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<< Previous   of   Next >>   ADVERTISEMENT   CONTACT THE HERALD Robert Frank, City Editor frank@heraldnet.com   Published: Thursday, September 27, 2007 GPS unit will mind some high-risk offenders Requiring sex criminals to wear tracking devices may help solve crimes, police say. By Jackson Holtz and Diana Hefley Herald Writers OLYMPIA -- A handful of the state's most dangerous sex offenders soon could wear tracking devices as part of a new effort announced Wednesday by Gov. Chris Gregoire. The devices -- global positioning systems in ankle bracelets -- cannot prevent violent crimes but can help police know if a sex offender was at the scene of a crime, officials said. "The community needs to understand that this is not going to be an air-traffic control center where these guys will be monitored 24-7," Mountlake Terrace Police Chief Scott Smith said. "We don't want to create a false sense of security." The additional monitoring on the worst offenders is an appropriate, measured response to an immediate need, he said. Smith, chairman of the legislative committee of Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs, is part of a committee the governor tasked with developing stricter sex offender rules after the killing of a Tacoma girl. "It's not going to stop sex offenders from committing crimes in our communities," Smith said. "It's simply another tool." The monitoring is a passive system that every 24 hours will provide a detailed summary of a sex offender's travels. "They'll be more likely to behave themselves in the community if they know they're being monitored and we can track where they've been," Smith said. Ideally, the system would be active, giving real-time data, and law enforcement would have direct access to information on the offenders' whereabouts, Snohomish County sheriff's detective Joe Beard said. The system could help police verify that the sex offender is actually living at the address the offender provides when he or she registers with the sheriff's office, he said. "If they're telling DOC (Department of Corrections) they're homeless but telling us they live somewhere, we can go look," Beard said. There are about 1,600 sex offenders registered in Snoho­mish County. The vast majority have been deemed level one offenders, or the least likely to reoffend. For now, the only offenders subject to the new monitoring will be those judged level three, or deemed at the highest risk to reoffend. Their crimes also must have been committed since June 2006. On Wednesday, one sex offender in Washington was outfitted with the tracking device, state Department of Corrections spokeswoman Anna Aylward said. Four more will be required to strap on the devices this week. By the end of June, 50 more will wear the device and in the next year, as many as 150 offenders may wear the devices. Currently, about 32 offenders meet the criteria for the ankle bracelets, officials said. Of those, 18 have been identified as possible candidates for wearing the tracking devices. Corrections officers will look at a sex offender's compliance with laws, stability in the community and other risk factors to determine who wears a bracelet, Aylward said. "As governor and as a mother, keeping the community safe is one of my top priorities," Gregoire said. "With advice, guidance and partnership of state and local police officers, we are taking additional measures to better track sex offenders to better protect communities." The money to expand electronic monitoring will come from an emergency fund. The move comes after the July kidnapping and slaying of 12-year-old Zina Linnik of Tacoma. Police arrested a sex offender, Terapon Adhahn, in connection with the case. Adhahn now faces aggravated first-degree murder, first-degree kidnapping and first-degree rape charges in Pierce County. Adhahn failed to register when he changed residences. Authorities did not know his whereabouts at the time of the crime. The program announced Wednesday would not have affected Adhahn, officials said, because he was not then considered a risk to reoffend. Offenses can still happen and people can still make poor choices, Aylward said. "This is not an end all, be all," she said. "This is just one more tool we can use to promote public safety." Herald writer Jerry Cornfield contributed to this report. Reporter Jackson Holtz: 425-339-3437 or jholtz@heraldnet.com.

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