Court Makes it Easier to Commit Sex Offenders
The state Supreme Court ruled that sex offenders who have completed their criminal sentences may be sent to psychiatric hospitals against their will, and prosecutors are not required to meet the toughest legal test to win further confinement.
Judges need only see “clear and convincing evidence” that an offender will commit another crime, wrote Associate Justice Jaynee LaVecchia.
Under a 1999 New Jersey law, sex offenders deemed likely to commit similar crimes after their release from prison may be committed to a state psychiatric hospital. The law allows for annual case reviews for the inmates.
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