numerous accomplishments in their early years, including assisting Sarah Tofte’s 2007 Human Rights Watch report, “No Easy Answers: Sex Offender Laws in the US, participating Jill Levinson’s collateral damage study, working with other organizations in efforts of locating housing for former offenders due to residency restrictions across the country, sending reports to therapists, criminal defense attorneys, reporters and politicians upon request, and SOSEN members have spoken to many social justice students, law makers and committees.
SOSEN played a major role in the 2007 “Silent No More” rally in Columbus, Ohio. This rally was the Anti-Registry Movement’s first successful public awareness event, despite death threats and a counter-protest staged by members of a biker gang, an online vigilante group tied to the Dateline NBC TV show, and a vigilante who had made appearances on daytime talk shows of the era. The 2007 rally, in turn, helped form the Anti-Registry Movement into the modern structure that endures today.
In 2009, SOSEN changed the “S” in the acronym from “Support” to “Solutions” at the suggestion of those who had stated legislators and media would shut down on them if they explained that the S stood for support. As one member noted, “This was a great SOLUTION to the problem people encountered when talking with legislators and others and then saying we were with SOSEN. As soon as you said Sex Offender Support… the immediate mindset of the person you were speaking with changed as their immediate thoughts went to something like “these people are supporting the idea that it is alright to have sex with children?” or some similar negative idea. Using the work Solutions in our name allows us to not change SOSEN except by indicating in our name that we are working towards SOLUTIONS in the way our society is presently addressing sex offender issues.”
Kyle Sandusky, an advocate who passed away in the mid-2000s, had created a website called “Sex Offender Solutions – Network” (SOS-NET) when he was alive, so the name change from “support” to “solutions” was a dedication to his efforts.
SOSEN grew dramatically under the leadership of Mary Duval, a blind woman whose son landed on the registry for having consensual relations with a classmate. Mary Duval, with assistance of SOSEN members, had visited the Registered Persons forced to live under the Julia Tuttle Causeway in Miami, FL. Mary and a man named Kevin hosted a podcast on Talkshoe called “Americans’ Reality Check,” which had included guests from under the bridge, and even interviewed Ron Book, the mastermind of the law that forced Registered Persons to live under the bridge. Mary Duval made numerous media appearances during her life, and was among the first to bring the national media to the Anti-Registry Movement. The movement suffered a great loss when Mary Duval passed away in 2011, but she helped inspire a new generation of activists to step up their game. At one time, SOSEN boasted of nearly 800 active members, an impressive feat for the era.
Central to the longevity of SOSEN was the members’ forums, a private and protected forum where Registered Persons and their loved ones could speak to one another, share important news and legal commentary, or simply to share memes and stories with each other. SOSEN’s forums supported attachments up to 4MB and could support numerous file formats. It even contained “smileys” (emojis).
But after 21 years, the time has finally come for SOSEN to shutter its doors.
To paraphrase a modern expression. “SOSEN walked so that others may run,” The concept of a national group with state chapters had previously been tried with both SOSEN and SOHopeful, their early contemporary, but it was ReformSexOffenderLaws.org, the group that eventually rebranded into NARSOL, that had the greatest success with implementing the “state affiliate” system. This also made it difficult to attract people to SOSEN. SOSEN helped lay the groundwork for other groups to exist and thrive and surpass even the wildest dreams of the founders. But few of the early pioneers of this movement are alive today, much less have stuck around for over 20 years. Virtually all of SOSEN’s original staff have either passed away, moved on to head other groups, or have dropped out of anti-registry activism altogether.
The forum format utilized by SOSEN was innovative for its time, but eventually, other formats surpassed the abilities of the forum to share media. In 2008, the forum was sufficient to share info with fellow activists and encourage them to comment on articles. The MP4, the PDF, and other modern file formats grew too large for sharing certain files in the forums. Some activists wanted a “one stop shop” for all their online needs, so some activists decided they would rather create groups through Facebook, a social media platform that bans Registered Persons. In addition, news outlets also shifted to Facebook-only commenting, which led to a decline in participation from members joining in on calls of action to spread anti-registry comments. Ironically, even Facebook, the choice of many activists in the early 2010s, is also on the decline as a dominant platform as activists continue to move on to other platforms for sharing information or to engage in activism.
SOSEN has continued to provide information and the forums to those who needed it, but with the passing away of SOSEN staff members came the challenge of trying to retrieve control of meager resources left behind by those who passed on. SOSEN was (and is) still a repository for the thoughts, theories, and legal commentaries of the era in which it existed. In the mid-200s, as SOSEN was forming and growing, most legal commentary was merely prognostication and speculation on potential legal challenges to relatively new laws like residency restrictions. But today, there have been numerous challenges to post-conviction sanctions, so legal theories and commentaries no longer hold the same value it once did.
