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Life & Times Transcript

07/05/06

Val Zavala>> Tonight on Life and Times --

No one wants a sex offender living next door, but what can a landlord do about it?

Ronda Kerwin>> "Did you know there was a high-risk sex offender that moved into the community? How could you, Ronda? How could you move a high-risk sex offender on my community? How come you can't evict?"

Val Zavala>> And then, they've already done hard time behind bars, but some ex-offenders say it's even harder when they get out.

It's all straight ahead on tonight's Life and Times.

Announcer>> Life and Times is made possible through the generous support of the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of medicine, health, science and education.

And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg.

Val Zavala>> Welcome to this special edition of Life and Times where we take an in-depth look at ex-cons. What happens to people who come out of prison and move back into our neighborhoods? We'll look at their chances of finding a job. But first, a two-part report on landlords and sex offenders.

Sex offenders as tenants. When it comes to renting to sex offenders, landlords cannot discriminate and yet, if someone should become a victim, the landlord can be sued. Is this fair? Hena Cuevas talked to one landlord who learned this the hard way.

Hena Cuevas>> Ronda Kerwin has managed apartment buildings for the past eighteen years. She recently faced one of her biggest challenges. Last February, she rented an apartment to a tenant. Two days later, police knocked on her door.

Ronda Kerwin>> We confirmed that the resident did live onsite and the police officer said, you know, are you aware that this is a high-risk sex offender, which we were not.

Hena Cuevas>> According to Kerwin, the man who police told her liked to expose himself to children had requested a unit overlooking the pool. He was considered so dangerous that police asked to have three undercover officers onsite to keep an eye on him.

Ronda Kerwin>> After he let us know that they have this undercover type team on the property, he actually gave me the statement that said it's not if he's going to offend. It's when he's going to offend, Ronda, and you need to be aware of that.

Hena Cuevas>> Even with the agents watching, Kerwin worried about something happening to young tenants.

Ronda Kerwin>> What if something happens to this seven year old that lives next door? What if he chooses to pick somebody up from our pool? What if he offends? What's going to happen? I am going to feel this overwhelming guilt that I didn't notify my residents.

Hena Cuevas>> But as much as she wanted to, her hands were tied. By law, landlords cannot inform residents that a sex offender is living in the complex and it also prevents them from evicting offenders based on their record.

Ronda Kerwin>> I'm in a catch-22 situation. If I notify the residents, then I have a high-risk sex offender who can sue my organization and sue me personally for a fair housing violation. If I don't notify, then I have residents that I've put in harm's way.

Hena Cuevas>> But why didn't this man's conviction pop up during the application process? As a registered sex offender, his information is readily available on the internet on the Megan's Law website, a registry by the Office of the Attorney General of more than sixty-three thousand sex offenders.

The law was named after Megan Kanka from New Jersey who was killed in 1994 by a twice-convicted sex offender. In 2004, the registry went online, making it easier for parents to know if any sex offenders were living in their area. So why didn't Kerwin use the site to make her decision?

Debra Carlton>> Rental property owners cannot use the Megan's Law database to make decisions about housing.

Hena Cuevas>> Debra Carlton is with the California Apartment Association.

Debra Carlton>> When the legislature created this statute, they sent the public message that these guys pose a risk. But at the same time, they said the database cannot be used by rental property owners or managers to make a decision about housing.

Hena Cuevas>> Landlords can evict tenants with thirty days' notice without giving them a reason. However, if the sex offender challenges the eviction and takes the landlord to court, the landlord needs to show that his or her decision wasn't based on anything they found on the website. If it is shown that they were influenced by information from the internet, they could be fined up to twenty-five thousand dollars. In Kerwin's case, the offender's new address hit the site twenty-four hours after he updated it. She immediately got barraged with questions from angry residents.

Ronda Kerwin>> "Did you know there was a high-risk sex offender that moved into the community? How could you, Ronda? How could you move a high-risk sex offender on my community? How come you can't evict?" I can tell you that, out of the fifteen individuals, fifteen residents, that I actually spoke to regarding this situation, not one of them understood that. Not one.

Hena Cuevas>> Within a month, four tenants moved out. That's why Carlton and her group want to modify the law so landlords can deny tenancy or evict a sex offender.

Debra Carlton>> We don't want these high-risk sex offenders to have the ability to claim that they are a protected class so then, when rental property owners use the database to evict them, they claim fair housing laws or they've been discriminated against.

