Sex Offenders in the Denver Area

Crime and Society

“There are currently 10,096-registered sex offenders in Colorado, as of June 2, 2008.” According to the Colorado offenders’ registry, there are 8 offenders within one-mile radius of where I live: 5 were convicted felons; 2 were “continuously registered”; and one was a multiple offender (who happened to be a “sexually violent predator”). In all of Denver (my home town), there are 969 people per one sex offender as of August 2011. After comparing Glendale to other cities, including Denver, this is pretty low: Denver has 593 per one offender; Greenwood Village has 14,382 (the lowest ratio); and Wheat Ridge with 365 (the highest ration). To be honest, I have felt safe every time at any given time in my neighborhood and have heard of no criminal activity around my area related to neither of these people nor anyone else. After examining my neighborhood on the registry, I realize that there are no means of security as in frequent police patrols, watchdogs, prevalent vigilantes, nor fenced in yards. The only exceptions are the occasional crime deterring home security signs. My neighborhood is a quiet diverse, middle class community, with a couple of schools and parks in the vicinity. The biggest crime I feel would be the rare skateboarding, so to think that there are offenders in my area is hard to believe. There are children who ride school buses without the intentional supervision of an adult; so I see no kidnappers. People take walks at night; I haven’t heard of any assaults of any kind. Bikes are sometimes left unchained and people park their cars outside their own garages; there’s no mention of any robberies, though a house was burglarized one summer morning in 2010- should one call a house that’s unoccupied, unlocked, and wide open being burglarized. In reality, I have not heard one bit of commotion from my neighbors and my neighbors’ neighbors. I’m not sure if it’s because we are unaware of who is an offender, if we are aware and we actually...