Twenty-one years is a long time. SOSEN was founded the year of my release from prison. A lot has changed for all of in those years. Unfortunately, in a crowded field, some businesses fall behind and eventually go out of business. It is not a condemnation of the product, but a simple fact of life. SOSEN helped get the ball rolling but it went as far as it could go as people left for greener virtual pastures. The fight for the rights of Persons Forced to Register to be allowed the opportunity to reintegrate and not endure draconian laws continues, but we are far better organized than when SOSEN’s journey began.
There will always be the Web archive for those who want to take a virtual stroll down memory lane or read some of the articles published in the later years of the site, but when the website goes offline in mid-July, the forums will no longer be accessible. Gone will be the conversations, the sharing of stories, and even the silly banter between members.
One off-topic conversation on the forums in 2009 began with a discussion on the then-new Star Trek movie. What followed was an exchange between a few members that only those attuned to anti-registry activism could truly understand and find both sad and silly simultaneously:
“I wonder if sex offenders have a 2000 parsec rule to follow by the time we catch up with the 24th century…”
“Nope, it’ll be 2000 LIGHTS YEARS, from any planet with LIFE on it!” (Note: A parsec is actually about 3.26 light years, so it would be longer than a light year.)
“If that’s the deal I am cutting a deal with the Romulians.” (thumbs-up smiley)
“Unfortunately, they will have passed the Intergalactic Megan’s Law bill by then and we won’t be allowed to leave the sector without our papers.” (Note: We may have predicted “International Megan’s Law” in this exchange)
“I will simply find an uncharted worm hole and abscond to the Delta quadrant.” (thumbs-up smiley)
“LOL!! Let’s see them follow us THERE!!! But we gotta watch out for the place that sucks ships in, where the ships feed off new arrivals….”
“Got to watch out for those Borg! Resistance is futile…..You will be assimilated…” (thumbs-up smiley)
“Now that could work. When they arrive we shove the politicians and media and idiots like Lunsford out first…Once they are assimilated… the Borg will be so STUPID they will be trying to assimilate EACH OTHER and leave the rest of us ALONE.” (Note: We may also have predicted the mid-2020s social and political climate, except for the leaving us alone part.)
“‘the place that sucks ships in, where the ships feed off new arrivals’… Do you mean the dreaded ‘Politico’ galaxy? LMAO”
“Great. We send Walsh and Lunsford and our politicos and media hounds out and they’ll simply exaggerate the amount of bullcrap going on here on earth and turn the whole federation into a bunch of intergalactic helicopter moms”
“The Lunsford Nebula located in the f*cktard galaxy ruled by Helicopter Borg?..LOL Now that’s a show I want to see”
SOSEN had a good run but eventually everything comes to an end. It may be the end of SOSEN’s story, but the fight to abolish the public registry continues. Those who experienced it will hopefully have good memories of the old website. Farewell, old friend. SOSEN, 2003-2024.
Since 2016, OnceFallen has published an annual report summarizing the efforts of our anti-registry activism. Most of the activism performed by OnceFallen is either the maintenance of the OnceFallen.com website, responding to inquiries, or through prisoner outreach. When needed, OnceFallen is willing to attend activist events, conduct media interviews, and legislative meetings addressing sex offense laws when necessary. OnceFallen runs on a shoestring budget BUT rarely needs donations unless that need involves traveling to events.
OnceFallen major accomplishments in 2023:
1. Organized the DC Vigil in March 2023 to protest 20 years of the terrible Smith v. Doe ruling, and gave the eulogy at the event.
2. Assisted a record number of individuals, averaging over 2 per day.
3. Was featured in the book, “From Rage to Reason: Why We Need Sex Crime Laws Based on Facts, Not Fear” by Emily Horowitz (2023). No media contacts were made and no OpEds were published, however.
4. Conducted 2 surveys, a larger 99-question survey of anti-registry activists, of which there were 695 participants (final paper still in progress), and a smaller 19-question survey on Insurance and Travel issues for Registered Persons (final report published in Dec. 2023)
INITIAL CONTACT STATS
Total New Contacts 2023 – 788 (710 in 2022, +78, an 11% increase over 2022)
Reasons for initial contact, in order of most to least common reasons for first contact. Please note, this is only for INITIAL contact, and in the case of prisoners, it may begin with a “general info” contact followed by a later resource request: Housing (202), “General Inquiries” (i.e., those with general questions or unclear about needs (167)), sex offense law questions (69), state law summaries (54), ICoN/Informational Corrlinks Newsletter (32), Your Life on The List book (30), Attorneys (28), Activism (22), jail/prison issues (21), Information Sharing (20), PO Issues (17), Thank You (13), and Treatment issues (10). There were many individual inquiries; also, some services people seek are not services I provide, like attorney lists or issues related to treatment while incarcerated, but people still send requests me way in hopes of getting their personal issues resolved.
New contacts were spread across 46 US States, Puerto Rico, and the USVI, in addition to one contact each from Australia, Brazil, and Germany. I made no known contact with anyone from AK, ND, MA and ME in 2022.
