Man accused of hiding in tanks of portable toilet to spy on women

30-year-old Luke Chrisco faces eight counts of second-degree burglary, all felonies, and two misdemeanor counts of unlawful sexual contact and criminal invasion of privacy.

| Bob Cronkleton

FoxNews: Facebook filters fail to block pedophiles

Facebook is failing to prevent child predators from posting illegal photos on its website, a FoxNews investigation alleges.

The investigation includes an interview where FoxNews takes two Facebook executives on a click-by-click tour of the website.

| Bob Cronkleton

Amish elders plead guilty to failing to report child sex abuse

Christian Schwartz, Jacob Schwartz, Emmanuel Eicher and Peter Eicher, elders of an Amish church in Seymour, Mo., pleaded guilty Monday to failing to report child abuse as mandated reporters.

Prosecutors alleged that they knew for at least six months that Johnny Schwartz, a member of one of Webster County's six Amish churches, had been molesting two girls. Schwarts had confessed to the congregation that he had molested the girls, but no one no one reported the abuse to authorities

Schwartz guilty in January and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

| Bob Cronkleton

Commander of Canada’s biggest air force base pleads guilty to 2 murders

David Russell Williams pleaded guilty to murdering two women.

But that was just the begining of the crimes he committed. It took 36 minutes to read all the charges he faced. In addition to the murders, he admitted to two sexual assaults that involved forcible confinement, and 82 break ins.

From The Toronto Star:

By day, Russell Williams was the commander of Canada’s biggest air force base, CFB Trenton. By night, he broke into homes, taking pictures of himself modeling the bras and panties of little girls.

He escalated quickly, from fetish break-ins, to sex assaults with no penetration to rape and murder. He logged his crimes, kept track of police reports of his crimes and left notes and messages for his victims.

And story from the Winnipeg Free Press.

Hat tip to Keith G. in P.V.

| Bob Cronkleton

Sentencing focus of appeal in case of teacher who had sex with boy

The Kansas Court of Appeals will hear arguments this week concerning the granting of probation to a woman who had sex with an underaged boy for more than three years.

At issue is a Shawnee County judge's decision cut the sentence of Jennifer Dawn Liskey in half and then granted her probation. She pleaded no contest in 2009 to aggravated indecent liberties and criminal sodomy after being accused of having sex with a boy for more than three years. She met the boy when he was 13.

Prosecutors claim the judge's decision to depart from the sentencing guidelines was "grossly excessive." Her attorney called the sentence appropriate.

Mug shot alert.

| Bob Cronkleton

Study finds that 88,500 inmates nationwide sexually abused while behind bars

According to the study by the Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics in 2008-2009, 4.4 percent of inmates in prison and 3.1 percent of inmates in jail report being victimized sexually by another inmate or staff member.

The study's findings:

• Female inmates were more than twice as likely to report experiencing sexual victimization by another inmate.
• 13 percent of male prison inmates and 19 percent of male jail inmates were victimized within the first 24 hours of  being incarcerated.

Pat Nolan, vice president of Prison Fellowship said the study shows "the problem is even worse than we thought."

Hat tip to Keith G. in P.V.

| Bob Cronkleton

Two Amish men face incest, bestiality charges

The two brothers face charges involving six different family members and multiple animals.

The Grant County (Wisc.) sheriff said it's one of the strangest and most disturbing cases he has seen.

Hat-tip to cripjak

| Bob Cronkleton

Lawrence Taylor indicted in sex case

Former football player Lawrence Taylor has been indicted in New York on accusations that he had sex with a teenage prostitute, the New York Daily News reports.

Butler of billionare sex offender sentence to jail

Alfredo Rodriguez was convicted of obstructing justice by trying to sell a journal that recorded the sexual dalliances of his boss Jeffrey Epstein.

Federal prosecutors believe the journal might have helped in the government's investigation of Epstein. A federal grand jury was investigating whether young girls were being brought to Epstein's mansion. Instead of federal charges, he pleaded guilty to two state charges and served 13 months in prison.

| Bob Cronkleton

Warren Jeffs beats the rap

An Arizona judge has dismissed the case against Warren Jeffs, a polygamist leader who was accused of sexual misconduct with a minor. The charges were dismissed with prejudice, meaning they can't be refiled. He'd already served more time waiting for trial than he would've if convicted. Jeffs still faces charges in Texas, and he was sentenced to two five-year sentences in Utah for his part in a spiritual marriage involving an underage girl and her teenage cousin.

Florida cops raid bikini club

In St. Petersburg, Fla., police raided a so-called bikini bar late Friday over allegations that dancers were showing more of their bodies than allowed by law, the St. Pete Times reports. Bikini bars are designed to beat the area's tough zoning laws, which make it difficult for strip clubs to find a place to operate. Police say they've gotten several complaints about alleged prostitution and drug-dealing at the clubs, though:

Officers shut down Bottom to the Top, 1101 First Ave. N, about 11 p.m. Friday, then lined up about 30 scantily clad dancers outside the building.

