The new neighbors are Shawn Schulpius and Edwin West - sex offenders.
These are bad men. They're dangerous.
Is it surprising that residents in the area don't want them released in their neighborhood?
No.
Is it surprising that during a meeting at St. Veronica Church Milwaukee County D.A. John Chisholm told concerned residents that the sex offenders WILL be moving in and they need to deal with it?
No.
From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:
Two convicted sex offenders scheduled to soon move into a Bay View home drew a crowd of a couple hundred residents to a meeting Monday night.BS.
After listening to police, prosecutors and corrections officials explain why Shawn Schulpius and Edwin West will move to a rental home in the 1100 block of E. Van Beck Ave. later this month, residents scribbled questions on cards and later angrily shouted questions. One resident asked how they could feel secure if both West and Schulpius are repeat offenders.
Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm said the men have served their sentences as well as many years at a secure treatment center for sex offenders in Mauston and now experts have determined, and a judge has agreed, that they should be allowed back into society.
"I understand there are great concerns of everyone in this room," Chisholm said at the meeting inside St. Veronica Church on E. Norwich Ave. "We treat all these cases like they're our neighborhood."
Does Chisholm have two sex offenders like Schulpius and West living down the street from his family?
Check out the crimes of new neighbors Shawn Schulpius and Edwin West:
West, 48, was convicted twice of sexually assaulting an acquaintance when he was 23 and 25; Schulpius, 39, was convicted of sexual assault of a 6-year-old girl, a 12-year-old girl and a 4-year-old boy when he was a teenager. The sex offenders were both convicted in Milwaukee County and will live together.Good Lord.
Schulpius did monstrous things. He admitted to assaulting TWENTY victims in less than a decade. TWENTY.
Other neighborhoods have been successful in keeping Schulpius out, but this time, officials are ignoring the residents, leaving them feeling powerless and victimized.
Both men were committed under Wisconsin's Chapter 980 law that allows inmates deemed sexually violent to be held for mental health treatment after they serve their prison terms. Schulpius has received more media attention because he repeatedly sought supervised release from the program at Sand Ridge Secure Treatment Center with his case reaching the state Supreme Court in 2005.If their supervision will be so tight, it seems to me that they aren't exactly ready to be released into the community.
For many years Milwaukee County prosecutors successfully argued against Schulpius' discharge from Sand Ridge until a judge last month decided he should be released.
Officials told the crowd Monday night that for the first year Schulpius and West will be under strict supervision and will not be allowed to leave their home - not even to get mail or shovel the sidewalk - except under limited conditions such as buying groceries and going to therapy sessions. Whenever they leave home in the first year they'll be accompanied by escorts.
Will someone live with them, monitoring them constantly? No.
This is insane.
After the first year the men are expected to get jobs to pay for their living expenses. And for the rest of their lives they must wear GPS monitoring ankle bracelets while they're in Wisconsin and comply with the sex offender registry program.Why dump them in this neighborhood?
When residents asked how their neighborhood was chosen, an official said many locations are considered and in this case at least 30 rental homes were investigated before the location on E. Van Beck Ave. was picked.
Is the plan to let yet another Milwaukee neighborhood go to hell?
I don't understand why Schulpius and West will be unleashed in an area with so many schools.
"There's absolutely no perfect placement. We recognize that," said Jason Cram, supervised release program manager at Sand Ridge. "There simply isn't a place in Wisconsin where there will be no children nearby."Then keep them locked up and away from the good people.
Here's more:
Schulpius has repeatedly sought supervised release or discharge from the program without success. His case once threatened the constitutional underpinning of the Chapter 980 law, adopted in 1994, when it got all the way to the state Supreme Court in 2005.In 2010, Schulpius was deemed likely to reoffend.
"He's been continually involved in one of the most strenuous treatment programs in the country," said his attorney, Robert W. Peterson.
On Thursday, Schulpius appeared before Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Charles F. Kahn Jr. via video conference from the Sand Ridge Secure Treatment Center.
"This is going to be a big change for you, and it's not going be easy," Kahn told Schulpius, who sat alone in small room wearing a blue dress shirt and a tie.
Kahn told Schulpius he'll be under be greater restrictions, in many ways, than at Sand Ridge, and that he will have "no wiggle room" around some 50 specific conditions of supervised release. "You're ready for that?" Kahn asked.
"Yes sir," Schulpius responded.
The supervised release plan Kahn approved will keep Schulpius under constant electronic surveillance. His limited excursions from home will be accompanied by someone from a supervision team. He will be subject to scheduled and unannounced visits from a probation agent, polygraph tests, physical exams, continued counseling and training.
Assistant District Attorney Gale Shelton said prosecutors gave the release plan - prepared by the Department of Health Services, which runs the Sand Ridge center - "very close consideration."
She reminded Kahn that in four reports from 2000 to 2012, Sand Ridge staff thought Schulpius met the conditions for discharge. Relying on different experts, prosecutors convinced a jury in 2010 that Schulpius was still more likely than not to reoffend, and his release was denied.
What's happened since? Are we to believe that in the last three years he's changed, and that he no longer wants to assault children?
What can residents do now that their children are in danger?
Police are telling them to form block watch groups, block watch groups to keep the sex offenders in line.
Unbelievable.
Alderman Tony Zielinski blames the state of Wisconsin for having laws that allow sex offenders to be placed in "densely populated neighborhoods."
In other words, "There's nothing I can do. Don't blame me."
Residents would be crazy not to blame Zielinski. There were 30 other homes cited as possible locations for the criminals. If he can't protect his constituents in a matter as important as this, then he's a bad alderman and should be voted out of office.
Chisholm had the audacity to say the residents should remember the Chapter 980 law kept the offenders out of the neighborhood for as long as it did.
That's no consolation. Put Schulpius somewhere else, someplace with a less target rich environment. Area residents have the right to protect themselves from this threat.
Chisholm says they've run out of options to keep Schulpius locked up. Really? Chisholm managed to drag out that John Doe investigation for years. I'm sure he could do something. Maybe if residents appeal to Chisholm by saying they signed the Scott Walker recall petition he'll try a little harder not to punish these law-abiding citizens.
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Watch video, from CBS-58.
Watch video, from TMJ 4.