States ranked from most to least inquiries: Wisconsin (153); FloriDUH (45); Texas (33); Indiana (34); Missouri (29); California (28); Ohio (25); Illinois (21); Pennsylvania (20); North Carolina (17); Georgia (15); Virginia (13); Kansas (12); Alabama (11); New York (10); Kentucky/Michigan/Oregon/Washington State (9 each); Arizona/Louisiana/New Jersey (8 each); Nevada/South Carolina (7 each); Colorado/Tennessee (6 each); Arkansas/Iowa (5); Delaware/Mississippi/New Mexico/Oklahoma/Utah (4 each); Nebraska/New Hampshire/Wyoming (3 each); Connecticut/Hawaii/Maryland/Minnesota/South Dakota/Vermont/West Virginia (2 each); Idaho/Montana/Puerto Rico/US Virgin Islands (1 each)
Initial Contact Type from most to least common: Email (246), Corrlinks (233), letter/postal mail (159), phone (97), text (35), Facebook (17), LinkedIn (1)
New contacts by month; January (94), February (62), March (87), April (83), May (62), June (59), July (59), August (60), September (68), October (63), November (41), December (56)
Corrlinks Informational Newsletter (ICoN) subscribers: At the end of 2023, I had 1315 total Corrlinks subscribers (up from 1315 in 2022), but of those, 446 are state prisoners (up from 392 in 2022), and because it costs extra to send email to state prisoners, these 446 do not receive monthly newsletters. That leaves 1005 federal and CCA prisoners receiving the newsletters. In 2022, there were 923 subscribers, so this is an increase of 82 subscribers, or 8.9%.
Letter Stats: OnceFallen received 296 total requests by mail (note: many were repeat requests), which is 3.5 (%) more than last year.
Financial Resources & Expenses
Financial support decreased over 2022 numbers by about 44.5%. Since OnceFallen typically operates on a shoestring budget, donations are generally not needed nor have they been solicited when not in immediate need, so even small donations significantly change the numbers. Typical expenses include supplies related to prisoner outreach, including envelopes, stamps, printer toner, phone expenses, the occasional free book to prisoners, etc. Largest expense was related to the DC event, but as costs were offset by a transportation sale and a fellow activist opening his home to OnceFallen reps, expenses were minimal for this trip.
Below is an Op-Ed I wrote for the Sun-Sentinel after Lauren Book was arrested for trespassing. Of course, the Sun-Sentinel refuses to publish anything negative about the Book Crime Family.
Politicians should be held to the same standards as everyone else
Derek Logue, April 5, 2023
In 2015, I engaged in a peaceful protest in Tallahassee against now-Senate Democrat leader Lauren Book. Book tried having me arrested. Then she filed a restraining order against me in an attempt to prevent me in organizing future protests. She even sent pictures of me to local law enforcement and had me arrested on theft charges.
I was arrested in Ohio and spent six days on the road in an extradition vehicle with no air conditioning. By the time I reached the Broward County Jail, my blood pressure was 200/140 and my feet had swollen 4 times the normal size. I was held an additional time in jail to be forced to register as a “sex offender” before being release. I spent years defending myself against this barrage of false allegations brought on by Florida State Senator Lauren Book.
Every single false allegation made against me by Lauren Book was ultimately tossed out of court. See Logue v. Book, 297 So. 3d 605.
But that was not enough for Lauren Book. In 2021, Book added an addendum to CS/HB 921, a bill addressing cyberstalking, to make public criticism of people like her a felony. In 2022, Book sided with Republicans to pass CS/HB1571, the controversial DeSantis bill that outlawed many types of public protest. Needless to say, Lauren Book is no friend of free speech.
Fast forward to the night of April 3, 2023, when this same state senator who tried to imprison me for exercising the right to peacefully assemble by the state capitol in 2015 was arrested for engaging in a protest. Sure, Senator Book was detained. Sure, Senator Book was handcuffed (very carefully), Sure, Senator Book was taken to the police station with the other ten arrested protesters. But state law prevents Senator Book’s (and Nikki Fried’s) mugshot from being released, while the faces of the commoners who protested were published. Senator Book was the first to be released. The police assured us that she was treated with the utmost care. Despite the fact that I was innocent and she was arrested in the commission of a crime, we were treated vastly different.
Florida State Senator Lauren Book should have been treated the same way as any other accused criminal. Keep her in a cell for hours for processing then moved to another cell to await your first appearance up to 72 hours later. Feed her food not fit for human consumption. Strong-arm those handcuffs on her even if she isn’t resisting. Make her sit in a sweltering van for six days. Release that mugshot and make it look hideous for added effect.
Alternately, perhaps we can treat the common folk who stand accused of offense with the same air of dignity as Senator Book was treated. We have seen in both Tallahassee and in New York City that the criminal justice system works differently for the rich and powerful than it does for the average citizen. That is something that needs to change.
