Public Schools Mainstream Registered Sex Offenders

Hundreds of teenagers, convicted of felony sex crimes, are attending middle and high schools throughout Washington.

KIRO Team 7 Investigative Reporter Chris Halsne is doing something that's never been done: Show where juvenile sex offenders go to class with your kids because the school districts never will.

UPDATE: Teen Sex Offender Raped Special Ed Student At School, Police Say

We found regular students and their parents are intentionally being left in the dark by school administrators, so young rapists and child molesters can get uninterrupted public educations.

Click here for a map showing 2009 data of sex offenders in schools.

It wasn't easy, but we identified about 60 schools in this area where registered teenage sex offenders are on campus every day. Our website features details on each offender, including exactly where they attend class.

Backpack in tow, heading off to first period, one boy looks like any other floppy-haired, 14-year-old boy walking up the middle school hallway.

He's not.

Public records show that one particular junior high student was recently convicted of sexually assaulting a 4-year-old girl. A judge sentenced him to probation and registration as a sex offender. With no jail time, the young man went right back to hanging out in the school courtyard and going to class.

The school district did not inform other students or parents.

“I couldn't believe - I couldn't believe what I was hearing!” Charlina Macri told KIRO Team 7 Investigators.

Macri runs a licensed daycare two blocks from the middle school and has a son who goes to class with the registered sex offender. She strongly feels all parents have a right to know.

“I'm not saying you need to plaster the students name everywhere. That's not what I'm saying here, but I need to be given the opportunity to review the situation and say OK is this a safe environment? Am I comfortable with my student in this environment?” said Macri.

Our exclusive research found at least 412 registered sex offenders in Washington under the age of 18.

Of those kids convicted of sex crimes, 234 are 16 years old or younger. Nearly all of them must attend public school as part of their probation, parole, or other court ordered decree.

Many of their rap sheets are serious, including nearly 100 teenagers who were convicted of child rape, child molestation, for first-degree rape. Hundreds more have convictions for indecent liberties, sexual assault, stalking, and a half dozen other serious offenses.

Mug shots uncovered by Team 7 Investigators show the criminals are just baby-faced 14, 15, and 16 year olds, who are allowed to blend into crowded public school lunch rooms and hallways throughout the state.

Occasionally, we found local Sheriff’s Departments post a young offender’s picture on a sex offender registration website, but in the vast majority of the cases, law enforcement are apparently not publishing their images.

State Representative Kirk Pearson wants a new law that allows schools to notify concerned parents when one of these potential predators enrolls.

Pearson says, “Student sex offenders have an advantage. If no one knows they're a sex offender, they can groom a student, which has happened.

(*KIRO Team 7 Investigators know of two such reported cases, one in Puyallup and one in Lake Stevens.)

KIRO Team 7 Investigators spent months fighting with 50 Western Washington school districts over public records act requests for basic information regarding the location of juvenile sex offenders.

Several districts, including Auburn, Lake Washington, Bellevue, and Kent, used tax-funded lawyers in attempts to delay, minimize, or exempt themselves from cooperating.

Others, including Marysville, Everett, and Edmonds, just refused to let forward key information - yet we prevailed on most accounts.

Our website has a full listing of specific middle and high schools, but here are some highlights: The Bethel School district in Pierce County enrolled 8 sex offenders this year. Mukilteo started the year with 7. Tacoma is dealing with 20 juvenile sex offenders, several which are repeat rapists.

Seattle Schools say it has 9 teens enrolled right now, either already registered as convicted sex offenders or awaiting adjudication for serious sex crimes.

We found Seattle schools hired a security officer that creates a "safety plan" for each offender and provides extra monitoring. Most districts don't.

Spokesperson Patti Spencer told us, “If there is a deviation from what is a fairly strict and structured plan, then that is addressed immediately.”

Spencer added “We do have a very strong process, procedure, plan, and monitoring in place. There are a very small number of these students in the district and we absolutely stay on top of monitoring to provide a safe and secure environment for every student.”

With supervision and counseling, repeat violent crimes are not the norm according to Lucy Berliner, director of Harborview's Center for Sexual Assault and Traumatic Stress.

“Most of these kids don't re-offend. The kids are really safe. It's really a matter of how do you get people to "feel" safe as opposed to being safe.”

Berliner also told Team 7 Investigators. “If we create a circumstance in which no young person who has ever been in trouble with the law for sexual behavior can go to a public school without there being public notification to the entire school that they are there, I guess I wonder what it is that we would recommend in terms of restoring the kids to functioning within society.”

Some parents of non-offender students wonder if school districts should be keeping the secrets of proven sex criminals, just so juvenile offenders have a second chance at rehabilitation.

Macri speaks plainly. “There are consequences from making mistakes. That's what the world is all about.”

In 2004, Representative Pearson helped push a new law that required local sheriff's departments to tell a principal when a registered sex offender is about enroll, so your child’s school can't claim they don't know.

Other legislators, however, voted down a measure that would have also passed that information along to other parents.