Appeals court ruling rejected Colorado’s approach to treatment
Colorado’s sex offenders have long maintained the state treats them as pariahs, closely monitoring where they live, what they look at, who they talk to and what they discuss. One claimed in federal court filings that he was warned against keeping a crucifix because it displayed partial nudity. Another, convicted of groping a woman, said he had to write down his thoughts every time he saw a school bus.
The idea was to protect children, but the resulting system that cut off offenders from their own families has now been struck down in federal court. That leaves Colorado to create a new sex-offender treatment and management system that defense lawyers say is long overdue but prosecutors worry will put children at risk.
Supporters of the changes point to lives disrupted by what they call an outdated and overreaching system. David Zayatz, 39, said Colorado authorities threatened to separate him from his family after he was arrested in Florida on a parole violation in 2015. An indecent-exposure charge when he was 15 years old — for “mooning some people,” Zayatz said, although an official account was not available because he was a juvenile — put him on Colorado’s radar as a sex offender.
Police in Florida had stopped Zayatz for a traffic offense and discovered he absconded from parole in Colorado 16 years earlier after serving prison time for burglary. When Zayatz was returned to Colorado, he learned he was classified as an “unadjudicated sex offender” because of the old exposure charge. Based on a psychosexual evaluation, authorities determined Zayatz could continue living with his common-law wife and daughter after he reparoled back to Florida.
“I mooned someone when I was 15. How many kids do stupid stuff like that every day? And here I am turning 40 years old and still dealing with it,” Zayatz said. ..Continued.. by Christopher N. Osher
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