UPDATED: Registered sex offender notice: Grande Road in Mesquite

Rawlins Gilliland, says:

Am I supposed to understand why this man's photo profile and whereabouts are posted here? Is this 'due process' arbitrary or personal? Or can we expect to see all Mesquite (and other area) registered offender locations posted? Or for that matter, all felony (or in the case of many 'registered sex offenders', class c misdemeanor) convictions of any kind ever?

Rawlins Gilliland, says:

For God's sakes, I just returned home to read this. I have several comments here, and I am not at all happy to begin anew explaining why:

For starters: Many of those 'registered sex offenders' are misdemeanor cases, in which case it is not nearly as serious as it sounds. But that said, what if it is? Isn't it a little 'arbitrary' to show ONE man's face and not ALL.

And how about this reality check, what these people who are ‘convicted’ sex offenders were convicted OF. In some cases, it was being 18 years old in an affair with a 17 year old girl, who may have claimed she was 18. Is that as serious as a man who is janitor at a grade school and lures a 7 year old into sex? Hardly. But they are currently lumped together as a cyberspace Guantanamo, with no escape. For the rest of their lives.

Then too, the convictions vs. acquittals? How would many of these people fight?
I on the other hand DID fight and won what was supposed to be a landmark case, before a Dallas jury. Police Chief David Kunkle gave me his word in a private 1 hour meeting last summer to that effect. But here we are. Still cherry picking who we choose to spotlight while those with money get these things hidden and erased?

I fought and won because I am a fighter, and I am smart as hell and completely determined to win when I am face to face with corrupt officials or systems. Or at least risk prison as I did rather than take a plea bargain as I was advised over and over. At which case I would have been a listed ‘offender’? Never.

But then, not everyone is Rawlins. A 7 year veteran commentator for National Public Radio, National Endowment Master Poet award recipient, well published Opinion writer, former National Sales Director for Neiman Marcus. I had credentials that could translate to credibility. Most do not. And despite being in a horrible condition financially when this travesty happened to me, wrecking my life for 2 ½ years, I was able to enlist help from a fine and noble man, John Loza, attorney and former city council person. Would most have that ability?

I believe strongly in registered sex offenders for those who do horrible things to children, etc. But as it stands, everyone is tossed into the same life ruining basket, with no sorting whatsoever. And the applications of who is ‘shown’ online and who is not is completely arbitrary. Why not show everyone instead of an occasional man, like today?

And a bigger question that I asked Chief Kunkle; How is it that my picture was plastered across the Dallas Poice Dept. website before my trial, which is ongoing still, along with all the other ‘misdemeanor’ sexual offenses like urinating in public. But even MORE to the point. Why not show the photos of men who are convicted of rape, intoxicated manslaughter, armed robbery, violent assault, etc. As it is, the only ‘registry’ and photos freely posted are of those ‘convicted’ ‘sex offenders’. Which can mean an 18 yr old man who received oral sex from his 17 year old fiancée’. Or a pedophile rapist.

Like most things in life, this is something we know and care nothing about until we are faced with horrific injustice. Mine is a one of my proudest battles and victories. But I became aware, in the course of the horror story, how many others are fighting losing battles for justice, and how no one cares. At all.

I wish I did not have to fight this battle again. But apparently, my role in life is to become aware of things others might not. And to act rather than feign outrage and do nothing, as many of my 'liberal' friends do. Or assume everyone is getting equal and just treatment, and many of my more 'conservative' friends do.

Rawlins Gilliland, says:

Good to see Pegasus differentiating re: posting felony convictions only. And yes, earlier I had not missed your post regarding Pegasus intent, and per usual saw your comments as reasoned on the surface valid and articulate. That said, in answer to your question therefore about the postings going forward; sadly, and impossibly, this becomes a case by case situation, which makes it effectively impossible. Here is why.

