Just checking, not arresting

When I was in Chicago recently I saw an article about the Cook County Sheriff's Department arresting sex offenders for not complying with the registry laws. Its a felony for registered sex offenders to not provide accurate and current information, and the Cook County Sheriff has a unit to enforce those laws. They even post those who are non-compliant on their webgetphotology which asks for tips to find the offenders.

In Springfield today the SJ-R has an article about 20 registered sex-offenders in Sangamon County who aren't in compliance with the law. It states:

"Officers, after weeding out those who are in prison, jail or living out of state, checked 207 of them Monday morning, not so much to make arrests but more to update their information..."

Does this piss off anyone else? They're actually bragging to the press that they found out 20 sex offenders are committing a felony and none of them have been arrested! It amazes me that this story is being promoted by local law enforcement leaders when what I see is that they aren't finishing the job.

I hope there's a plan not mentioned in the article to start arresting them very soon. If there's a story about a dozen or more sex offenders being arrested during the next two weeks then I'm happy to give the Springfield Police and County Sheriff Departments all the praise they deserve.

Right now all I see is a public relations attempt to reassure people that something is being done when they should be doing a lot more. I'm not trying to bash the police officers because I know they have a hard job but the Chiefs need to show some leadership on this. I'm waiting for them to prove me wrong.