Des Moines Halloween Sex Offender Safety Information

DES MOINES, IA — As kids prepare to go trick-or-treating on Beggars' Night, a number of safety factors are likely to be discussed, from watching for cars when they cross the street to not eating treats until a parent has checked them. Fall also is a good time to take inventory of who is living in your neighborhood since children will be visiting homes where they may not be familiar with the occupants.

Approximately 570 registered sex offenders are listed on the Iowa Sex Offender Registry with a Des Moines address. Of those, 314 are classified as Tier 3 offenders, the group officials indicate as the likeliest to reoffend based on criminal past. Offenders in that category are reviewed quarterly.

Des Moines also has 108 Tier 1 offenders, who are required to provide annual updates to authorities, and 148 Tier 2 offenders, who are reviewed twice a year. (For more local news, click here to sign up for real-time news alerts and newsletters from Des Moines Patch, or click here to find your local Iowa Patch. Also, find us on Facebook and, if you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)

Offenders are required to provide their legal address and update with officials for the registry if they move. A review by Patch of state records shows that although slightly more than 10 percent of Iowa's 5,531 registered offenders live in the capital city, determining how many are in a particular area can be difficult. Some list multiple addresses — and they can show up on the registry in more than one place — while others may list a jail address or a federal office if they are in custody of such an agency.

In cases where no specific address can be provided — if an offender is homeless, for example — authorities provide as much detailed information as they can and that can result in a listing of a business or other nearby property. One Des Moines offender, for example, is shown living 200 yards from a business "in an orange and white tent." Others can list a specific building an offender is known to sleep near, directions to encampments along the river, or the make and model of a vehicle an offender sleeps in and where it typically is parked.

ZIP Code search

The Des Moines list also includes dozens of offenders who technically live outside city limits or live in neighboring communities that share a ZIP code with Des Moines. Patch separated Des Moines' registered offender list by ZIP code for a breakdown of home addresses throughout the city and to find anomalies.

Des Moines has 31 postal ZIP codes, but 12 are specific to large businesses or solely for post office box sites, and a check shows no offenders listed those as part of an address. Another six ZIP codes listed under Des Moines are physical addresses in other cities, such as 50327 (Pleasant Hill) and 50323 (Urbandale).Within the remaining 14 ZIP codes, sorting the number of offenders provided a total higher than the 571 offenders living in the city because of the multiple addresses offenders may be registered under.

Here is the number of offenders in Des Moines by ZIP code:

• 50309: 36 offenders, of which 18 list the same shelter as their address, 3 listed the Polk County Jail and 3 are in custody of U.S. marshals.
• 50310: 44
• 50311: 38
• 50312: 21
• 50313: 131, including 68 living outside city limits in unincorporated areas (with 15 of those listed at the same extended stay motel and 10 in one mobile home park).
• 50314: 42
• 50315: 103, including 38 listed at a Polk County work release center
• 50316: 57
• 50317: 100, including 25 in unincorporated areas outside the city limits and 8 listing the same mobile home court address outside the city limits
• 50319: 4, all listed at the Polk County Jail
• 50320: 27
• 50321: 5
• 50322: 35, of which 27 are Urbandale street addresses

While no Iowa laws prohibit sex offenders from participating in Halloween or Beggars' Night activities, several states do have such bans. In neighboring Illinois, for example, registered sex offenders are prohibited from passing out candy on Halloween. They may not appear in a Halloween costume or dress as any child-centered holiday character, such as Santa or the Easter Bunny, in public.

Information on Iowa's registered offenders can be found on Iowa Sex Offender Registry website. The list is updated hourly and may differ from details above — and in fact three offenders were added to the list while this data was being prepared.

The list is for public information only, and cannot be used to unlawfully injure, harass, or commit a crime against any individual named in the registry or residing or working at any reported address, police said. Such action could result in civil or criminal penalties.

Patch provides offender statistics each fall and in some cases maps in detail where offenders live. A group advocating for sexual offenders, NARSOL, has objected to Patch releasing the offender information. You can read a letter from that group here.

Image via patch.com