-Caveat Lector- In cases such as this one, the offender is *always* labeled as "mentally ill"--other possible reasons for these incidents don't seem to ever be investigated.... ----------------- http://www.legal-ledger.com/archive/129law.htm Mentally ill rapist prompts call for change to registration law by Todd Melby ,Staff Writer While Minnesota's sex offender registration law applies to those convicted of many kidnapping, rape and other "predatory" crimes, it overlooks people like Roger Lloyd Zimmerman. On a July morning in 1996, Zimmerman entered a Wayzata home where a 13-year-old girl was babysitting. According to a criminal complaint later proven in court, Zimmerman pulled a rug over the teenager's head and raped her twice. Before leaving, Zimmerman said he would kill her if she told anyone. With a baby in her arms, the girl ran from the house and flagged down a passing car. Zimmerman was arrested in the woods near the home later that day. A judge at Zimmerman's 1998 trial believed he had indeed committed the crime, but found him "not guilty by reason of mental illness." Because Zimmerman was never officially convicted of raping the girl, current Minnesota law does not require local community members to be notified if he is ever released from St. Peter state hospital. That troubles Daryl Coppoletti, a research and investigation coordinator at WATCH, a nonprofit group that monitors violent criminal cases in Hennepin County, who has followed the Zimmerman case closely. "He's slipped through the registration requirements," Coppoletti testified at a Senate Crime Prevention Committee meeting on Wednesday. "Offenders like Roger [Lloyd] Zimmerman are exactly the type of predatory offender that this law was meant to address." Added Coppoletti, "Although few in number, the threat to public safety is great." Sen. Jane Ranum, DFL-Minneapolis, who is also on WATCH's advisory board, is sponsoring a bill that would alter the current sex offender registration law to include people who are: • charged with a "predatory" crime that meets the same sex offender registration standard in current law; • found not guilty by reason of mental illness or mental deficiency; • and are civilly committed as being "mentally ill and dangerous to the public." "We're not trying to widen the net," Ranum said. Patients now in confinement at state hospitals under the "mentally ill and dangerous to the public" standard, but who have not been charged with a sex offense, would not be affected by the proposed change. The committee unanimously passed Ranum's bill, S.F. 174, on a voice vote. Before July 1996, Zimmerman had been previously diagnosed as "paranoid schizophrenic," and treated at St. Peter state hospital. According to WATCH, the 27-year-old man had quit taking his prescribed medication before the crime and taken to living in a self-described "cliff house" (actually a hole dug out of a hillside). He also heard voices that told him "things were getting hotter and hotter because the sun was coming down out of the sky." Zimmerman apparently believed "that the only way to cool things down was to have sex with a woman." Zimmerman had previously been charged with several relatively minor offenses: indecent exposure, burglary, stalking, assault and damage to property. ======= MARtin F. ABErnathy <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html <A HREF="http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html">Archives of [EMAIL PROTECTED]</A> http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ <A HREF="http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/">ctrl</A> ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Om
