The Marion County Sheriff’s Department in Indianapolis is sending e-mails to anyone who wants alerts whenever an offender moves into the neighborhood, the Indianapolis Star reports. The service is part of a new department-sponsored Web site that allows users to plug in an address and get pictures, addresses, and information on sex offenders living nearby. “I don’t want to scare anyone,” Sheriff Frank Anderson said, “but I do want our community to have the resources they need to keep our children safe.”
There are about 1,800 registered sex offenders in the county; 180 of them are wanted on warrants for not being registered properly. “When it comes to your safety, the sheriff’s office is making all the information available to you,” said Mike Cormaci of Covington, La.-based Watch Systems, the company that developed the site. Watch Systems has developed similar sites for law enforcement agencies across the country. In Ohio, more than 356,000 residents have signed up for the e-mail alerts.
Link: http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080523/LOCAL18/805230454