Below is the speech I gave in front of the SCOTUS Building in Washington DC on Tuesday, 3/7/2023, as part of a vigil to remember the lives lost thanks to the rulung in Smith v. Doe, 538 US 84 (2003), which had claimed the registry is not punitive (punishment) and therefore we don't deserve constitutional protections.
Just ONE DAY after my speech, on Wednesday, March 8, 2023, a person convicted of a sexual offense over 40 years ago named Lawrence V. Scully, of Grand Marais, MN, was beaten to death in his home by a deranged man who had falsely accused him of stalking kids to justify the murder. The MN Star-Tribune had reported that the murderer, Levi Axtell, filed a bogus restraining order against Scully (claiming he was "stalking" a 22 month old going to day care and referring to Scully as a "convicted pedophile") that was eventually dismissed. "Axtell posted on Facebook a photo of someone pointing a gun behind the words "Only cure for pedophiles. A bullet." He added the comment, "People always ask me why I hate pedophiles. They assume I've been abused. But really I think being protective is just an Axtell trait."" Scully had been convicted of an offense in 1979 and was released in 1982 and had apparently been offense-free for 40 years. (Lawrence's offense predates the registry by over 15 years and was likely never registered, BUT when he ran for public office in 2014, a local reported drudged up his record.)
Chief SCOTUS Justice John "Price Club" Roberts, the blood of Lawrence Scully is on your hands.
DEREK W LOGUE OF ONCEFALLEN.COM'S SPEECH FOR DC VIGIL, MARCH 7, 2023 AT 9AM
We are gathered here today because twenty years ago, in this very building beside us, six United States Supreme Court Justices published Smith v Doe, a terrible decision that has destroyed hundreds of thousands of lives, all based on lies and misinformation. Writing for the majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy upheld the draconian practice of forcing those convicted of sexual offenses to provide private information for a publicly accessible registry. Justice Kennedy relied heavily on the false premise that recidivism among those convicted of sexual offenses was “frightening and high.” Justice Kennedy also relied upon the arguments of John Roberts, who at the time was working on behalf of the state of Alaska, and argued the act of sex offense registration was no more intrusive than applying for a “Price Club” membership.
Smith v Doe is terrible decision has caused in measurable harm to every person forced to register over the past two decades. Constitutional protections often taken for granted by the average American citizen were stripped from persons forced to register, and we are treated like second class citizens. Smith v Doe opened a Pandora’s Box of increasingly draconian laws, from residency restriction laws to restrictions on employment to lifetime GPS, and virtually every law directed at persons forced to register use the Smith v Doe decision as the basis for these increasingly oppressive laws.
Six US Supreme Court justices condemned us to death – Former chief justice William Rehnquist, Sandra Day O'Connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy, David Souter, and Clarence Thomas. If you include current Chief Justice John “Price Club” Roberts, seven SCOTUS justices in total have stained their hands with our blood and the blood of those who died for the sake of this “Price Club.”
Washington DC is a place for memorials of all kinds. This casket, built by a Registered Person is our own makeshift memorial to remember the countless lives lost to one of the worst US Supreme Court decisions in human history. To date, I am aware of hundreds of deaths that can be tied, whether directly or indirectly, to the public registry. And this may only be scratching the surface, since we rely heavily on news reports, and crimes against Persons Forced to Register are highly underreported. Much like the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, we have our own tomb for the untold numbers who have died because of the terrible decision rendered by six justices in the building standing behind my back 20 years ago.
Despite not knowing the names of every person who died because of the registry, I cannot possibly cover every single story here. Throughout the rest of my eulogy, I will share the names of people who have died in various ways as the result of the public sex offense registry. Not everyone who was killed was a Registered Person. Some were loved ones like a family member or a friend. A few were falsely accused of a crime. A few were simply mistaken for a PFR. But in all of these cases, the registry, upheld by the six SCOTUS justices in 2003, are directly responsible for these deaths.
I shall begin by reading the names of those whose murders have been proven beyond a reasonable doubt to be directly tied to the registry, whether by the online registry, community notification, or notices given out by law enforcement. This does not even include unsolved murders where motivation could not be definitively proven or where the media downplayed the role the registry may have taken in these murders.
•John Mayo, Salt Lake City UT, died 5/9/2005
•Hank Eisses & Victor Vasquez, Bellingham WA, Died 7/13/2005
•Joseph Grey, Milo ME and William Elliot, Corinth ME, Died 4/16/2006. Both were murdered by the same vigilante.
