Missing, undocumented sex offenders mark SC registry

A News13 investigation uncovered dozens of convicted sex offenders missing in the Eastern Carolinas and several more registered in places you wouldn’t expect to find them. Our investigation exposes loopholes in the system that has allowed some offenders to remain undetected for years.

For weeks, News13 poured over the state’s sex offenders registered in the eight counties that make up the News13 viewing area in South Carolina.

We went through every offender registered in Chesterfield, Darlington, Dillon, Florence, Marlboro, Marion, Horry and Georgetown counties looking for current registration dates, mugshots, current addresses, and any other information to see how well the state tracks convicted sex offenders in the area.

We started the investigation at the end of October and found that in every county in the area, there were missing offenders and offenders who moved out of the area without forwarding addressed.

If the state’s registry said an offender moved out of state, we checked the Department of Justice’s national database to check for that offender’s new address.

In several cases, an offender listed as moved out of state, couldn’t be found on the national registry.

Another issue our investigation uncovered was that offenders listed as incarcerated on the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division’s registry, don’t always show up on the South Carolina Department of Correction’s online inmate search.

A loophole that allows many offenders to go unregistered is when they leave prison.

The state DOC is required by law to notify the inmate orally and in writing that he is required to register with the sheriff’s office in the county where the inmate plans to move to after his release from prison.

State law requires the DOC to notify SLED and the sheriff’s office that the inmate plans to move to the county, but on several occasions, that never happened.

In Horry County, we found nine offenders registered by the DOC with home addresses listed at the Horry County Government and Justice Center.

Some of those offenders never showed up to register at the Horry County sheriff’s office, according to Sgt. Lori Avant, who maintains the county’s sex offender registry.

“Some of these offenders, they may not know specifically where they are going. They may have been incarcerated for a period of time and the only information that’s received is that they intend to move to Horry County,” Avant said.

That means offenders could go days, weeks, months, and years without registering while investigators try to track them down, “For every offender that comes in and for every record that’s processed, it does require a good bit of paperwork and a good bit of time, particularly if that offender has not provided an address. There’s a good bit of investigative time that has to be involved in determining where that offender is,” Avant said.

“There have been some issues where some folks have been released form prison and have not given an address, that’s a concern to me,” Horry County Sheriff Philip Thompson said.

Another limitation on maintaining accurate information on the SLED registry authorities said is when an offender is homeless, there’s no way to notate that on the registry.

One homeless offender in Horry County’s address is listed as the 900 block of Mr. Joe White Avenue “In the Woods.”

“That particular case, this is a homeless person. They don’t have a residence to provide to us, but in fact in that particular case, did what they could do and let us know where they were sleeping at night,” Avant said.

Two Florence County registered sex offenders had home addresses listed as the Florence County Detention Center.

“It’s a concern and we have to document something. We have to make that entry on a particular address and sometimes we’ll use our address here,” Florence County sheriff Kenney Boone said.

Boone said the current registry system opens itself up for misinformation and mistakes, “It’s repetitive because you have to do it on so many levels. SLED has to do it, we have to update Offender Watch, we have to update all of our records here, so you’re talking about doing this information three and four times down the way,” Boone said.

One resolution to the problem is a centralized system that links all sheriffs’ offices together that allows deputies to update the registry and to share offender information.

Florence, Horry, and Georgetown Counties use the Offender Watch system to help the public track and pinpoint where registered offenders live by using mapping software to show offenders who live within a 5-mile radius of an address.

The Offender Watch costs $7,000 each year to operate, Boone said.

Another issue with the current registry is that there are serious delays in offender information between SLED and sheriff’s offices.

Some offenders we found with registry problems in the area had registered with the county, but their information was not updated on the SLED online registry, “There might be some discrepancies between their information that they might have today, maybe the information is being sent to us; maybe we haven’t had the time to get this information in. There are some things that we probably need to do there to make sure the information is current as quick as you can.” Boone said.