Jesse Timmendequas had been convicted of two other sex offenses toward a child, once in 1979, and again in 1981, both times for assaulting a female child less than seven years of age. After his second conviction, Timmendequas was sentenced to six years in the Adult Diagnostic and Treatment Center in Anvel, New Jersey. After he was released from Anvel, he and to other convicted pedophiles moved into a house across the street from the Kankas in Hamilton Township, New Jersey. Megan Kanka

Prosecutor Kathryn Flicker said in her closing statement "the magnitude of Timmendequas' crime outweighed any abuse he might have endured." The jury agreed with that statement because Timmendequas was found guilty of all charges brought against him. The jury decided that while he had probably been abused both sexually and physically as a child, it did not account for his raping and murdering Megan Kanka. On May 30, 1997, Jesse Timmendequas was convicted of intentional murder, rape, sodemy, kidnapping, and felony murder. On June 20, 1997, Judge Andrew J. Smithson ordered that Timmendequas was to be put to death on August 1, 1997 because there were two aggravating circumstances that were enough for the death penalty. These two circumstances were that he killed Megan Kanka to eliminate a witness, and also that he did so while committing another felony.

There are many different offenses that would require registration. These offenses would be aggravated sexual assault, sexual assault, aggravated criminal sexual contact, endangering the welfare of a child by engaging in sexual conduct which would impair the morals of the child, luring and enticing and kidnapping a child, criminal restraint, and false imprisonment. Any one who is on parole for a sex crime, or has ever been convicted of a sex crime, has to register no matter when their crimes are committed. Some pedophiles have to register every year, while others have to register every 90 days.

Many registered offenders have been victims of vigilantism and other acts of violence done by the people in their own communities who are trying to get revenge against them. Vigilantism is "crimes like vandalism of property, verbal or written threats of harm, or physical violence against the offender, his family, or his employer." Some people think either the pedophiles are dangerous criminals and should be put in jail for the rest of their lives, or they are not dangerous after they are released from prison, in which case they should be given back their full civil rights. They should not have to go through the rest of their lives having to register every time they want to move.

There are some variations from state to state in their notification laws. For example, some states notify the public by having the local police hand out handbills with all the information needed on them; other states have a CD ROM disc it all the relevant information that anyone who wants to can come look at it, but it is up to the public to come see it. States also have different versions of Megan's Law. In Pennsylvania a repeat child molester will be sentenced to life in jail. Defendants also have to prove they aren't sexually violent predators before they are released. Their law not only requires offenders convicted of sex crimes against children, but offenders convicted of sex crimes against anyone to register with local police agencies. In California, if a law enforcement official thinks that a child is in danger, then he can release the needed information to the school district in which the child attends. Also, information is released whenever needed about the pedophiles, but there will never be any information about the pedophile's victims released. It is good that states have some form of notification laws, but every state needs to have the same law for everyone to really be protected.

In 1996, most states had laws about registering or tracking released sex offenders, but only 15 of these states require public notification of the location of these offenders. States now have to classify pedophiles on how likely they are to repeat the crimes they have previously committed and how dangerous they are to the community, not just on how severe their original crime was. County prosecutors evaluate the offender to determine his risk level and how dangerous he could be. Some of the things that help the prosecutors determine the risk level are the status of his therapy or cou

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2960
Approximate Pages = 12 (250 words per page double spaced)