Methuen City Councilor Ken Willette has proposed a city ordinance that would legally restrict the rights of level three sex offenders to travel to certain areas of the city. He would prohibit those offenders from traveling within 1000 feet of any city park, school, or the Nevins library. This proposal has stirred a backlash from the family of a level three sex offender now living in Methuen. From yesterdays Eagle Tribune.

“These guys come up with these rules and laws and initiatives, and they don’t bother, I don’t feel, to do their homework to learn how it’s going to affect people or their families,” Claudia Bobb said.

The Tribune article gave a short history of this offender, and also the family rationale for opposing this ordinance.

Charles and Claudia Bobb moved to Methuen from San Jose, Calif., in January 2007. They live at 18 Russ St. with their 16-year-old daughter. They brought Howard Bobb into their home in November, after discovering he was living in a crummy apartment in Akron, Ohio, with no food or clean clothes.

Howard Bobb was convicted of two counts of indecent assault and battery for molesting two children under age 14 in 1979. He spent 41/2 years in prison.

He was released from prison and re-offended, his son said. This time, in 1987, Howard Bobb was imprisoned for 18 months for one count of indecent assault and battery on a child under 14.

He was released from prison and re-offended again in 1995. He was convicted of the same charge and spent another 18 months in prison.

“My father was wrong for what he did in the past,” Charles Bobb said.

But, he said, the man “did his time” and never committed a crime in Massachusetts. His last conviction was 13 years ago.

Howard Bobb, a paranoid schizophrenic, is in a rehabilitation facility in Salem, Mass., suffering from an infection and paralyzed from the waist down. Charles and Claudia Bobb said it will be a few weeks before he’s able to go home. When he does, they say, he will not go anywhere without one of them.

Charles Bobb said his father no longer notices children.

“He’s not the same person he was back then,” he said.

Willette responded:

Willette pointed to Howard Bobb’s repeated convictions and said, “No matter how you portray it, he’s a high-risk offender.”

Willette not only wants to ban entry to level three offenders, but to further publicize their presence.

Willette wants to place fliers from the state Sex Offender Registry Board, showing the photographs and addresses of Level 3 offenders, in school offices, City Hall, the Quinn Building, on the city’s Web site, and more prominently at Nevins Memorial Library. He also wants to hang signs declaring schools, parks and the library “predator free zones.”

The A.C.L.U. has spoken against similar efforts, and has sued to overturn similar laws.

Chris Ott, a spokesman for the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts, has said laws like these could keep sex offenders from neighborhoods where they see a doctor for treatment.

Banishing offenders from certain areas, and in turn potentially cutting them off from family and friends and making it harder for them to get treatment, also makes them more likely to re-offend, Ott said.

The City Council has approved this ordinance for first reading. Willette has indicated that he is open to some suggestions to change the law.

Willette said he’s open to considering modifications to his proposal. He might reduce or drop the 1,000-foot rule, for instance, or amend the proposal to simply ban sex offenders from stepping onto school grounds.

He wishes the authorities would incarcerate repeat offenders like Howard Bobb for life.

“It also destroys entire families, it destroys children forever and these people should not have the freedom to walk our streets,” Willette said.

Read the Tribune article here.