•Lee Alexander,Brandon FL, 5/14/2007
•Michael A. Dodele, Lakeport CA, 11/20/2007
•David Coody, Jr. and Chad Wiggins, both non-RPs who were murdered because they rented a home to a PFR, Echols Co. GA, Died 5/28/2008
•Neil Hayes, Sacramento CA, Died 1/1/2009 (murdered by white supremacists)
•Silas Miller , Moss Point MS, Died 6/2/2009
•Edward Vaughn Keeley, North Palm Springs CA, Died 8/10/2009 (murdered by a white supremacist)
•David Morrison, Las Vegas NV, 12/17/2010
•Bobby Ray Rainwater, San Juan Capistrano CA, 12/2/2011
•Gary Blanton, Port Angeles, WA, and Jerry Ray, Sequim WA, Died 6/2/2012, were both murdered by the same vigilante
•James Grant, Elkhart IN, Died 8/5/2012
•Lawrence J. Lewis, Molunkus Township ME, Died 3/12/2013
•Charles Parker, along with his wife, Gretchen Parker, a non-RC, Jonesville SC, Died 7/22/2013. The murderers were Neo-Nazis who wrote a manifesto calling for the murders of Registered Persons AND their
•Lawrence Ballesteros, Fresno CA, Died 4/3/2014
•Jonathan Tarvin, Doniphan MO, Died 4/26/2016
•Jerry Caudill, Logan Co. KY, Died 6/7/2017
•Alfred Wilheim, and Rhonda Ballow (a non-RC dating Alfred) Las Vegas NV, Died 12/26/2017
•Jerry Wayne Scott, Zwolle LA, Died July 2017 and Adam L Jeter, Zwolle LA, Died 12/15/2017, were both killed by the same vigilante.
•Matteio Condoluci, Omaha NE, Died 5/16/2020
•James Christopher McClernon, Evansville IN, Died 7/27/2022
Here are the names of other persons Forced to Register who were murdered; in these cases, the Registrant’s status was used to justify the murder:
•10/10/2003: Matthew Lee Raynor (non-RC) and Russell Charles Markvardsen, WA
•12/6/2003: Joseph Pilger, KY
•1/28/2004: Richard L. Tunley, NY
•6/13/2004: James Patrick Seldomridge, IN
•4/1/2007: William "Stoney" McCarragher, AZ, whose killer was self-professed serial killer to rid the world of "less than desirables"
•11/30/2007: Daniel G. Sorensen, MI, victim of a “thrill killing”
•12/1/2007: Davion Crow TX
•5/24/2008: Hano Bailey: IA
•6/14/2008: William Joseph Hough, FL
•8/15/2008: Raymond Pike NY
•9/2/2008Cristobal Cuellar, NM
•8/23/2009: Dennis McCarthy, MI: Police believe victim was targeted because of his RC status, wife of victim was in the home and ignored by intruder
•8/25/2009: John Stouffer, OH: One of the killers was pregnant, believed she would lose the baby due to victim's RC status
•3/24/2010: Willard Rex Wright: WV: Stated the victim "had it coming", taunted victim while killing him
•9/14/2012: Constance "Connie" Cole (non-RC), AR: Friend of RC that was target of murder
•9/14/2012: John Poff, AR
•9/26/2012: Derrick Vaccianna, FL
•12/20/2012: Brian James Brinson, TX: Plan was to rob victim as retaliation for alleged sex crime
•1/24/2013: Arthur Schroeder WA: Tried claiming victim, an 82 yr old man in wheelchair, assaulted them to justify robbery-murder
•6/22/2013: David Bailey, KY
•8/12/2013: Donald Wayne Crisp, CA, murder remains unsolved
•9/19/2013: Donald Robinson, MD
•5/8/2014: Ryan Thomas Wells, TX, unsolved murder
•5/26/2014: Tara Vance (non-RC) & Daniel Marker Jr.Charles: OH, vigilantes burned down home of RC
•8/18/2014: Joseph Moisa & Michael Henderson, WA, falsely accused of “grooming”
•8/26/2014: Rolland Lee Tockey, AZ
•9/17/2014: Norman Bill Williams, FL
•12/24/2014: Steven D Manuel, KS
•1/5/2015James Naylor, AL: Killer was not charged even though had posted flyers in the neighborhood & had harassed victim
•1/27/2015: Johnny Singleton, SC
•8/29/2016: Wesley Dee Nay, UT
•1/9/2018:Roderick White (non-RP): CA, killed after a FB page identified White as an RP, though no match on registry could be found by media
•On 5/13/2019, Steven Stryker was murdered by his FloriDUH Court appointed guardian, who capped disabled Stryker's feeding tube despite warnings not to; signed do-not-resuscitate order against Steven's wishes.
