Joshua's Law - Burning the Candle from the Opposite End of the Spectrum of Jessica's Law

The alleged sex offense against 18-year-old Joshua Lunsford, son of Mark Lunsford, has the potential to become a catalyst for change. Could it be that the proverbial lightning that has struck twice within this family could actually work toward a common good by igniting the candle from opposite ends of the spectrum? I believe it just might, and here’s why.

Mark Lunsford went from biker / truck driver to becoming one of the most influential people in our nation’s history in terms of affecting legislative change in child sexual abuse laws last year when he toured the country speaking out in favor of Jessica’s Laws. These laws were introduced in 2006 and 2007 legislative sessions in sweeping fashion from state to state in honor of Mark’s 9-year-old daughter who was abducted from her bed, molested, and buried alive at the hands of a Registered Sex Offender. As it happened, the monster who committed that heinous crime, John Couey, wasn’t registered where he was living and had been a poster case of high-risk potential having been a self-professed pedophile for decades.

Jessica’s Laws vary from state to state, but for the most part include mandatory minimum 25 year sentences for first-time offenders in child sexual abuse cases, increased monitoring, and increased restrictions pertaining to former offenders presently living in our society. The problem with the restrictions is that they don’t simply target the high-risk offenders but, rather, impose blanket restrictions across this entire population of some 600,000 Registered Sex Offenders, even those who were merely Romeo/Juliet cases – or cases involving children having sex with other children.

Mark Lunsford has spoken out on behalf of his son this week in several Florida newspapers. In fact, the Tampa Tribune reported:

Mark Lunsford said it has not been proved that his son has done anything wrong. Even what has been alleged, he said, cannot be compared with the crimes of the pedophiles he has helped put in prison through his work with the Jessica Marie Lunsford Foundation.

"We're talking about Romeo and Juliet here, not some 36-year-old pervert following around a 10-year-old," Lunsford said. (1)

This is why I believe this case has the potential to become a catalyst of change from the opposite end of the spectrum of Jessica’s Laws. I will go out on a limb here and call my proposed legislative change “Joshua’s Law.” Perhaps now Mark Lunsford will make another tour to clean up the danger to our communities left in the wake of last year’s Adam Walsh Act and Jessica’s Laws. It is time to treat former sex offenders differently depending on their potential risk to our communities. We must allow low-risk offenders the ability to benefit from treatment programs and to return to lives of normalcy and remove high-risk offenders from society. The present mechanisms, which literally torture this entire group of people, only serve to antagonize the entire population and thus are counterproductive to public safety.

I don’t make this proposal lightly. Even though I have never even been accused of molesting a child or having inappropriate physical contact with any other person, I would be considered a high-risk offender based on standards used to make such assessments. I have three offenses spanning the course of 12 years all of which involved boys between the ages of 13 and 16. Despite the fact that I personally believe my last two cases should have never seen the light of a courtroom, I would rather spend the rest of my life incarcerated along with all of the rest of the Registered Sex Offenders who would be deemed as high-risk rather than to allow the present powder-keg situation to exist.

Wouldn’t it be a positive outcome from two tragic situations affecting the Lunsford family if both cases could burn the symbolic candle of child sexual abuse from both ends and at the end of the day all of the waxy substance would simply melt away?

1 Tampa Tribune Article

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