Friday, August 28, 2009

Kafka Would Cry

Wendy Whitaker is the poster child for Georgia's byzantine Sex Offender laws.While Genarlow Wilson's very public case fixed one flaw in the system, Whitaker, recently featured in the a Economist article, is still lost in a legal maze only a legislature guided by goodness but not wisdom could design.

Whitaker is a registered sex offender due to her untimely fellating of a classmate during a break at school. At the time, she was 17 and the "victim" was 15. A Creative Loafing story in 2006 detailed the hardships resulting from the scarlet letter.

Now, she's been arrested again.

No, she has not returned to her fellating ways. She failed to notify her local Sheriff's office of a change of address - a change mandated by recent additions severely limiting where registered sex offenders can alight.

Creative Loafing's Scott Henry has the details.
In Whitaker’s case, because it was her husband’s name, not hers, on their home mortgage, she was allowed to return to her house — after living with relatives in a rural trailer park — only due to a temporary court injunction....But this past Monday, police in Columbia County arrested Whitaker at her mother’s house, charging her with failing to register a new address. If convicted, she faces a 10- to 30-year prison sentence under Georgia law. Last year, a bill to reduce the penalty for failure to register passed the state Senate, but Keen was able to kill it in the House...At this writing, Whitaker remains in jail, unable to make her $10,000 bail.
Regular readers know it takes an exceptional circumstance for this site to take a position of advocacy. This is one.

If someone sets up a defense fund for Wendy Whitaker, I'll pass along the details. Hell, I'll likely contribute.

5 comments:

Sara said...

I wish I had time to set one up myself, because I am THAT angry about this.

This poor woman has been persecuted for something that should never have been a crime in the first place. It is completely garbage.

Icarus said...

One of us over at the "cesspool" just weighed in on this one.

chamblee54 said...

Thank you for pointing this out. The fishwrapper has not reported this story. There is now a story at chamblee54.

Dave Bearse said...

"is still lost in a legal maze only a legislature guided by goodness but not wisdom could design."

There's no goodness here, unless politician's pandering is considered good.

Someone ought to be able to challenge the school bus stop component on the grounds that a school authority has taken property without compensation should a new school bus stop be establish that would require a registered offender to move from a home he owns and where he resides.

Sara Totonchi said...

with regard to challenging the bus stop provision, the Southern Center for Human Rights has a challenge pending in federal court. In face, Wendy Whitaker is our named plaintiff. See: http://www.schr.org/safety/registry