When one goes to court, a process that usually has a least three separate dates, the pressure comes to plea bargain, as happened for instance recently with the Colombian DISD school teacher (Arango) who was accused by his first grade students, who claimed he had violated a girl’s private sexual areas in class with his hands. He had just disciplined her and a couple of others, I believe the story went. I knew, as did others, that this case smelled to high heaven. ( His lawyer was now Judge Lena Levario. )The charges were ultimately lowered to 'assault' because he was advised (as is everyone) to waive the trial where you risk certain prison and felony conviction.

In my case, the charges each time continued to escalate until I went from being charged with essentially solicitation of prostitution, a misdemeanor, to tacit attempted rape by physical restraint. Those charges were, as you can imagine, far more serious. This is how the headache becomes a chronic migraine. So here’s some of the fine print on how these felony cases are spiked. The cases seldom go through to trial. As I said, I was unyielding in my fixation to fight. Few others are wired that way, so advised, or even allowed. It’s a rubber stamp assembly line process.

Right now, a childhood friend’s son-in-law is about to go to August trial, accused by a student’s parents (again) of indecency with a minor based on the things she wrote in her diary. I allude to him in my DMN Op-Ed. It’s a year later in his life and only now this is going to trial. I could bore you to tears with what I have learned following his trial, and through his wife’s account. What can one do? It becomes a runaway train for particularly male school teachers. They are sitting ducks for the kid who is punished…as was reputedly the revenge case with Arango… or for sexualized fantasies.

Last, since we have laid this out, there is the second tier case with the Dallas Police newest scandal, the ‘arrest tickets’ that the one ‘arrested’ does not know has been filed. This is ALSO part of what I fought, but that was lost in the shuffle. In Dallas, the police can approach and talk with you, you leave, and then learn weeks later there is a warrant for your arrest when in fact you were never ‘arrested’. That’s a whole other subject, but it has FINALLY broken as a news story.

Let’s put it this way. I was never arrested. (In fact, I was scheduled to speak before the Dallas City Council about how I had been harrassed alone hiking on a remote Dallas Siera Club nature trail near Irving, LB Houston where I mountain bike.) But I received a call from a friend weeks later telling me there was a posted online DPD warrant for my arrest, now active for ‘failure to appear’ and when I went to Lew Sterrett to get to the bottom of it, I was held. This is the ‘quota scam’ and there is more: these bogus ‘arrest’ tickets are then tipped off by internal clerks to low level ‘bounty hunters’ who then appear at someone’s job or home and serve you. Of course there are kick-backs involved. This I only learned about when I became embroiled in the system none of us have cause to know about.

So you see, you have done nothing wrong, but ignorance is seldom bliss when it comes to Dallas District Attorney’s office pre-Craig Watkins. And although Chief David Kunkle is a wonderful asset to the city, I told him when we met about the fake ticket and I can see no reason to believe anything changed until now. He, like all leaders at the top, is seldom able to be aware what is happening at street level. I met some truly walk-on-water police officers in my course, namely Kunkle and Southeast Division Chief Patricia Paulhill and Northeast Chief Jan Easterling. But the handful of slime I dealt with in the course of my case would truly scare anyone. Totally sadistic sociopathic quota mongers.

I wish I had more answers. Especially since I AM in the media. But at least I have the questions, and they are based on something besides emotionalism or knee-jerk rhetoric.

Rawlins Gilliland, says:

Scott, read my original Op-Ed in the Dallas Morning News that Mike Orren linked to above, and/or for that matter the extensive comments I took the time to pen above. There should be no unanswered questions remaining after that. The decision what you do with what I wrote in both formats is yours to do with as you wish.

I stand to gain nothing beyond telling you what I 1) experienced 2) did about it 3) learned in the process. But prior to those three bullet points, I was a clueless 'where there's smoke there's fire' guy who was mighty happy to risk a few 'mistakes' for the 'greater good'. Sounds to me like that's where you currently sit. Perhaps, rather than you having to experience this all firsthand, you can feel I shared valuable insight and information for you to consider.