Hena Cuevas>> But potential lawsuits don't stop there. Megan's Law says that, if a landlord fails to protect a resident from a known risk, the resident could sue the landlord and the landlord could be liable. And yet, allowing landlords to use the sex offender site would violate the original intent of the law, which is only to inform and not discriminate. Scott Ciment is an attorney who is against the idea of expanding the use of the website.

Scott Ciment>> The problem saying that we're going to allow landlords to not rent to somebody who has to register is that it's going to be pretty difficult to find a place to live.

Hena Cuevas>> Ciment works for California Attorneys for Criminal Justice, one of the few groups protecting the rights of sex offenders.

Scott Ciment>> They're not getting special privileges. Because we're not allowed to throw stones at them as they walk down the street doesn't mean that they're a protected class.

Hena Cuevas>> He says, in California, certain safeguards were included in the law precisely to make sure offenders weren't discriminated against.

Scott Ciment>> When they came up with the database, there was a lot of concerns about, well, is there going to be vigilantism based on making this information publicly available and what are some of the ramifications of doing this?

Hena Cuevas>> The website provides the name and address of the offender as well as the crime and some of the descriptions are chilling. "Lewd or lascivious acts with a child under fourteen". "Oral copulation with person under fourteen". "Annoy and molest children". But Ciment is quick to point out those other penal code listings as legal speak and may sound worse than the actual offense.

Scott Ciment>> And these things aren't explained. Annoying a child is a misdemeanor, annoying or molesting a child in California. It doesn't necessarily involve bodily contact at all.

Hena Cuevas>> And that's one of the criticisms of the Megan's Law website. It lumps high-risk and low-risk sex offenders together. Not only that, but there are no dates listed, no way of knowing if the offense happened two years or twenty years ago. That's the case for Paul, a registered sex offender whose single offense happened back in 1988.

"Paul">> People don't even know if you did it one time or if you did it ten times. So they have no way of knowing if he's a problem or not. If they see you on the website, they assume that you're the same type of person that attacked and killed Megan.

Scott Ciment>> The process for getting off the Megan's Law database is so convoluted and so difficult that it essentially doesn't exist.

Hena Cuevas>> So basically, once you get on the list, you're on for life.

Scott Ciment>> You're on the list, oh, yeah, except for certain low-level offenses. In misdemeanor sex offenses, you can apply to get off the database, but you have to go through a fairly difficult process to get off.

Hena Cuevas>> Paul, who had kept his offenses secret for two decades, never had a problem finding a place to live until now. Just three months after he moved into an apartment in Orange County, his information was posted online. After residents complained, he was asked to move. He did. Now it's happening again at his new place, but this time, the new landlord is paying him to leave.

"Paul">> It's not enough money because what you're buying is my right to live anywhere I want and I don't know if I can find another place equal to or better than the place I'm at right now.

Hena Cuevas>> Paying offenders to move is how most landlords are taking care of the problem. That's what Kerwin eventually did.

Ronda Kerwin>> So after six thousand dollars, we were able to negotiate with him to move off the property with a signed stipulation.

Hena Cuevas>> Six thousand dollars, she says, is a small price to pay for some peace of mind. I'm Hena Cuevas for Life and Times.

Announcer>> Kcet.org is the place to look for the very latest on Life and Times. You'll find previews of upcoming stories, plus transcripts and audio of past episodes and links to some of our most interesting features. Just go to kcet.org, scroll down the page and click on "Life and Times".

Val Zavala>> There isn't much sympathy out there for sex offenders and, these days, their criminal records are easily available online, but what about low-risk offenders like the man you're about to meet? A single offense twenty years ago makes him very unlikely to offend again. Hena Cuevas takes a look at how the Megan's Law website has impacted his life.

Hena Cuevas>> It takes only a few clicks and the information of more than sixty-three thousand registered sex offenders is available for all to see. This is the Megan's Law database which became available on the internet in 2004. Its main goal is to help parents protect their children by tracking the whereabouts of sex offenders.

They can search by name, address, zip code, county or school, but the site has also created havoc for some of those listed here, like this man. He's a registered sex offender who asked us not to use his real name, so we'll call him Paul.

"Paul">> About two weeks after I'd moved here, my landlord came to me and said that someone was moving in and they saw my face on the Megan site. They knew that I lived here and they refused to move in here because of that.

Hena Cuevas>> Paul's first and last offense happened back in 1988 when he was high on drugs.

