On his 18th birthday, Virgil McCranie and his 14-year-old girlfriend of one year, Misty, decided to have sex. Because of their ages, that meant McCranie committed the crime of statutory rape. When Misty told her father months later, after finding out that McCranie had cheated on her, he went to the police. In 1994, McCranie struck a deal with prosecutors, pleading no contest to lewd and lascivious behavior. He avoided prison, but as part of the deal, he had to register as a sex offender. In time, Virgil and Misty reconciled, eventually got married, and began raising four children together. "It was a mistake, it happened, I’ve been with her since, I’ve loved her before then," he said in a news interview. At that moment, McCranie was a still a registered sex offender. He says that he lost 17 jobs because of his status. Worse, he couldn't attend his sons' games and his daughter’s dance recitals. "I wish I could take it back," Misty told the Florida Sun-Sentinel. "Once we got back together I realized how detrimental it was to him." In the end, McCranie was one of the lucky ones. He applied to Florida's then governor Charlie Crist for a pardon and received one. Others like him, however, remain on the registries. There are at least 29 states require registration on sex offender lists for consensual sex between teenagers. In the 6 states of Alabama, Kansas, Michigan, Oregon, Tennessee, and West Virginia, people can be put on the sex offender list for prostitution-related offenses, such as solicitation and running a brothel. Mapped: Sex offender registry laws on statutory rape, public urination, and prostitution. (slate.com) Chanakya Sethi, August 12, 2014 related threads: 19 year old put on sex offender registry for having sex with underage girl 11-year-old became lifetime registered "sex offender" for touching sister
Four years is a pretty significant gap at that age. He would have met her in middle school as a Jr. in high school. Doesn’t stoke me as a healthy relationship. Edit: Looked up Romeo and Juliet laws. Based on what I saw it looks like he may have been legally in the clear depending on his state. 4 years is the upper end.
Maybe there should at least be two different categories on the sex offender registry, to immediately let people know that the person on the list committed a less serious sexual crime, and is not a rapist or something like that. An example: Someone in Washington state gets drunk and they go pee in the bushes. The person is mostly oblivious to everything else going on around them. A child happens to see their wee-wee, and now that person gets put on the sex offender registry for indecent exposure. It has happened.
Shawna: A Life on the Sex Offender Registry, The Marshall Project, September 17, 2017 - YouTube "Shawna isn't some serial rapist or violent pedophile, but a young woman who happened to hook up with the wrong guy when she was 19 and he, it turned out, was 14. Fifteen years later, condemned to life on the sex offender registry, she still pays the price for that mistake every day."
Then you have the reverse. In 2014, James Tubbs was 2 weeks away from turning 18 when he followed a 10 year old girl into a public restroom and molested her. He fled when somebody else, and he remained uncaught until 2020 when his DNA was finally linked to a criminal in Idaho. Back in California finally, the state dropped most of the charges and he pled guilty to lesser ones. As he was 17 when the crime happened, the judge sentenced him to a juvenile facility. And as he was 17, he will not have to register as a sex offender. And to pour salt on the wound, he now identifies as transgender, so if he is locked up it will be in a female juvenile facility.
