This is such an important bill and I ask the General Assembly to please pass this as law. No matter what the indecent libertiy may be to a child it is a horrifing experience to them one that they never get over. I know personally a child who went through this experience and there are not words to describe how hurt and terrified she has been because of her experience. No one has the right to sexually abuse a child and french kissing has to be included as a form of sexual abuse. This is a very intimate act some might say more intimate than the actually act of sex. To a young child this takes there youth away and can make that child live in fear. Please concider passing this bill into law. If we don't protect our child then who will. No one has a right to touch a child in any inapproperiate way so please help protect our children.

As a parent of three children I'm horrified to think that this is not already law. You would think that someone that it is in a custodian or supervisor role of a child would know the difference in inapproxiate behavior. This is a form of sexual and mental abuse. Yes I want this law changed. We are our children's role models.

I have trouble understanding how anyone could debate the need for such a law. Obviously an adult mouth kissing with tongue a child is sexual abuse and probably a precurser to other sexually explicit behavior. By cracking down on this initial behavior the lawmakers will show abusers that they are serious about protecting our children.

This should have been a law from the beginning. MOST PEOPLE THINK IT IS.It must have been an oversight. Lets see clearly and get this law changed. The victim and there family has to deal with this everyday. This law needs to be changed, the offender needs to added to the sex offenders list for the rest of there life.

I agree that this should be the law, although it is really covered under other areas of the current indecent liberties statute.

I would like to comment to John Smith, that families (and the child victims) that have undergone this abuse are then subjected to that same lifetime of restrictions as the offender. When you place an offender on the registry for life, his family is also subjected to those lifetime punishments - daddy can't go to parent-teacher conferences or soccer games. Daddy can't take the kids to the pool. People throw things at their house and taunt the kids at school. Lifetime registration is a life sentence for the families, too. This fact has contributed to the decline in reported child sexual abuse cases (40% decline from 1992-2000 according to FBI reports).

There is ample evidence now that treatment does work with most sex offenders and recidivism is actually quite low according to the Bureau of Justice (around 3% for child molestation offenses) and the Virginia Sex Offender Task Force (about 6%).

While this offense should definitely be on the books, the lifetime registration requirements regardless of the offender's assessed risk to reoffend are over the top. We have to come up with better methods of sex offender management that prvide for offender accountability and treatment while actually increasing public safety - not decreasing it because families are reluctant to report a loved one.

Currently this is not being addressed in the State of Virginia This happened to our child, and the offender was only charged with contributing to a minor, & assault charge. He is not on a Sex Offender List at all. As a mother of a Sexual Assault Child Victim, I can not begin to comprehend how someone would allow their child to be around a known sex offender, family member or otherwise. I do believe in rehab. but when you are talking about a child's safety I can't and will not take that chance.
I understand parents can not safeguard children from all dangers especially the ones that have not presented themselves yet. Pro Action is the best action for the safety of our children. There are many mistakes in life as adults we make that time served, or rehab. can help, accidents that happen that should have forgiveness but when you intenionally harm a child you relinquish all rights to your own self pity.

Patty Wetterling (whose son was abducted and murdered by a sex offender prompting the Wetterling Act and the creation of the Sex Offender registry) has spoken numerous times and written articles about how we have gone too far with sex offender legislation. You can check out a recent article at http://www.sacbee.com/110/story/377462.html. She is obviously no stranger to the pain caused by a sex offender yet still urges the public to understand that all offenders are not the same.

I understand the anger and suffering of having a child sexually assaulted and AGREE that this bill should be law. I'm just cautioning against a broad approach to dealing with all sex offenders and imposing liftime registration and restrictions without regard to their actual risk to reoffend.

I traveled here today to express my concern. A concern for our children and their futures. As adults we are are suppose to protect our children and I am asking you for your help in doing just that. By passing the requested law we may together help protect other children from the sexual abuse inflicted on so many before. The sad truth is that most child predators are not labeled until their abuse has gone much further. Sexual abuse no matter how small, ultimately leaves the victims with a lifetime of confusion and pain to sort through. As a mother of an eleven year old girl I am terrified that our current laws do not protect her from an adult who finds it okay to french kiss her and begin his grooming cycle. As in the recent case where Roland Knight of Varina preyed on the little girls entrusted in his wife's care, it appears that the laws were in his favor and not of our children. Shouldn't the parents of the current children in the Knight's care be warned and their children be considered worth protecting? In closing, I am asking you to help protect the children of this state from men like Mr. Roland Knight that do not consider themselves predators.

This is addressed to anyone who can help this bill to become a law in Virginia and hopefully a future Federal law. Our children are supposed to be able to look up to adults and therefore should be able to trust and respect them. As parents we should be able to trust and respect the adults to protect our children when we place our children in their care. When an adult takes sexual liberties with a child, they take away that trust. There are people who were abused sexually as children who are now adults, some of them abused more than 40 years ago that still have not gotten over the abuse they suffered as children and will probably carry it with them to their graves. We need to protect our children by giving these offenders the maximum punishment they can be given. They should all be made to register for a lifetime as sex offenders. It is hard enough on adults that are sexually abused or to put up with unwelcome sexual advances but you cannot even imagine how it feels for a child or how helpless the parents of that child must feel. As far as punishment I feel that at the least it should be a felony, because the adult that perpertrates this act on a child has stolen the trust they have for adults along with an innocence that should be lost at a later time in life. That childs innocence should be lost out of love, not lust. I very strongly feel that they should be made to register as a sex offender for life in a place available to all the public. Yes, I'm well aware thatt this affects their families and chidren and limits activities they can take place in. The adult sex offender should have taken this in consideration before they took away a child's innocence. I am a christian and do belive in forgiveness, but we should be responsible for our actions and that man in Varina, Roland Knight should have been given more than a "slap on the wrist". What he did should have been a felony when he did it and we need to make sure these type of offenders are charged as felons in the future. If more of these cases were punished to fit the crime we may be able to cut down on future crimes like these. My Grandmother is almost 96 years old and one of the smartest people I know or even know of and one of the most important lessons she taught our family and we teach ours is THAT YOU TREAT OTHER PEOPLE AS YOU WANT TO BE TREATED! I pray that this bill passes and becomes a law as soon as possible. Thank everyone who has worked to make sure this bill becomes a law. I pray that all the sex offenders get help. I pray for all the children who have ever been abused by a sex offender and hope they can one day get over what they have been through.