•8/10/2019: Jace Decker, a non-RC, was beaten into a coma because the killers falsely believed he was a registered sex offender
•3/24/2020: Elijah Raider, KY
•7/2/2020:Mark Pitts, MO
•10/8/2020: Steven L Weaver, NE: The killers bragged to cop they were hunting victim down before committing the murder; Charles died in a car crash with the victim
•1/15/2021: Robert Braman, Sr. and Samuel Compton Christopher, MI: The killer stated on Facebook he planned to kill RPs
•5/12/2021: Ralph Mendez, Rory Banks, CA: The killer was a Qanon follower, wife says he used registry website and talked about PRs before murder
•5/22/2021: Daniel Sanders, TX
Being accused or convicted of a sexual offense makes many a favorite target for jailhouse bullies. But the following names are Registrants who were murdered in jail or prison while being detained on accusations of Failure To Register:
•10/14/2005: Peter Brian Deakin, Mohave Co Jail, UT (killer was a white supremacist)
•2/14/2008: Shannon Lee Grailing, CSP-Sacramento, CA
•12/2/2009: Robert Running Bear Jr, USP Marion, IL
•11/25/2011: Mark Frederick Hanson, Sterling CF, CO
•2/21/2012: Stuart Brooks, East Mississippi CF
•9/5/2012: Eddie Nelson Jr, Muscogee Co Jail, GA. H was placed in cell with black man looking to murder whites
•12/8/2012: Matthew Scheile, Cummins Unit, AR
•6/4/2013: Shon Demetrius McClain, Wake Co. Det Ctr, NC
•12/14/2014: Edward Larson, Sacramento Co Jail, CA
•8/28/2016: Charles Jones, Brevard Co Jail, FL. Charges later dropped, medical negligence (burst bowels)
•7/29/2017: Harley Holt, Algoa CC, MO
•6/18/2018: James Mills, Pinellas Co Jail, FL
•7/1/2019: David Kever, Santa Rose CI, FL
•10/1/2019: Mark Lawhead, Oklahoma SP. Murderer bragged he "smoked a Savage"
•3/11/2021: John Sullivan, San Quentin SP, CA
•3/15/2022: Scott Gunter, Wasco SP, CA
But not all murders were at the hands of vigilantes. PFRs have also died due to denial of services and neglect. Finding low-income housing, assisted care facilities and nursing homes is a growing problem since many programs refuse to take in a PFR, and many of the programs that accept a PFR tend to provide inadequate service. Here are just a few names of people who have died due to denial of services:
•Joseph Heverin of Dover DE died on 2/25/2008. He had Huntington’s disease, an inherited disorder that causes nerve cells (neurons) in parts of the brain to gradually break down and die. Joseph Herevin was denied entry into an adequate assisted care facility due to his status. He died when someone at a mental health who was not properly trained in Huntington’s disease fed him a grilled cheese sandwich, and Heverin choked to death.
•Thomas Pauli of Grand Rapids MI died 1/26/2009. He was denied shelter due to the state’s residency restriction laws, justified by Smith v Doe, and froze to death in sub-zero temperatures.
•Studies have shown that chronic homelessness shortens lifespans by about 15 years. Thomas Craig, San .Francisco, CA, Died Nov. 18, 2010, and Nicholas Chaykovski, San Francisco, CA, Died Feb. 18, 2010, had health issues but could not receive proper medical care due to registry status.
•In January 2020, Charles Hobbs was detained on suspicion of FTR in Miami FL. When the COVID pandemic began, a judge ordered him released from jail and placed in home confinement, given his multiple underlying conditions of congenital heart failure, kidney failure and hypertension. But the jail refused to release him, and he ultimately died of COVID on 5/2/2020.
As with murders, there is simply no way to know how many people have committed suicide because of the registry. Few of these suicides made headlines so suicide rates among Persons Forced to Register remain underreported. Here are names of a few Registered Persons who took their own lives:
•Justin Fawcett was 17 when he had consensual relations with a 14-year-old classmate. On March 19, 2004, he took his own life. Seven years later, the MI SOR unit had sent the parents a letter notifying them Justin would be excluded from the public registry and was eligible to have his name removed from the registry.
•Clovis Ivan Claxton, Ocala FL, 4/24/2005, who killed himself after fliers in the neighborhood declared him a “child rapist”
•The body of David Allen Bolivar was found on Thanksgiving day 2016 on a beach in Broward Co FL. He was forced into homelessness by the laws championed by Florida Lobbyist Ron Book.
•The threat of registration alone may be enough to compel someone to commit suicide. On 8/28/2009, William Evans of St Augustine, fearing a false conviction for rape, fled the court, and while he was at home taking his own life, the jury had read the verdict in his absence, declaring him not guilty. And on 10/2/2013, a 15 year old from Huntsville AL named Christian Adamek, who already suffered from depression, committed suicide days after being threatened with inclusion on the registry for streaking at a football game.
Smith v Doe based much of their ruling off Kansas v. Hendricks, 521 U.S. 346 (1997), which determined civil commitment for Persons convicted of sexual offenses is also punitive. As a result, many people have been sent to civil commitment centers to rot, and hundreds have died in these concentration camps. Even today, we do not have an accurate picture of the number of deaths because some of these concentration camps censor attempts to pass along relevant information or provide misinformation.
•As of June 8, 2022, 30 men were known to have died in the Texas Civil Commitment Program. The Texas Civil Commitment Office claims only three, so perhaps they forgot to add the zero?
•As of August 18, 2022, 95 registrants have died in the MSOP in Moose Lake and St Peter MN, while only a handful have been released since the program was created in 1993.