Dominatrix offered sex on trampoline, Florida police allege

From the Naples News:

A dominatrix with a torture chamber in her garage, offering sex on a trampoline, in a shed and threesomes were just some of the things that led to the arrests of 13 people in an undercover sting operation targeting girls advertising on the Internet in Lee County.

Something awful happened at Arby's

Story is from Iowa City. It's a bad situation, but I think the worst part is how the suspect allegedly "made eye contact" with the shocked customers.

Now, THAT is a lovely mugshot

He looks ... surprised. Almost like he was interrupted in the middle of something.

Teens arrested for sex at S.M. North

KMBC reports that two teenagers were arrested for allegedly having sex Thursday in the field house at Shawnee Mission North. Two teachers reportedly caught them and told administrators, who contacted police.

KC investigates Northland rape

From Christine Vendel: Kansas City police were looking for a masked man who raped a 23-year-old woman last night after she stepped out of her Northland apartment to smoke a cigarette.

The Man continues his persecution of bikini baristas

A group of bikini baristas has run afoul of the law, simply because they might have licked whipped cream off each others' bodies while police took photographs. Isn't this common practice in most U.S. workplaces?

58 years for sex abuse involving teen

Yesterday, a Riverside woman was sentenced to 58 years for sexually abusing her teenage daughter on videotape, the Platte County prosecutor reports. Mom's Boyfriend had previously received 25 years in the case. The prosecutor's office says the mother's recommended sentence under state guidelines would have been probation.

Sex offenders can be held indefinitely, Supreme Court rules

It's one of the thorniest questions in U.S. law: Should authorities be able to detain dangerous sex offenders indefinitely, even after they have served their sentences? Several states already do this, and now the U.S. Supreme Court says it's a constitutional practice. The case is U.S. v. Comstock, and the decision can be read here as a PDF. So can the dissent from Justice Clarence Thomas, who was joined partly by Justice Scalia. Here's the AP take.

The case specifically dealt with the federal law allowing civil commitment of "sexually dangerous" criminals. That law was part of the larger Adam Walsh Act.

UPDATE: Reader Sarah responds ...

This post and pretty much every article about this case has totally missed the issue that was actually decided. Way back in 1997, SCOTUS had already decided that civil commitments for sexual predators were a-ok. That case was Kansas v. Hendricks. Justice Thomas wrote that opinion and Justice Scalia was with him in finding that civil commitments by state government do not violate due process. So that part of the case is nothing new at all.

Today's decision was not about the constitutionality of civil commitments. Today's decision was about whether the FEDERAL government can do it.

Two year sentence, after 33 years on the run

A Clay County man who ran from the law for 33 years was sentenced today to a two year prison sentence. That is what jurors recommended for Berney V. Ferguson Jr. after he was convicted of incest in 1977. 

From the photo, it looks like the decades he spent hiding out at homeless shelters under an alias wore on him.

A likely story

A Massachusetts man accused of indecent exposure could TOTALLY EXPLAIN after he was literally caught with his pants down. From wickedlocal.com:

“Allen explained that his work uses strong air conditioning and then when he leaves, the hot air is overwhelming so he often removes his pants for the drive home,” according to a police report.

Hat Tip: Saw this via obscurestore.com!

Are you smarter than a sexual predator?

There's going to be a seminar on avoiding sexual assault at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the Kansas City police academy, sponsored by MoSAVE and MOCSA with the police department. (The name of the program is "Are You Smarter Than a Predator?" -- which sort of reminded me of the Jeff Foxworthy game show, "Are You Smarter Than a Fifth-Grader?") It's free and open to anybody, though the focus is on men and women age 16 to 22. Raffle prizes will be given away.

Man sentenced for seeking $100 sex with 16-year-old

Steven E. Mikoloyck was one of seven men prosecuted after answering an ad placed on Craigslist by police posing as pimps and offering underage girls for sex.

Ten years, no parole, $5,000 fine.

| Sara Shepherd

Waldo rape suspect faces judge, hears 15 charges against him

Bernard Jackson appeared this morning in Jackson County court, where a judge read charges that he raped four women in the Waldo area in 1983 and 1984 -- cases that have been cold for decades. Jackson, a twice-convicted and twice paroled sex offender, is considered a person of interest but has not been charged in the recent Waldo rapes.

In Sunday's paper, Tony Rizzo explored one question everyone's asking: Is court-system failure to blame for Jackson being back on the street?

| Sara Shepherd

Move along, sex offenders

In L.A., homeless sex offenders (roughly 1/4 of California's 8,500 sex offenders are homeless) tried parking the RVs and station wagons they live in right outside the parole office. It was great, they said, because there were no schools nearby, they didn't have to go far to check in, and they could re-charge their ankle bracelets right there in the office.

But as usual, nobody wants huge camps of sex offenders taking over their neighborhood.

| Sara Shepherd