"Paul">> I was walking to the bathroom. I was living in a home with a single mom and her daughter. Her daughter was sleeping with the door open and I thought to myself that I could touch her without her knowing because she's asleep. I didn't do anything to hurt her, but I just touched her improperly.

Hena Cuevas>> How old was she?

"Paul">> She was fourteen.

Hena Cuevas>> The mother kicked him out of the house. He says he was so distraught that he turned himself in to the police.

"Paul">> I began to think about it and I realized you got a problem, man. I said this is stupid. This is sick.

Hena Cuevas>> Was that the first time it had happened or the first time that you had gotten caught?

"Paul">> No. The absolute very first time it ever happened, the last time that that ever happened. I was very clear after that that I had crossed some boundaries.

Hena Cuevas>> His offense happened almost two decades ago, but like all the entries on the Megan's Law website, his doesn't have a date.

"Paul">> People don't even know if you did it one time or if you did it ten times, so they have no way of knowing if he's a problem or not. If they see you on the website, they assume that you're the same type of person that attacked and killed Megan.

Hena Cuevas>> Megan's Law was established nationwide in 1994. It was named after Megan Kanka who was killed in New Jersey by a twice-convicted sex offender. According to Scott Ciment of California Attorneys for Criminal Justice, having the information available online has created some unintended consequences.

Scott Ciment>> There are a lot of people who have convictions back when they were teens or in their early twenties who are now in their fifties and their sixties. This information is coming up on the database and they haven't had any problems in the last thirty years.

Hena Cuevas>> After Paul's twenty year old secret was out, his landlord asked him to move.

"Paul">> She didn't think it was right, I didn't think it was right, but she was up against it and she said the pressure was insurmountable. It wasn't just the realtors, but the company that she works for.

Hena Cuevas>> As it stands, a landlord can't evict someone because of information they found on the Megan's Law website. In fact, they're even barred from using the site during the application process or they could be fined up to twenty-five thousand dollars. However, they're still responsible if something were to happen to a resident because of a known danger and one such danger would be having a sex offender living on the premises.

Debra Carlton>> So they're in a catch-22 situation.

Hena Cuevas>> Debra Carlton represents the California Apartment Association. Her group is trying to change the law so that landlords can use the information.

Debra Carlton>> What we're asking the legislature to do is basically give us the ability to make decisions through the application process or through the eviction process when it comes to high-risk sex offenders.

Hena Cuevas>> The restrictions became a problem for apartment manager, Ronda Kerwin, after a high-risk sex offender moved into her complex earlier this year.

Ronda Kerwin>> We were actually told by the police department that this is a really bad man and you don't want him living in your community.

Hena Cuevas>> But there was nothing she could do. She couldn't notify her residents and she couldn't kick the guy out.

Ronda Kerwin>> It became almost as if he became the protected resident when, in fact, I felt this overwhelming obligation to protect the hundred fifty-seven children and the nine hundred ninety-nine residents that lived on my property.

Hena Cuevas>> She eventually reached a settlement with the tenant, offering him six thousand dollars to move. In Paul's case, just two months after he moved in, his landlord also offered him money to leave, but the amount was much higher.

"Paul">> I said I don't know when I move from here where I'm going to go and how much it would take for me to maintain my family until I did find a place. I said I don't think your people are ready to hear what I'm about to say, but fifteen thousand is what comes to my mind.

Hena Cuevas>> When you hear the number of fifteen thousand dollars, that's quite a bit of money. It could be either considered -- is it extortion that you're working the system?

"Paul">> I don't want to move, but at the same time, what would it take to make me move or would I be willing to move for? That would be an encouragement, but even now at that point where I'm going to be moving tomorrow, it's not enough money.

Hena Cuevas>> So basically, something to make it worth your while.

"Paul">> It has to be worth my while, but at the same time, it's not enough money because what you're buying is my right to live anywhere I want and I don't know if I can find another place equal to or better than the place I'm at right now.

Hena Cuevas>> And knowing that it may happen again.

"Paul">> Oh, that's almost a given now.

Hena Cuevas>> This is actually the second time Paul has been forced to move. At his previous address, neighbors plastered these flyers all over the complex.

"Paul">> They're not educated enough to even understand what they're given, so they take this mob mentality and turn you into an object and say, "Oh, yeah, whatever you do with him is fine with me because the person deserves punishment."

