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Plan May Require Sex Offender Identification
BY JENNIFER ADAMS
STAFF WRITER
As controversy stirs about methods for
crime prevention throughout the state and
country, most recently under fire is a pro
gram to require convicted sexual offenders
to be registered in the community where
they live.
In his State of the State address Feb. 9,
Gov. Jim Hunt called for the mandatory
registration of convicted sexual offenders
and community notification, “so commu
nities will know exactly who is in their
midst.”
State legislators are of the same mind;
N.C. Senate Bill 53, now in committee
hearings, would create a registration pro
gram for convicted sex offenders in North
Carolina.
Last year’s federal violent crime control
bill asked states to register released sex
offenders and permitted them to establish
community notification plans, although
such plans are not mandatory. If states fail
to to enact registration plans by 1997, the
federal government will withhold 10 per
cent of funds otherwise provided by the
Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets
Act of 1968.
Forty states now require sexual offend
ers to be registered with local authorities;
16 states passed these laws last year.
New Jersey’s statutes have received the
most press. Known collectively as
“Megan’s Law.” the statutes require con
victed sex offenders to register with local
law enforcement officials when they are
released from prison.
Depending on how dangerous the indi
Zollicoffer Speech Addresses Health-Care Reform
BYERICABESHEARS
STAFF WRITER
Dr. Mark Smith delivered the 15th an
nual Zollicoffer Lecture on Friday after
noon at the Old Clinic Auditorium at UNC
Hospitals. The title of his lecture was
“Health Care Reform: The Long View.”
The lecture series, which honors Dr.
Lawrence Zollicoffer—who in 1962 was
the fourth African-American graduate of
the UNC School of Medicine in 1962 and
who founded the Garwyn Medical Center
in Baltimore, Md. was established in
1981 after Zollicoffer’s death in 1976.
Smith who completed his under
graduate degree at Harvard in Afro-Ameri
can studies, his M.D. at UNC in 1983 and
his M.B.A. from the University of Penn
sylvania was the first UNC School of
Medicine alumnus to deliver the lecture.
Smith opened his lecture by telling the
audience that the debate over health-care
reform now and in the future would focus
VARSITY
FROM PAGE 3
Because the Varsity often offers fewer
commercial films that other theaters shy
away from, moviegoers from around the
Triangle sometimes make the trip to Chapel
Hill. Steele said his main concern was
showing high-quality films, not making
lots of money. “We are meeting the need
we want to meet, ” he said. “It isn’t a matter
of getting bodies in the front door; it’s the
matter of playing the films that we like and
having those meet with enough success so
we can continue to do what we do.”
The theater’s concession stand also
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vidual is believed to
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at large may be no
tified as well.
Jayne Rebovich, ■ jgdßj
spokeswoman for B
the N.J. attorney k,
general’s office, said
New Jersey's law
distinguished be- I
tween serious and R
less serious offend- Gov. JIM HUNT has
ers. called for the
When an indi- mandatory registration
vidual is released, of sex offenders when
the department of they move into a
corrections notifies community,
the county prosecu
tor. The prosecutor evaluates how much of
a threat the individual poses for the com
munity and then places him orherinoneof
three “tiers” that determine who is noti
fied: law enforcement only; law enforce
ment, community organizations that su
pervise children and the victims; or the
public at large.
Rebovich said there were two main con
stitutional arguments being used against
New Jersey’s statutes.
First, opponents say the statutes violate
ex post facto because they place an addi
tional punishment on offenders who have
already served their sentences in jail.
Secondly, they violate “due process”
because county prosecutors determine the
categorization without input from offend
ers. Offenders have no right to appeal this
decision.
“This is not a punishment,” Rebovich
said. “This is a community or public safety
on the difference between reform driven by
the government and reform stemming from
the grassroots level.
“I’m going to talk about health-care
Reform —the big ‘R’ versus the little ‘r,’”
Smith said.
“Reform is driven by the legislature,
insurance coverage and cost containment, ”
he said.
He said federal reform was being held
back by the public’s fear of too much gov
ernment involvement.
“In California, there was a proposition
to create a single-payer system it went
down to defeat. The number one reason—
too much involvement by the go vemment, ”
Smith said.
He said reform was happening now in
the form of health management organiza
tions.
“Americans are increasingly joining
HMOs. From almost a third of the popula
tion in Massachusetts and California to
almost none in Wyoming,” Smith said.
strays from the mainstream movie fare. It
sells a variety of imported candies, Kenya
AA+ coffee and popcorn popped in olive
oil.
In an effort to keep the theater as mod
em as possible, Steele has updated audio
and visual equipment. He has been re
searching the seating, lighting and walls to
improvethescreeningrooms’ environment.
Steele, who has served as the theater’s
manager for more than a decade, said the
most frustrating part of his job was having
too few screens and too many good films to
choose from. He said that because the
theater had only two screens he couldn’t
show as many films as he would like to and
STATE & NATIONAL
measure.”
