Lawyer challenges Pasco predator ordinance

UPDATE: Pasco asks court to dismiss sex predator’s lawsuit over residency

12-30-15 Florida:

LUTZ — Instead of enjoying Christmas surrounded by his family in the Lutz home where he grew up, Earl Reyes Villagomeza passed the holidays alone in a cheap hotel room near the Florida State Fairgrounds.

Some would argue that’s exactly what a convicted child predator deserves — a lonely, isolated existence.

Tampa lawyer Patrick LeDuc, however, contends Villagomeza has paid for his crimes and deserves to go home.

He has filed a lawsuit against Pasco County, asserting the county’s sexual offender and sexual predator ordinance, passed by the county commission in April, is unconstitutional, calling the ordinance “unconstitutionally vague, overbroad and punitive.”

At the Dec. 15 Pasco County Commission meeting, the commission OK’d the county attorney’s request to defend the county against the lawsuit. Assistant County Attorney Kristi Sims will represent Pasco County.

But LeDuc believes the county is poised to spend a large hunk of taxpayer money on a defense it can’t win.

“They aren’t doing their taxpayers any favors. The Pasco County Commission is attempting to violate the constitutional rights of convicted sexual predators by making it impossible for them to live in Pasco County,” he said.

“I get it. Sex offenders are horrid people; the scum of the Earth,” said LeDuc. “But these types of laws really begin to go to a dark place. They’re trying to build a Chinese wall around Pasco County to keep these people out.”

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Florida’s Sexual Predator Act, passed in 1998, already prohibits convicted sex offenders from living within 1,000 feet of schools, child-care centers, parks, playgrounds and other places where children gather.

But the Pasco County Commission, at the urging of County Commissioner Mike Moore and Sheriff Chris Nocco, unanimously passed its own ordinance, increasing the buffer to 2,500 feet, or about half a mile.

The Pasco ordinance also makes it illegal for registered sex offenders to give out candy on Halloween and establishes safety zones that make it illegal for them to be within 300 feet of school bus stops, public pools, skating rinks, Boys & Girls Clubs and other child-centered facilities.

Nocco said the new rules are needed to protect children against vicious predators.

“We’re not talking about Romeos and Juliets here,” he said. “These crimes are the worst of the worst.”

Hillsborough County sheriff’s deputies arrested Villagomeza, 31, on Sept. 18, 2014, and charged him with three counts of lewd or lascivious molestation of a child age 12 to 15.

“He was accused of inappropriately touching over clothes,” said LeDuc.

His first offense, Villagomeza pleaded guilty to two counts of lewd or lascivious molestation. Instead of receiving jail time, he was sentenced to two years of community control followed by eight years of sex offender probation.

But LeDuc said the punishment being imposed on Villagomeza by Pasco County goes way beyond community control.

“He has to wear a Scarlet A for the rest of his life,” said LeDuc, referring to Nathaniel Hawthorne’s historical novel, “The Scarlet Letter,” in which a woman accused of adultery is forced to wear a scarlet letter A on her dress.

Villagomeza has lived at his parents’ home on Dockside Drive in Lutz since he was 3 years old, said LeDuc. Under the state’s sexual predator law, he still would be allowed to live there.

But Villagomeza is the first registered sex offender to fall under the county’s new residency restrictions. The 907 registered sex offenders living in Pasco prior to enactment of the ordinance are subject to the state’s less-restrictive statute, said LeDuc.

However, he foresees many more civil rights complaints against the county as convicted sex offenders are released from prison and attempt to return to their lives in Pasco County.

“If I were Hillsborough and Pinellas counties, I’d be very concerned,” he said. “This ordinance is going to force registered sex offenders to relocate to surrounding counties that fall under the state’s less-restrictive residency requirements.”

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In his 43-page complaint against Pasco County filed Oct. 8 in Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Court, LeDuc details how it is impossible for Villagomeza to step foot in Pasco County without violating the county ordinance.

“Pasco includes home-schools. There are 1,200 home schools in Pasco County,” said LeDuc. “Offenders have to be 300 feet from a school bus stop. There are 4,400 bus stops in Pasco County. They have a list of 27 places these offenders aren’t allowed to go, including public and private parks, libraries, zoos, public beaches, game centers, carnivals and businesses where children gather.”

LeDuc said the ordinance doesn’t specify which businesses are off limits, so it is left up to the discretion of law enforcement.

“Target and Wal-Mart stores have toy departments where kids gather,” noted LeDuc. “Are they included? Under these restrictions, the only alternative for a registered predator is to pitch a tent in the Green Swamp.”

LeDuc believes the intent of Pasco’s ordinance is clear.

“They don’t want sex offenders in Pasco County,” he said. “If any county commissioner says otherwise, I’d call him a liar.”

Moore isn’t refuting the intent of the ordinance.

“We want to make it as difficult as possible to return or relocate back to Pasco to commit what, to me, are pretty sick crimes,” said Moore when he first proposed the ordinance in December 2014. “Quite a few municipalities (in Florida) have done similar things.

Miami-Dade County passed a more restrictive ordinance in 2010, and Lake County followed suit in 2012. Both counties now face legal challenges.

The city of Jacksonville’s ordinance was struck down by a Duval County court in 2007. The court concluded the city cannot pass an ordinance that preempts a state statute.

“Every court that’s dealt with this issue has concluded these statutes are unconstitutional,” said LeDuc. “Pasco County is going to lose huge.”

In the meantime, on Tuesday LeDuc filed an emergency motion for a temporary injunction to allow Villagomeza to return home until the lawsuit is resolved. A hearing on the motion tentatively is scheduled for Jan. 6.

“Yes, these guys have done terrible things and deserve to be punished,” said LeDuc. “But at what point do they find redemption? Whatever happened to the Judeo-Christian doctrine of grace and forgiveness?”

Assistant County Attorney Kristi Sims was unavailable for comment. ..Source.. by D’ANN LAWRENCE WHITE