•One activist sent me a list of 104 registrants who have died in Florida’s civil commitment centers.
•While I lack complete numbers for deaths in NY, a news investigation reported two deaths in the NY civil commitment centers. One of the men who died had a history of swallowing things and required constant supervision. Workers told police that the man likely swallowed a wad of newspaper while in the bathroom and choked. Police ruled the death an accident.
New York is one of a handful of states that detain people beyond their release dates if they lack definitive housing. UT, AL, IL, and KY have all reportedly kept people in prisons beyond the end of sentence. In KY, Kentucky, five RPFs been “violated at the gate” — that is, found to have violated the conditions of their release before they even left the prison gates, in 2015. One of them died in custody three months later. Many prisoners died during COVID outbreaks, and during the initial outbreak, around 300 people in Illinois were held beyond their release dates.
And even after law enforcement agencies shut down most services during the COVID outbreak, many of us were forced to continue to register, exposing us to a highly contagious and potentially fatal disease.
Over the years, a number of people lost their lives in a different way. They sacrificed their time and effort and ultimately their lives for the sake of advocating against these draconian laws. We honor their sacrifice:
•Mary Duval, OK, Died 6/19/2011
•Ron Daniels of CA, Died in 2013
•The Rev. Dr. C. David Hess, Rochester NY, Died 3/7/2014. In a final email to his state Representative, Rev. Hess stated, “At least my death will get me off the registry. :-) I had hoped for a different exit.”
•eAdvocate, died in January 2018, and another man I just knew as David, who worked behind the scenes for many years, died 7/28/2018.
•Gregory Lauby, Wymore NE, Died 1/25/2023
Finally, we remember the millions who are either currently on the registry, soon to be placed on the registry, those recently removed from the registry, and all who stand with us. In many ways, the public registry has already murdered all of us. We are in many ways The Walking Dead. We are alive and yet we are not allowed to live life to the fullest, restricted in all aspects in our lives—where we can live, work, travel, leisure, and sometimes, even with whom we can establish any kind of bond. We suffer social ostracism. We suffer denial of housing, employment, and social services. We suffer denial of assistance common protections afforded to others during global pandemics and natural disasters. We suffer harassment, vandalism, assaults, and even murder. People encourage us to commit suicide or mutilate our bodies. Some states mark our ID cards and Driver’s Licenses, while the US State Dept. marks the passports of many PFRs.
And even when we want to leave the US for good, the so-called “Angel Watch” program, a service of International Megan’s Law, notifies the nations where we plan to visit or to emigrate. And both visitors and Ex-pats have experienced harassment by law enforcement officials and neighbors. The US had stated in the passage of IML that they intended to spread the American concept of Megan’s Law across the globe.
And all of this pain and suffering can be directly tied to Smith v. Doe. This is the mess you helped create, Chief Justice John “Price Club” Roberts. Do the right thing and clean up this mess you created.
Summary: This year, I had more new contacts than any other year. Many were prisoners, which is unsurprising since I respond to prisoner inquiries and print out some materials for them.
Most of the activism performed by OnceFallen is either the maintenance of the OnceFallen.com website, responding to inquiries, or through prisoner outreach. When needed, OnceFallen is willing to attend activist events, conduct media interviews, and legislative meetings addressing sex offense laws when necessary. OnceFallen runs on a shoestring budget but rarely needs donations unless the need involves travel.
OnceFallen major accomplishments in 2022:
1. Offered assistance to, and attended, a rally against Civil Commitment in Austin, Texas
2. Completed the 3rd Edition of Your Life on The List.
3. Wrote four articles for The Crime Report. No media contacts were made this year, however.
INITIAL CONTACT STATS
Total New Contacts 2022 – 710 (667 in 2021, +43, a 9% increase over 2021)
Reasons for initial contact, in order of most to least common reasons for first contact. Please note, this is only for INITIAL contact, and in the case of prisoners, it may begin with a “general info” contact followed by a later resource request: Housing Leads (165), Legal info or referrals (90), General Info (89), ICoN prisoner newsletter (62), State Law questions (50), Probation/Parole issues (28), Prisoner/Jail issues (25) Book/Your Life on The List (23), Activism (23), ARM surveys (14), Harassment (11), Thank You notes (10), and Employment issues (10). The rest were specific questions not listed.
New contacts were spread across 44 US States, DC, and the USVI, in addition to at least one contact from Denmark, Germany, The Netherlands, and Singapore. I made no known contact with anyone from AK, HI, ID, MT, MS, and RI in 2022.