Hena Cuevas>> Paul is considered a low-risk offender, but he hasn't been able to get off Megan's list and there's no way of knowing the details of his offense just by looking at his profile. Low-risk sex offenders like Paul are lumped in with high-risk ones. In working on the story, the reaction has been, "I don't care. I do not feel sorry for these people. It serves them right that we know where they are" and there's just no love lost.

"Paul">> If I hadn't done what I did and I wasn't in this situation, I almost feel like I understand that. But what they don't know is that this is another person just like you that made a mistake, that actually in this case requires this type of punishment.

Hena Cuevas>> If there is a tightening of the law or a change in the law, then where would sex offenders live?

Debra Carlton>> We usually say, "Where shouldn't they live?" Our answer to that is they shouldn't live next door to a five year old. Apartments are very unique in that you have high density, where you have playgrounds, you have family swimming pools, you have shared facilities. Our answer is, "Not there."

Scott Ciment>> You can create a powerful disincentive for them not to maintain their registration requirements. You're going to create a whole class of homeless people.

Hena Cuevas>> Paul has a steady job, is married, and drug-free, but finding a new place to live may prove difficult.

"Paul">> I didn't realize it would be a lifetime punishment. I didn't realize it would go to the levels it has.

Hena Cuevas>> Although the Megan's Law website offers important information, it's not enough to distinguish between the truly dangerous and those who, like Paul, only want to live out their lives peacefully. I'm Hena Cuevas for Life and Times.

Announcer>> To send a comment or a question to our program, you can reach us by mail at this address:

Life and Times
4401 Sunset Blvd.
Los Angeles, California 90027

You can also call our viewer comment line (323) 953-5555) or contact us the fast way by e-mail at kcet.org.

Val Zavala>> Call them ex-offenders, felons, criminals or previously incarcerated, but don't call them useless. Many people who get out of prison find that building a second life for themselves can be as hard as doing time. But as Toni Guinyard found out, many of them are determined to do it.

Theresa Cusimano>> I started when I was twenty-three. I never had a juvenile record, never got in trouble by the police, never had a ticket.

Toni Guinyard>> At first glance, Theresa Cusimano looks like any other student. Her appearance gives no indication of her past.

Theresa Cusimano>> I started stealing cars and I started doing forgery and I just started doing a lot of that.

Toni Guinyard>> You got caught.

Theresa Cusimano>> Yes, I ended up getting caught. The first time was for forgery and then a couple months after that, it was for stealing a car. Ever since then, I was going in and out of the county, in and out. I couldn't stay out more than a month. I would go right back in and finally I ended up going to prison.

Toni Guinyard>> When we met Theresa, she was on parole, free after spending five months of a sixteen-month sentence behind bars. She's keeping busy juggling the demands of school, motherhood and a part-time job. She's also speaking out and providing us a glimpse of the challenges faced by ex-offenders trying to re-enter a world that was once out of their reach.

Theresa Cusimano>> I'm doing okay. Actually, to be honest, I'm surprised that I even made it this far. I'm almost off parole. I wouldn't have done any of this if I wasn't using drugs.

Toni Guinyard>> Theresa is well aware that most law-abiding residents don't care about her situation or that of others who have served time in prison, but she believes the public should care. A disproportionate number of released felons live in Los Angeles County and their success or failure at re-entering society impacts the community.

Yusef Omowale>> You look at a lot of people in Los Angeles living in gated communities, living in fear. Why is that? Because of the climate of fear created around incarceration and decisions that we're making and we're all worse off when there are large segments of our population that are suffering, facing economic problems, poor educational resources, all those kinds of things.

Toni Guinyard>> Yusef Omowale is director of the Southern California Library for Social Studies and Research. The stories of ex-offenders have found a home here in the stacks of books and archives.

Yusef Omowale>> There are people that use our resources and may not agree with creating new policies to benefit people in this community and they believe in increasing incarceration. But they can still hopefully come and look at that to make a more informed decision because right now we don't feel that it's really informed with the voices of people who are experiencing this.

Toni Guinyard>> The library wants to know what the former inmates know, the personal and societal effects of incarceration and re-entry into the community. So it's collecting items from ex-offenders documenting their stay in and release from prison for its generation locked-down collection.

Yusef Omowale>> So we have release statements. When you get out, you get this and you get approximately two hundred dollars gate money which you have to find a place to stay, to eat, to do all those kind of things. This is a card from someone who is incarcerated sent back to their family and talked about how they wish they could have some more money to send home. This is a canteen list with the prices for everything from a toothbrush and deodorant to lotion to tortilla chips.