PS: There is currently ZERO way to have one removed from these ‘predator’ lists once they are out there in cyberspace. Even if overturned for wrongful conviction, the online data remains unchanged and unchangeable for the remainder of that person’s life. No one loves the internet more than I, but the permanence of things online and the ease with which it can be posted is unnerving.

The choice should not be between ‘what the hell…let the chips fall where they may’ and ‘do nothing to warn the citizenry about a dangerous man (or woman) in our midst’. Currently, that is precisely the choice we are being offered. My efforts are to make those who do not realize this, even those who do not care, to have input from me and others that was hard earned.

A great and happy (semi-dry?) weekend for all! Rawlins

Rawlins Gilliland, says:

Mine is to try and get others to consider policy implications based on what I wrote. Personally, I believe that those who have been arrested DUI 5-6 times should be posted. Those who have twice or more been the perpetrators of domestic violence. Why not shame the shameful across the board?

In other words, to answer your question, I think all sexual or violent felony convictions should be posted or none at all. Otherwise, isn't that by definition 'arbitrary'? I believe that there should be equal justice. That means everyone who is convicted of felony crimes against persons in our city should be singled out. Or none. Either way, that is equal. As it is, it is those who can afford to get their cases brushed under the legal rug who are being protected, while those who cannot are not. Simple.

You expect any of us to believe that there are not cases of incest, sexual battery, etc. in upscale zip codes and 'model citizen' homes? Statistics state otherwise. But when was the last time you saw the man driving the top-of-the-line Lexus in the DPD sexual arrest website? Even Chief Kunkle admitted that when he looked online at his own department’s website, (approved by our Dallas City Council a few years back to showcase men soliciting undercover hookers, posted PRIOR to any case even going to court!)......... that he was surprised to see that they all appeared to be indigent and/or Hispanic with some Black thrown in. Bingo. Impossibly simple.

FYI: I have a friend at a major American newspaper and I asked her why the 20-something whose blood alcohol breathalyzer test read like a radioactive grenade, who drive her car across a tent of campers, making one a paraplegic and another lose an arm….why there was no photo shown. She said it was their policy to withhold names many times and photos while the case is on appeal. Why not? They were convicted. But then what if they won on appeal? My question exactly. What if, for instance, I was convicted but then ‘won’ on appeal? The mechanisms to correct the false information fed to the net would be irretrievable. The harm would be permanently on some ‘offender’ list.

You don’t see what I am diagramming here as a suggestion in ‘policy’? I’m not fond of double or triple standards. “Equal justice under the law” makes perfect sense to me. Now you tell me what that says in terms of policy implications.
I’ve all but offered moral Bisquick. Just add water, stir and place in a preheated oven

Rawlins Gilliland, says:

If I am being seen as such ( someone who insists on berating anyone who attempts to have a logical, dispassionate discussion of policy on this site ) it is not my intent. I just feel that the implications behind these lists is neither understood nor known. The fact that I have written so much about this dilutes my intended point, which is to be fair and even handed and to help explain what is going on behind the scenes. But that leaves me wide open to criticism as a defender of those who might threaten us, when my hope is to do the opposite.

My experience tells me that this is a no win argument. But that Pegasus has, like NPR, such attractive and fair minds, I decided reluctantly again to wade in.

I promise I am only 'berating' those who do not care. I've tried to lay out my 'policy' but apparently I am not doing so in a manner that is being 'got'. I can take the heat for that.

You say I offer no proof of my premise other than my talk with Chief Kunkle? I mention several cases above and in the paper. I sadly have dozens of others, but is it for me to be making this a front page Pegasus discussion where the burden of proof is for me to diagram, when I have carefully mentioned all the variables and specifics in comments and the Op-Ed? I am not the only one aware of these issues. They are getting play in Austin with the new policies going into effect regarding these predator/offender lists. That will be better, as they break out the categories better. But it is my understanding that these new policies will not be retroactive.