States ranked from most to least inquiries: Wisconsin (70); FloriDUH (56); Ohio (35); Texas (29); Georgia & Missouri (20 each); Illinois & California (17 each); New York (15); Michigan (14); Pennsylvania (13); Virginia (12); Kansas (11); Arkansas, New Jersey, & Washington (10 each); Colorado, Indiana, & Tennessee (9 each); N. Carolina & Oklahoma (7 each); West Virginia (6); Arizona & Oregon (5 each); Kentucky (4); Connecticut, Iowa, Maryland, & Minnesota (3 each); DC, Delaware, Louisiana, Nebraska, The Netherlands, Nevada, and Vermont (2 each); Denmark, Germany, Maine, North Dakota, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Singapore, Utah, US Virgin Is., and Wyoming (1 each). 228 ever mentioned location
Initial Contact Type from most to least common: Corrlinks (212), email (216), letter/postal mail (133), phone (91), text (39), Facebook (12), LinkedIn (1), Twitter (1)
New contacts by month; January (106), February (52), March (73), April (50), May (43), June (52), July (46), August (64), September (61), October (64), November (38), December (61)
Corrlinks Informational Newsletter (ICoN) subscribers: At the end of 2022, I had 1315 total Corrlinks subscribers (up from 1196 in 2021), but of those, 392 are state prisoners (slightly up from 385 in 2021), and because it costs extra to send email to state prisoners, these 392 do not receive monthly newsletters. That leaves 923 federal and CCA prisoners receiving the newsletters. In 2021, there were 811 subscribers, so this is an increase of 112 subscribers, or 8.7%.
Letter Stats: OnceFallen received 286 total requests by mail (note: many were repeat requests), which is 51 (15.1%) less than last year.
Financial Resources & Expenses
Financial support decreased over 2021 numbers by about 18%. Since OnceFallen typically operates on a shoestring budget, donations, particularly large donations, are generally not needed. I was invited to take part in a rally against Civil Commitment in Texas, which was the only action that required significant funds, and thus significant fundraising efforts. Typical expenses include supplies related to prisoner outreach, including envelopes, stamps, printer toner, phone expenses, the occasional free book to prisoners, etc. I do not expect to take part in any public awareness events in 2023 so I expect even less financial support due to a lower need to raise funds in 2023.
In 2022 the federal government decreased the amount of money individuals can collect from online transactions from $20k to $600, so OnceFallen suspended all online transactions. This is likely the reason behind the decline in donations. But since I have no plans to participate in public events in 2023, this is nothing to worry about.
Anti-Registry Groups are staging a vigil commemorating the terrible landmark ruling of Smith vs Doe, decided in March 2023, which declared the registry is not punitive. There is also a conference preceding the vigil. See details below.
YOU DO NOT HAVE TO ATTEND THE CONFERENCE TO ATTEND THE VIGIL. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO ATTEND THE VIGIL TO ATTEND THE CONFERENCE.
Once Fallen encourages those who can only attend one event to make that event the vigil. We need a strong PUBLIC showing.
VIGIL DETAILS:
The vigil that will take place at the steps of the US Supreme Court building on the morning of Tuesday, March 7th 2023, marks the 20th anniversary of the controversial SCOTUS ruling Smith v. Doe which concluded the public sex offense registry is not punitive (punishment) and constitutional safeguards do not apply. There is a large sidewalk in front of the SCOTUS building we can gather without a permit. The boundary is the lowest step leading to the SCOTUS Plaza (the large over shaped area before the steps to the SCOTUS Bldg.) This still gives us ample space for hundreds of people.
We cannot stand on the grounds/plaza, but there is ample room on the public sidewalk.
There are a few regulations regarding protest/vigil signs allowed near the SCOTUS building in regards to size and construction (not content). See these rules at:
You do not have to sign up for/attend the conference to attend the vigil, and you are not required to attend the vigil if you only wish to attend the conference. However, I encourage you to attend both if possible.
WAR is planning on using arranged transportation for visits to Capitol Hill and the vigil. However, if staying away from the hotel and are traveling independently to Capitol Hill and/or the vigil, you might want to consider leaving your car at the hotel and taking the METRO subway system. The “Capitol South Station” subway stop is a mere 2.5-block walk north to the SCOTUS building, and the Blue, Silver, and Orange subway lines make this stop. (If taking a different line you’ll have to transfer to the aforementioned lines.) For details on using the METRO rail system, go to:
Weather in DC can vary greatly. In 2022, March 5-7 saw mostly sunny weather with a high temperature between 55 degrees and 75 degrees and lows in the 40s and 50s, followed by rain and a cooldown with highs in the 40s. You may wish to plan for both a warm day and a cold day (and even a wet day) if you plan to attend the vigil.
Start making your plans today to attend this historic event!
CONFERENCE INFO:
See this link for more details and to sign up for the conference. WAR has a special hotel rate at a hotel in Alexandria VA:
If you are a Person Forced to Register and you are staying in VA or in DC to attend these events, you do not have to register if you are just visiting and are returning home after the events.
WAR is hosting a two-day conference preceding the vigil. The conference runs Sunday, March 5th, 2023 and Monday, March 6th, 2023. Keynote speakers include Virginia Representative Bobby Scott, one of the few legislators bold enough to speak out openly against the registry. On Monday afternoon, conference attendees will engage a visit to Capitol Hill and meet with our elected officials.
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