RSOL to Justice for all North Carolina: Take down that ad!

Cambridge, MA–In the strongest terms possible, Reform Sex Offender Laws, Inc. (RSOL) condemns both the content and the purpose of Justice for all North Carolina‘s blistering ad attacking North Carolina Supreme Court Justice Robin Hudson’s dissenting opinion in State v. Bowditch 700 S.E.2d 1 (N.C. 2010).  RSOL further demands that the ad be immediately retracted and that Justice for all North Carolina make a public apology for smearing and defacing Justice Hudson’s name by asserting that she supports child molesters over their victims.  Such a characterization, aside from being brazenly libelous, is a gross misrepresentation of Justice Hudson’s reasoned dissent and entirely distorts the fundamental question which faced the NC Supreme Court in reaching its opinion: whether or not a state law requiring electronic monitoring (SBM) of registered sex offenders (who have completed their sentences) could be applied to individuals who were convicted before the law was passed.

In Bowditch, the NC Supreme Court split 4-3 with the majority overturning a lower court’s decision and asserting that, because the SBM requirement was not punitive, the offenders’ claim was without merit. Justice Hudson penned a critical, but articulate, dissent.  In it, Hudson concedes that while “…we may not be fond of this particular class of defendants . . . that does not lessen their Fourth Amendment rights nor their expectation of privacy in their own homes.”  While admitting that the majority was correct in determining that the NC General Assembly did not intend for the law to be punitive, Justice Hudson was unimpressed by the majority’s conclusions regarding the law’s punitive effects.

Hudson wrote, “[w]hen weighed against its almost complete lack of efficacy in furthering the purpose of protecting our children, the intrusions of the SBM program become punitive in effect. The physical and practical realities of the SBM program—the size and weight of the ankle bracelet and MTD, the requirement to remain in one place for six hours for daily recharging, the degree to which SBM interferes with everyday work and recreation activities, the degree to which the program impedes enrollees’ freedom of travel, and its invasive requirement for consent to enter an enrollee’s home—transform the effect of the scheme from regulatory to punitive.”

In summarizing Hudson’s dissent, UNC School of Government’s Jaime Markham wrote, “Justice Hudson authored a dissent, joined by the other two women on the court. She . . . concluded that the regime’s ‘substantial interferences into the daily lives of those monitored are too punitive in effect to be imposed retroactively.’ She questioned the law’s baseline effectiveness and the underlying premise that sex offender recidivism rates are especially high, noting in a footnote that DOC’s own sex offender specialist calls this notion a ‘myth.’ ”

In anticipation of the May 6 primary and fueled by $650,000 received from the Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC), Justice for all North Carolina is peppering North Carolina airwaves with what many are describing as the most egregious attack ad since the late Sen. Helms’ “Hands” ad in his 1990 reelection bid against former Charlotte mayor Harvey Gantt.  Writing for, Scott Mooneyham labeled the ad “…perhaps the most despicable political advertisement ever aired in the state.”

On May 6, Hudson faces two primary challengers in a nonpartisan race: Superior Court Judge Eric Levinson and Raleigh lawyer Jeanette Doran.  The two highest vote-getters will then move on to the general election in November.  Hudson is a Democrat.  Both Levinson and Doran are Republicans.

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7 Thoughts to “RSOL to Justice for all North Carolina: Take down that ad!”

  1. Robert hogg

    The sex offender reg. Is a race program that put people on it in a place where they can’t find jobs or homes because they keep zoning them out I’m a sex offender I plead to rape at 19 in 96 because my p.d. That was appointed to me told me to talk the eight because they was going to let me go home and if I did my probation then it would be past me and I could live my life and forget it . I stayed out 3 years before violating my probation not for a sex offends 30 or so days before I got out of lock up the court of Putnam tenn. Changed my judgement with out me having the right to be there or defending my self that put me on the hit list for life and I’m all so to pay them 150 a year for life this is how the new slaves are being done I don’t have the money to fight or I would tenn. Made time limits of a year to apeal so if u was lock up when they did this with no money or anyone to help u , u have no rights and so much more that has happen to me from being made to quit a job that help me get a drug charge because I had rent and ect. To pay for not to say child support yes im a danger to be around kids but not to pay for them I have never hurt my kids or any kid but my kids don’t want anything to do with me because of something that happen be they was born and what happen u ask well let me put it this way I had sex with a 14 year old girl when I was 19 in the south most whites didn’t want their lil girl to do so with blacks so the mother pushed it and all kinds of lys came out of it plus the stupid 19 year old that didn’t know laws and seen he wasn’t doing anything wrong 120 pounds no hair on my face kid is what I was and did my time for it but as law changes I get it more and more time why is this so

    1. CJ Stone

      Maine does the same thing. Once you have a finger pointed at you, It’s over. No matter if you did it or not. No lawyer wants to go and fight againt big bother. It would put a bad name on them. Between D.A.s and lawyers they trade cases. It’s all about money. Sex offenders always get the sh## end of the deal.

      1. Robert Hogg

        There is no justice for all in this country , if u got money u can kill and do as u wish , they need to get money out the game , if u treat people the way hitler did the Jews or the way blacks was treated before the end of the sixties even know the first civil rights act was in the 1800 and it still took states that long to say black was human and my home state was the first to put the Jim crow laws in act ( tenn.) but now there is a black president and the Jim crow laws was about the safety of the public ha ha right just the words hitler said to and the Jim crow laws started with train cars by the time it was by courts to be wrong ( about a hundred years after the freedom of slaves) and the only reason is because of the blacks fighting back if they wouldn’t have we would be back picking cotton . Cowards are the ones who keep up these trends of laws and the god I luv wrote that treating people this way or the hate of and the abuse of people ( like the roman s did Jesus) will not go thru the gates of heaven no matter how they change it or lie about it

      2. Calvin J Stone

        As none just stated is what it is.

  2. none

    The real deal that Justice Hudson’s is preventing is illegitimate uses of courts for political pandering. Murders in some states are require to register now and have residency restrictions. People need to realize that this isn’t going to stop at sex offenders. It could very well span to every person with a criminal history, 1/3 of Americans. That would be well over half of the country that has a history or a family member, including a vast amount of children in danger, all in the name and same. We seen this exact kind of unchecked nonsense fascism before in WWII. And it is rising again. Finland, Germany and France and other countries will never have a registry, because they know it is against human rights. And if left unchecked in this country we could fall into a civil war. If this can not be done in a legal way, I’m afraid this will lead into another civil war. Eather way, every one should reinstate the constitution back as the main focus, just as Justice Hudson’s has seen it, because that is the only way to freedom and pursuit of happenies for everyone. The other 3 judges are actually the deserters of the constitution and that is GREAT SHAME and should be labeled as treason.

  3. RLMor

    Thankfully Judge Hudson won!!!! Those attack ads didn’t work!!!!

  4. Randall Bellamy

    I was convicted in 1992 in Colorado on a sex crime that they say took place in 1987. My sentence was 2 years probation which I had transferred to Oklahoma where as I completed successfully in 1994. Having to register was not a requirement of my sentence. I was then made to register in 2008 with no court, no judge, no chance to defend myself from this with their threat of imprisonment if I didn’t comply. I have a lawyer working on my case now. Why do they think it’s ok to do this to me retroactively.?? And they ARE doing it.!!

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