Jessica’s Law is the general term for the House bill HR 1505 of the 109th Congress which also applies to state-level versions, including the Florida law that inspired the federal Jessica Lunsford Act. This proposed law, if adopted, would mandate more stringent tracking of released sex offenders.
The bill is named for Jessica Lunsford, the nine-year-old Florida girl abducted and killed in February of 2005. Convicted sex offender John Evander Couey is in custody and is charged with those crimes.
The bill, if passed, would reduce federal grant money under the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 and the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 to any U.S. State that doesn’t conform its sex offender registration laws to the following:
• Require sex offenders who were convicted more than twice of failing to properly register as a sex offender to wear Global Positioning System devices on their ankles for five years following their release from prison, or for ten years for those deemed sexual predators, to better enable law enforcement personnel to track their whereabouts. Costs of tracking and monitoring offenders must be absorbed by each state.
• States must mail sex offender registration forms at least twice per year, at random times, to verify registrants\’ addresses. Any registrants who do not respond within 10 days must be considered non-compliant.
The bill has been promoted most notably by U.S. Congresswoman Ginny Brown-Waite R-Florida, and by Fox News anchor Bill O\’Reilly.
Jessica’s Law in Florida
The Florida law which inspired the federal action outlines mandatory sentencing and provisions for convicted sexual predators. Lawmakers and Florida citizens were outraged that the man accused of killing her was a registered sex offender who lived within a few hundred yards of Jessica’s home. He also had failed to register his whereabouts with authorities.
Jessica’s Law was passed in both the Senate and House unanimously. The law mandates a mandatory sentence of at least 25 years behind bars for people convicted of certain sex crimes against children 11 and younger, with lifetime tracking by global positioning satellite after they are freed. It also requires twice yearly re-registration by sexual predators; provides criminal offenses for failing to reregister, failing to respond to address verification, failing to report or providing false information about sexual predator, and harboring or concealing a sexual predator.
This is the first time a state law has required lifetime GPS monitoring for people who commit a specific crime.
The law also may open the way for the death penalty for more killers. A defendant’s status as a sexual predator can be considered as an aggravating factor during sentencing of convicted murderers.
The measure gives Florida one of the toughest child-sex laws in the nation and we feel that it or a similar version should be the law here in Tennessee. How can we protect our children from predators if we don’t even know who or where those predators are?
Material for this article taken from wire services, government publications and archived Herald Newspaper articles.

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