Toni Guinyard>> Transferable skills?

Yusef Omowale>> Right.

Toni Guinyard>> Explain this one to me.

Yusef Omowale>> I wish that I could.

Toni Guinyard>> The transferable skills form was distributed to an inmate during a class that is supposed to help ex-felons describe their skills when searching for a job. Omowale is far from impressed.

Yusef Omowale>> So for auto theft, I can say I have good mechanical skills. I work well alone. I work well under pressure. Forgery: I'm creative. I have the ability to improvise. I have the power of observation. For example, if I was convicted of prostitution, I could put on my resume that I'm good at adaptability, that I'm a good listener, that I have money management skills. So that's the kind of thing that they were given in their class.

If some people from your community are gone, they're spending years behind bars. There's no programs in prisons and ninety percent of the people incarcerated are going to get out. What are they going to be like when they get out? There's no transition or re-entry programs. All these services have been cut. What happens to the community? How does the community begin to rebuild itself from them?

Toni Guinyard>> What part of that question have you been able to answer?

Yusef Omowale>> That you have this revolving door of people being incarcerated coming out and ending up homeless. South Los Angeles has one of the highest rates of homelessness with the least amount of services for homeless. Those people end up back in prison.

Toni Guinyard>> The incarceration rate in California has quadrupled since 1980 and, of the felons paroled from California prisons, fifty-two percent have returned to prison within two years.

Michael A. Stoll>> Two things we know from the research that leads to successful reintegration: housing and employment. You don't have either one of those, the recidivism rate is very high.

Toni Guinyard>> Michael Stoll, Associate Professor of Public Policy at the UCLA School of Public Affairs, is co-author of a report examining the incarceration rate and the labor market for ex-offenders.

Michael A. Stoll>> Our survey tried to gauge employers' willingness to hire ex-offenders.

Toni Guinyard>> Not surprisingly, the survey of more than six hundred Los Angeles area business owners reinforced a commonly held belief. Most employers are unlikely to hire someone with a criminal record, but --

Michael A. Stoll>> The willingness to hire ex-offenders varies with the industry and occupations into which employers are hiring. So industries such as manufacturing to have very little customer contact, that don't require trustworthiness of the employee per se are industries in which employers are very much willing to hire ex-offenders.

Toni Guinyard>> Theresa didn't need a study to tell her what she learned after trying to get a job.

Theresa Cusimano>> When I would look for a job -- after I would be released from jail, I would go look for a job and they would deny me and I figured, okay, well, if no one's going to hire me, then I may as well go back to my same ways. I would just give up.

Toni Guinyard>> But she didn't give up. After being released from prison, she moved into A New Way of Life sober living facility and she's working. Through a chance meeting, she met Yusef Omowale. You hired Theresa. Why?

Yusef Omowale>> She needed a job. We needed someone to do the work and we don't have that fear that someone who was experiencing incarcerations is going to come in here, steal all our money, hurt us and those kinds of things.

Toni Guinyard>> Theresa has plans for the future. She's going to school part-time and working to earn her GED at the Maxine Waters Employment Preparation Center.

Janet Clark>> There are a hundred parolees released at the Watts area a week. There are so many more people than there are employers and there's opportunities and training and there's education and support. But we're going to do whatever we can to assist.

Toni Guinyard>> Despite the talk of rehabilitating prisoners, Theresa admits she was not prepared for re-entry into the community after serving her term. She credits all of the people who have helped her along the way and hopes that, at some point, the public begins to care about people like her. If I sit down with you a year from now, where do you hope to be?

Theresa Cusimano>> Hopefully, I'll have my GED and still be working at the Southern California Library because I'm not going anywhere.

Michael A. Stoll>> One prisoner per year costs the state of California about thirty-six thousand dollars a year to house. If we were to take that money and put it in a job training program which usually only costs between two and six thousand dollars a year, the economic reason for why we should care becomes very clear.

Theresa Cusimano>> Once you've been through the system, there's a chance you don't have to go through what they call that revolving door. There is change.

Toni Guinyard>> I'm Toni Guinyard for Life and Times.

Val Zavala>> And that's our program. I'm Val Zavala. For everyone at Life and Times, thanks so much for watching. We'll see you next time.

Announcer>> Life and Times was made possible through the generous support of the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of medicine, health, science and education.

And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg.

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