The state of Michigan has erased thousands of sex offenders from its database, including one particular notorious name that many will immediately remember: Dr. Larry Nassar.
The move to scrub as many as 20,000 names from the state’s sex offender registry followed a Michigan Supreme Court ruling holding that “amendments issued in 2021 to the Sex Offender Registration Act can’t be used to retroactively require registration due to older incidents.”
This led to the removal of offenders whose crimes were committed before July 1, 2011.
Among those whose crimes precede that date is Dr. Larry Nassar.
Nassar was convicted of using his position as team doctor for USA Gymnastics from 1996 to 2014 and as team physician for Michigan State until 2016 to sexually abuse hundreds of young women.
Even though Nassar’s conviction wouldn’t come until many years after the July 2011 cut-off date, his name was still removed because many of his crimes predated July 2011, prosecutors explained.
While Nassar is no longer a threat to the public, as he is currently serving lengthy prison sentences which will likely ensure he spends the rest of his life in jail, the disappearance of 20,000 sexual offenders from the state’s database will remove the ability of Michiganders to use the registry as a way of determining whether people living among them were ever listed as abusers.
“The Eaton County Prosecutor’s Office also listed other offenders its office had prosecuted over sexual assault of minors, where the registration requirement was lifted. The Supreme Court could have applied a different interpretation upon hearing the case, the prosecutor’s office claimed, and allowed for certain sex offenders to remain on the list,” CBS News reported.
“While the effectiveness of such lists can be debated, that should occur in the legislature, not by decision of the court.”