Kenosha – Kenosha County Sheriff David Beth said a new law is needed to require anyone who leases a property to a sex offender be a resident of that county.
The Sheriff’s comments come after friends, neighbors, local business people and elected officials gathered in Wheatland to show their anger and concern over a registered sex offender placed in a home literally yards away from a family home with a young child.
The Sheriff’s proposal is an effort to stop business partnerships from forming with the sole intent of buying inexpensive homes around the state and renting them at a premium to the state Department of Human Services as locations to house sex offenders.
“This will help to control the actions of absentee landlords from several counties away who have no connection to the properties in our counties where sex offenders are placed,” Beth wrote in an opinion letter to fellow sheriffs in the state.
Things have gotten heated after Racine County Judge Allan Torhorst upheld the placement of Michael McGee, 53, in the house adjacent to a home with a small child.
Torhorst ordered McGee be placed in the home within 10 days.
Kenosha County officials had claimed that McGee’s offender profile includes children as potential targets. McGee was convicted of burglary and second-degree sexual assault of a woman in 1987. After his release, McGee reportedly had his parole revoked as a result of an alleged incident involving a 10-year-old boy to whom he is related.
The placement in Kenosha County of an offender from Racine County came about because there are reportedly no available homes or facilities in Racine or Milwaukee counties.
A change in a state law loosened requirements that released offenders must be placed in the county of their arrest.
