Sex Offender Stigma: An Exploration of Vigilantism against Sex Offenders

ABSTRACT

The current study compiles open-source news reports involving vigilantes who targeted individuals because of their status as a sex offender (SO) or their suspected involvement in a sex offense. The Sex Offender-Vigilante database includes 279 separate incidents of vigilantism against SOs, ranging from the dissemination of unsanctioned fliers to murder. Results indicate that the stigmatization that convicted SOs experience is so pervasive that it extends even to individuals suspected of having committed a sexual offense.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Michelle A. Cubellis

MICHELLE A. CUBELLIS is an Assistant Professor at the Central Connecticut State University and Research Associate at the Research and Evaluation Center, John Jay College of Criminal Justice. She received her Ph.D. in Criminal Justice from John Jay College. Her research focuses on institutional responses to deviance, child sexual abuse, macro-level responses to violence and victimization, and program evaluation.

Douglas N. Evans

DOUGLAS EVANS is a Senior Investigator and Project Director at the Research and Evaluation Center, John Jay College of Criminal Justice and also teaches in correctional facilities in New York and New Jersey through Hudson Link for Higher Education and NJ STEP. His research focuses on the stigmatization resulting from criminal justice system contact, evaluation of violence reduction and alternative to incarceration programs, the effects of education programs in prisons, and the public health consequences of mass incarceration. He received his Ph.D. in Criminal Justice from Indiana University.

Adam G. Fera

ADAM G. FERA is a doctoral candidate at the Graduate Center CUNY/John Jay College of Criminal Justice. He is a Research Analyst on the Misdemeanor Justice Project. His research interests include jury decision making, capital jury research, methods of execution research, plea bargaining and the trial penalty, escapes from correctional custody, testing criminological theory, and sex offender research. His is currently writing his dissertation which is a longitudinal examination of the trial penalty in federal cases.