DCS honors two Rome supervisors
♦ Both helped clarify law dealing with sex offenders
Two Floyd County Department of Community Supervision officers received commendations Tuesday for the efforts to clarify the importance of ongoing supervision of sex offenders across the state of Georgia. Brandon Henderson and Cody Franklin were honored in front of their peers for raising questions that led to an amendment of state law this year.
SB 174 was passed in 2017, which called for anyone who was on supervision, including sex offenders, but did not have any restitution owed, to be placed on unsupervised status after two years.
“A lot of these guys need long-term treatment,” said Henderson. “We started having to petition the court to get these guys in front of a judge and argue to keep them on supervision. It was bogging down the court system and it was bogging down my officers.”
Henderson and Franklin subsequently contacted Tracy Alvord, executive director of the Sex Offender Registration Review Board, who submitted SB 407 amending the previous law to exclude sex offenders from the provisions of SB 174.
Franklin said that keeping up with changes in the laws every year is one of the most challenging aspects of the job.
“It’s something that changes every year,” Franklin said.
Sex offenders are seen on a regular basis, at home, at work, in treatment.
“We’re in their face at least twice a month,” Franklin said.
Alvord said the DCS staff plays a huge role in continuing to protect the Rome and Floyd County community.
“We want to present as minimal a risk as possible to our communities,” Alvord said. “The community doesn’t know what you do. Some of those guys are dangerous.”
Henderson said he could only recall a couple of instances where a sex offender committed a repeat of a crime while under supervision.
“I’ve seen it happen after their supervision, when they’re not being seen by us,” Henderson said. “That’s another reason why we want to try to prolong the treatment, because there is no cure for it. They have to learn to cope with their urges.”
Floyd County currently has 104 actively supervised sex offenders in the system.