Mike Orren, publisher Pegasus is model in my mind, and truly cares what they do and how they do it. For that reason I have worked for and with Orren and intend to going forward. I'm just not seemingly able to get across what a flawed and yes, corrupt behind-the-scenes and after-the-fact 'system' this currently is. I thought that using my case as an example helped buttress that point. But now I am feeling that in some ways it undermines my credibility, and it looks like it is a personal thing, when in reality, I fought and won that battle. It is not 'personal' to me any more than women's causes. I am not a woman, but I support and volunteer for abused women's outreach. I am neither black nor brown but I speak to at risk black and Hispanic teens as a volunteer counselor with Youth Conflict Resolution Centers/ Dallas at Sunset High. I proudly live in a very mixed race neighborhood, and have a longggg time..... where I am connected to alternative realities. And fool that I am, I try to share them.

I promise. We're all on the same page here. Literally.

Rawlins Gilliland, says:

Scott: Thanks for your kind input.

Records: Seems it all 'disappeared' after the Dallas Morning News ran my DMNews POINTS Op-Ed. Funny how that works, yes? More to my point how those with 'clout' disappear while the rank and file are forever.

Incidentally, my photo was on the DPD website for almost 3 years. Once on, no way off. And it says on the website that one must search 'public records' to learn the case outcome. In other words, who would take the time to learn if I was or wasn't exonerated? Still another angelical 'issue' regarding web cast info in the 'public interest'.

It was never in the newspaper. After all, this was originally just another in the post fake drugs scandal (tail end of the Bolton era) faked arrest 'ticket'. I was not as 'high profile' then. And according to (now) Judge Lena Levario, the record of my 'arrest' was still on the records. I was told I would need to take actions to have it removed. If it is ‘gone’ how interesting. That was recent that Judge Levario and I spoke. She and I had talked for other reasons on the phone in relation to what I saw at Lew Sterrett re: treatment of the mentally ill/schizophrenics.

Rawlins Gilliland, says:

After I ran my DMNews Op-Ed spring '06, following the trial, (and before) I began chronicling these kinds of stories that are endemic in life after political correctness and a so-called conservative backlash collided into a perfectly horrible storm.

I could go on and go telling about teachers, male, whose grade school pupil ‘got even’ by claiming ‘he touched me’. The man in a hot tub at a health club when two 14 year olds climbed in and took off their swim suits (per normal for adults but there was a ‘No children under 16’ sign plainly posted….. when the father walked in and complained to the manager that this ‘middle aged man was in the tub with my sons’. (He was not charged but the police were called in and he was questioned. Clearly he has been scarred by this experience dreadfully. He scarcely speaks to anyone anywhere anymore. He avoids all eye contact.) My plumber whose 15 yr. old step-daughter falsely accused him because he would not let her go out with a 28 yr. old man she ‘met’ online. The 19 yr old in prison for ‘underage sex’ with his 17 yr old girlfriend. Now, after 4 1/4 years out of prison but a registered ‘sex offender’ listed in my neighborhood. This man is practically unhirable.

Or what about my own neighbors, an African American mother with 6 adopted children that I tried to help by donating my old PC, etc. Her clergyman told her that a childless single middle aged man (that would be me) showing interest in young children was a ‘red flag’. The children are never up to see me now, where they used to come knock on my door and ask if my dog ‘Honey’ could come out to play. (How cute is (was) that?) The father returned the PC I gave them, for which I had no need and those kids ranging from 4 to 16 did. All because of fear, whispers, nuance and false accusations. Never mind that mine were refuted in a court of law in a brisk 15 minutes. The accusation is what the remember...and the photo. Not the recanted testimony or the 'not guilty' verdicts.

Thank you for sharing the story of your son. It means the world to me, and for the remainder of my life I won’t forget it. When a life is ‘lost’ when they remain living, all because of either ignorance or malice, I feel a need to find a place in my heart, no less than for those who die tragically in battlefields like Afghanistan and Iraq.

Personally, I can encourage you that the decision as to whether one is irretrievably damaged is to a large extent ours to make. I have gone on to experience (periods of) true happiness and even flirt periodically with joy. All things are possible to he who waits and refuses to let injuries inflicted falsely by others become their own fatal wound. Make your son understand this.