Law prompts more people to register as sex offenders

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. -- Authorities said more people are registering as sex offenders because a new state law eliminates a loophole in the old one.

The Greene County sex offender list alone has grown from 495 names in February 2002 to 670 this week, the Sheriff's Department said.

The Missouri State Highway Patrol maintains a statewide database of sex offenders based on reports from each sheriff's department.

Names on the state list increased from 8,174 to 8,715 in the past year, said Tammy Byrd, patrol fingerprint services supervisor.

Officials attribute the increase to the change in the law, which originally said an inmate must register within 10 days of moving into a county.

That provided a loophole for offenders who never left their home counties after prison or receiving probation.

Under the new law, all sex offenders must register with authorities within 10 days of conviction, release from prison or placement on probation.

In Greene County, many of the list's newcomers are longtime residents who had to register after new legislation passed last year.

"We haven't had that many new offenses. It's just that the registration is much better. It's much more intense," Sheriff Jack Merritt said.

But even with aggressive law enforcement efforts, officials say getting each offender listed isn't a given.

"I'm sure we have a lot that move in from other states and other counties that we never know about," Merritt said. "It's difficult for us to totally keep track."

Registered offenders must get photographed and fingerprinted on their birthdays each year, the sheriff said. If the crimes involved minors, the offender must report to authorities every 90 days.

Last year's legislative change encouraged more interaction between the counties, said Christine Fitz, who monitors the list full-time for the Greene County Sheriff's Department.

"We're communicating an awful lot," she said. "If we find that one has moved to another county, we'll notify, as an example, Polk County, and vice versa."