Dan Pollitt, a UNC constitutional law
professor, said civil liberties groups were
fighting the New Jersey law and recently
had won a case in trial court testing its
constitutionality.
“The law is hazy,” Pollitt said. “Either
it saves the community or incites the com
munity against persons.”
He said the laws denied due process for
two reasons. First, the law delegates too
much authority to those who determine
the risk factor of the released offender.
Second, there is a violation of the right to
privacy.
“This is a denial of the due process right
to privacy, the right not to be branded,”
Pollitt said. “It also may be cruel and
unusual punishment.”
N.C. Senate Bill 53 calls for establishing
a sexual offender registration program. In
the preamble to the bill, it states that the
General Assembly “recognizes that sex
offenders often pose a high risk of engaging
in sex offenses even after being released
from incarceration.”
It states that sex offenders “have a re
duced expectation of privacy because of
the public’s interest in public safety.”
The bill requires the court to determine
the threat the individual poses to the com
munity and to place them in one of three
risk levels: low, moderate or high.
Convicted sexual offenders would be
required to register with their local sheriff’s
department. Like New Jersey’s law, the
community at large would be notified only
if someone in the “high” risk category were
released.
Catherine Smith of the Victims Assis
He said the problem with HMOs was
that they didn’t offer the amount of care
they should.
“There’s a tiered system of paying
patients pay a fixed amount, and doctors
receive a fixed amount per patient per
month whether they come to see you or
not,” Smith said.
“With capitated payment, there’s in
centive to keep people out of the hospitals.
In California, there’s a push to keep them
out of the doctors' offices,” he said. “It’s
the notion of shifting incentives, from over
treating to undertreating. We’re a long
way from measures of quality that make
sense."
Smith said a big question facing the
industry was the function of health care.
“Do we want health care to be a busi
ness or not? We want it to be more busi
nesslike, but we think health care should
have an egalitarian approach,” he said.
Smith said that quality concerns were
different for doctors and patients and that
sometimes had toshorten the duration of a
film’s stay.
Many of the people who attend the
Varsity Theater said it was the actual mov
ies that brought them back to the theater.
“We’re big moviegoers; we see all
kinds,” said Roy McJilton on Saturday.
He and his wife had just seen “The Mad
ness of King George.” “That’s one thing
we like here; you get good art movies you
usually don’t get in Lumberton.”
Sharon Hodge, a UNC graduate stu
dent who was going to see “Red,” said she
came to the theater for similar reasons. “I
really like art films, so basically I come
largely for what they show here.”
tance Network in Raleigh said she thought
this was “a small step in the right direc
tion.”
“Sexual offenders have very high recidi
vism rates,” Smith said. “This is a great
crime prevention method.
“If the sheriff had information (about
local sex offenders) at hand, he could have
a sense as to where to start looking,” she
said.
She said she thought registration pro
grams also provided a deterrent factor.
Smith said opposition to passage of this
bill was coming primarily from trial law
yers who claimed it was a violation of the
constitutional right to privacy.
“But victims have no such protection,”
she said.
Deborah Ross, executive legal director
for the American Civil Liberties Union of
North Carolina, said she opposed the pro
posal.
“Sexual offender notification is consti
tutionally suspect it’s a violation of
privacy and other civil liberties, ’’Ross said.
“And it’s bad policy.
“It tends to give residents a false sense of
security and diverts their attention from
the danger of those not convicted,” she
said. “It encourages a state of hysteria and
vigilantism. And it doesn’t solve the prob
lem.”
She said that under community notifi
cation plans, signs had been placed in
people’s front yards.
“Certain provisions of sex offender law
and, in part, community notification, keep
offenders from being able to reintegrate, to
become productive members of society,”
Ross said. “Why let him out of jail?”
doctors should focus on patients’ needs.
“You don’t have to understand agricul
ture to choose an orange at the supermar
ket. Our idea of quality is how dose to the
linea alba is the scalpel? We need to get off
our high horse and learn how to judge, ” he
said. “We are the only system that ar
ranges itself for the suppliers.”
Smith closed his lecture by giving ad
vice to his colleagues in the medical profes
sion.
“We have to be willing to work in orga
nizations; we have to leam to work with
nonphysidans and value their skills and
contributions. We’re going to have to fo
cus on customer service,” he said.
“The world is changing very quickly;
it’s not what it looked like five years ago.
There are elements of the old system we
should hold on to. Do not too easily let go
of the old dedication to work; it should not
be lost in our drive to modernize,” Smith
said. “We must understand how the sys
tem is changing and embrace it.”
WILLIAMSON
FROM PAGE 1
victim or the commission of other crimes
during the inddent.
Neither Williamson nor his attorneys,
public defender James Williams and
Chapel Hill attorney Kirk Osborn, appeared
in court for a probable cause hearing sched
uled for Feb. 12. Instead, Fox opted to seek
grand jury indictments of Williamson.
IfW illiamson is indicted, a pretrial con
ference will be scheduled to take place by
April 15. The prosecution will then deride
if there are aggravating circumstances to
seek the death penalty.
