Swampscott's 2020 Sex Offender Safety Map

SWAMPSCOTT, MA — There are three registered sex offenders listed in the state registry as living in the town.

Of those, one is a registered Level 3 sex offenders who lives or works in the town. Level 3 have a high risk of re-offending and are considered to pose what is considered a moderate degree of danger to the public. The public can access information about both through local police departments and through the online registry.

These offenders are not wanted by police, and using this information to harass, discriminate against, or harm these individuals is against the law.

State law requires offenders to register an address if it's their primary residence, their place of employment, their post-secondary school location or a secondary address where they reside or visit for more than 14 days total throughout the year.

Pins on the map represent addresses of offenders convicted of Level 2 and 3 sex crimes who live or work in Swampscott. Click on the pins, and you will see more information pop up, including the registered sex offender's name, address, current age, convictions, and the age of the offender and victim at the time of the offense.

In some states sex offenders are not permitted to open their doors on Halloween.

In Massachusetts, sex offenders can't run an ice cream truck. And a Federal law makes Dangerous Sex Offenders ineligible for Public Housing. But in 2015, a city ordinance that limited where sex offenders could live was deemed unconstitutional, where the fabric of state law "evinces the Legislature's intent to have the first and final word on the subject of residency of sex offenders," according to the state website.

Otherwise, sex offenders mostly retain their rights on the holiday.

And perhaps rightly so, say advocates of lax sex offender laws. Law enforcement officials and researchers caution that the registries can play only a limited role in preventing child sexual abuse and stress that most perpetrators are known to the child. The U.S. Department of Justice, which oversees the National Sex Offender Public Website, estimates that only about 10 percent of perpetrators of child sexual abuse are strangers to the child.

The Justice Department estimates 60 percent of perpetrators are known to the child but are not family members but rather family friends, babysitters, child care providers and others, and 30 percent of child victims are abused by family members. Nearly a quarter of the abusers are under the age of 18, the department estimates.

According to national safety statistics, a higher risk for children on the holiday is being hit by a car: Double the number of children are hit by cars on Halloween compared to other days of the year. Wearing a flammable costume too close to a fire is also a top safety issue that police and hospitals see. Wearing reflective gear and reminding children to be aware of their surroundings during their pillaging can be helpful, say experts.

Related Articles

• Sex Offender Advocates Object To Local Mapping Of Registered Sex Criminals
• Why Patch Publishes Sex Offender Registry Maps