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The International Headquaters of Pi Lambda Phi Fraternity is
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Joining Pi Lambda Phi can offer you the following:
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To obtain more information please contact either Lance Caldwell of
Rick Higgins at the Chapel Hill Inntown at 967-7455.
Senate Committee Passes
Line-Item Veto Proposal
BYCOLBY SCHWARTZ
STAFF WRITER
The line-item veto, a critical compo
nent of the Republicans’ “Contract With
America” and President Clinton’s “New
Covenant,” moved doser to the Senate
floor last week.
The Senate Budget Committee approved
two bills Wednesday that would allow
presidents to veto individual spending items
and tax breaks that benefited specific
groups.
Sen. Pete Domeniri, R-N.M., chair
man of the budget committee, proposed
the first bill, which was approved by a
items in a spending
bill but also allows |WNwi.. w&f
ridethevetowitha Ifjjjp W
Tax breaks aimed at W
could also be re- President BILL
jected by presidents, CUNTON favors the
accordingtothebill. line-item veto, which
n -' would give him more
McCam, R-Ariz., control of spending,
proposed a second
bill approved by the budget committee.
This bill, which passed by a margin of 12-
10, requires a two-thirds majority for Con
gress to reinstate individual spending
projects vetoed by presidents.
The bills now move to the Senate Gov
ernmental Affairs Committee, where they
are on the agenda for Feb. 23, according to
a committee spokesman.
Richard Richardson, professorofpoliti
cal srience at UNC, said he thought the
bills would move quickly through commit
tee.
“(The line-item veto) is on the fast track
because it’s a part of the ‘Contract,’” he
said.
Diane Reese, press secretary for the
Senate Budget Committee, said she thought
the president would eventually gain line
item veto power.
“The ranking Democrat, James Exon,
supports line-item veto,” Reese said.
CAA
FROM PAGE 1
Galbo will be the next CAA president if 19
write-in votes are voided by 7 p.m. “19
votes are needed to be voided in order to
not have a runoff,” Lewis said.
Lewis spent Friday afternoon trying to
contact the 20 write-in candidates to ask
them if they considered themselves to have
ROBERTS
FROM PAGE 3
something the media often fails to note.
“What Congress is supposed to be do
ing is balancing—that’s its job—balanc
ing the interests of the people,” she said.
“We treat compromise as some sort of
basic cave-in: a sellout to special inter
ests.”
This does not mean that the press should
not be critical, she said.
“Every five minutes, we have Newt
Gingrich talking about hunting giraffes
and people rolling around in ditches,” she
said. “Bill Clinton, I’m convinced, walks
Monday, February 20,1995
“The disagreement is on how much
power to give the president.
“Exon believed that tax cuts should be
induded, hut the Republicans wanted to
water (the bills) down,” she said.
Reese said she thought Exon and other
Democrats had voted against the line-item
bills because of this disagreement.
Other political experts were more cau
tious with their predictions.
Thad Beyle, professor of political sri
ence at UNC, said he thought the line-item
veto might hit a roadblock once it reached
the floor. “My guess is the Senate will be
very wary of this (bill’s implications),” he
said. “The numbers are dose.”
Richardson said he thought the bills
were controversial and would be intensely
debated by the Senate. “(The line-item
veto) takes power away from Congress and
gives the president more power because he
can undo coalitions of Congress with just
the stroke of the pen,” he said.
In a speech on the Senate floor April 30,
1993, Sen. Robertßyrd, D-W.V., explained
his position against the line-item veto.
Byrd said he thought the line-item veto
was fundamentally against the Constitu
tion. “I do not want to see anything en
acted that would, in effect, shift power
from the legislative branch to the executive
branch,” Byrdsaidinthespeech. “Itwould
fly in the face of the intent of the Founding
Fathers to have such a shift in power.”
Although Byrd and other Democrats
oppose the line-item veto, Clinton is one eft'
its strongest advocates.
Governors already have line-item veto
power in some states, including Clinton’s
native state of Arkansas. And every state in
the union, except North Carolina, grants
its governor the power to veto individual
bills passed by the state legislature.
Beyle said he thought Clinton supported
the line-item veto because of his previous
experience with it.
“He knows what kind of weapon it is,
and he understands it more so than any
one.”
been legitimate candidates.
She had originally derided to dedare all
those who she could not contact on Friday
as legitimate candidates, assuming that
their names were written in because they
wanted to be considered as candidates.
“I spent all Friday on it and could not
get in touch with vety many people, ” Lewis
said. “So I made the decision to move on
with the runoff.”
around with a pocketful of banana peels
that he just throws in his path.”
She said Americans lacked unity, which
helped contribute to the problem.
“I think we are in serious trouble,” she
said. “When you look at the idea of
America, we have no reason to be here.
We have no common ethnidty, no com
mon religion, no common heritage, these
days we don’t even have a common lan
guage.
“But the one thing we all have is a
commitment to the Constitution and the
institutions it created—all the institutions
itcreated,” shesaid. “Toholdtheminsuch
contempt is a reripe for disunion.”
5