Caught in a bizarre Catch-22, Dan Wheeler may spend the rest of his life suffering the consequences. Via Radley Balko, KING5 reports:
It has been a nightmare for Dan Wheeler for 15 years. It started with his wallet being stolen from his truck, and his identity stolen. Usually the trouble that follows has to do with bank or credit fraud, but Wheeler says his identity was stolen by a sex offender who was arrested and used Wheeler’s name as an alias.
“It’s been absolutely miserable,” said Wheeler.
About five years ago the Port Orchard man was stopped for making an illegal left turn.
“The officer told me to get out of the car and I was under arrest,” said Wheeler. “I asked why and he said I was a wanted sex offender. I couldn’t believe it.”
Since then, Wheeler has been fighting desperately to get his identity back. He has a difficult timing getting any kind of job that involves a background check, and was recently rejected as a foster parent — all because of a case of stolen identity.
“I’ve been to police and prosecutors and they all tell me there’s nothing that can be done,” said Wheeler.
It’s not that there’s nothing that can be done, but nothing that either police or prosecutors, or anyone else in government apparently, is willing to do. A critical distinction.
With a few taps on a computer, Dan Wheeler’s identify, and the alias of the sex offender, can be removed from the sex offender registry forever. The problem is that the people with the authority to remove this stigma, burden, impairment, nightmare, won’t do it. They won’t because that means that the sex offender who stole his identity might get away with something. We can’t have that. Better to wreak havoc with the life of an innocent man, even deny him the opportunity to be a foster parent, lest some sex offender get away with something.
The underlying problem could fall under a number of rubrics, whether better that 100 criminals go free than 1 innocent person be imprisoned, or perhaps safety versus freedom. But the solution to the problem, easy at it may be, depends entirely on the sensibilities of those with the power.
A spokesman for the Washington State Patrol, which handles the State Sex Offenders Database, says when someone is arrested and uses an alias, that alias is kept on file forever. The concern is that if authorities delete the alias, the criminal could go back to using it again.
True indeed, and we certainly can’t have that. So Dan Wheeler’s life will forever subject to this? Hey, that’s the price we pay for safety, even if it’s only against a potential threat to safety. Safety first. Safety above all else. Really, don’t you want to be safe? Of course you do, especially when it’s only some guy named Dan Wheeler who has to pay the price for it. After all, you don’t even know him and it’s not like the misery of this stupidity would affect your life at all.
This seems like another fine opportunity to turn to Phil Ochs.
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One of my favorite albums. Phil Ochs–a tragedy, too. Died too young. Dating myself by owning up to all that–but let me blurt something out and date myself again. I need help. A confession:
I really dislike cops. All of them. Even Andy Griffith types. I think of them at best as rocks and plants. And as untrustworthy white trash blowing down Main Street. It’s irrational–but it has kept me off of several juries. Yet it may be impeding my development as a human being and real American.
Is there a rehab for this? “My name’s Dan and I am powerless over wanting to speed up so I am pulled over and I can mess with cops every morning on the way to work.” Some days I must do this several times. An addiction. I love it when they walk over to the car. I sit there brimming over with ways to ruin their day but yet get no ticket.
Can you help me?
It’s wrong to dislike cops. There are good ones and bad ones. There are cops that are wonderful one day, and awful the next. Let’s not get anti-cop crazy. The point is that cops need to police themselves, their attitudes and behaviors that give rise to the problems that become the fodder of criticism.
Cops do good things as well as bad. The emphasis here on the bad should never cloud the fact that there are cop who save lives, help people, do good.
And there may be drugs for your condition. You should see a doctor.
… or just plain decent database design. It’s not a great stretch — given that it’s happened — that a perp who has used as a nom de perv of an innocent person might continue to do so, and there’s an obvious law enforcement benefit in identifying that nom. And it’s also an obvious potential law enforcement problem of hauling in the victim, particularly repeatedly, thereby not only impinging on his rights, but wasting time that can be better served.
Solution: fix the database(s), so that when Dan Wheeler’s name comes up, it indicates that there is a warrant out for a guy who has stolen his identity, perhaps along with some identifying information about the real Dan Wheeler that isn’t available to the perv.
The only reason that wouldn’t be done would be if the authorities didn’t give a damn about it, and surely that’s not the case.
One glitch. Lots of nice folks use the SORA database to check up on other nice folks. Even if there’s an asterisk next to Dan Wheeler’s name, the nice folks doing the checking may have some difficulty distinguishing between the good Dan Wheeler and the perv Dan Wheeler. They may not be inclined to go to extreme lengths to distinguish between the two, and just say a pox on both Dan Wheelers. The good one still suffers, and doesn’t even know that he’s suffering or why.
It’s true that the perv may use the alias again. It’s also possible that he can use about 299,999,999 other potential aliases. There are lots of possibilities. We can’t prevent all of them, and we don’t know with certainty that it will happen.This makes it an inchoate threat to society, but a very real threat to the good Dan Wheeler. And then there are all the other pervs, as yet unknown. We can’t guarantee that we can stop all of them either. Lots of unknowns in this business, although it we just put everybody on the list, we can be assured that we haven’t missed anyone. That would solve the problem on the safety side, but doesn’t help the good Dan Wheeler.
The good Dan Wheeler shouldn’t be the one to suffer.
Everyone keeps telling me that. Thanks for setting me straight. I have made an appointment tomorrow with a special woman physician who had at tent at the Delmar Fair.
Just remember, the KY jelly isn’t covered by insurance. You have to ask for it.
You forget I was an Eagle Scout. Have at least a case in trunks of both BMW and SAAB together with my special custom Hazmat suits.
Might it be possible to sue the Government for slander on this? As with terrorist watchlists, these should be subjected to court oversight and authorization.
Isn’t this a case of punishment without trial?
Whenever this question is asked, there’s a pat response. Of course he could sue, though for civil rights violation rather than slander. It doesn’t mean he’ll win. It doesn’t mean he’ll make it past summary judgment. It doesn’t mean that he’ll receive damages even if he does. It does mean that he will have a huge legal bill for the effort. Suing isn’t always a viable solution to a problem.
There have been a number of cases in California recently dealing with people who were listed in various databases (the child abuse database is one) and sued to get their names removed. The 9th Circuit seems fairly receptive to such litigation though, as you note, suing isn’t free.
What boggles my mind is why the DA’s office or similar can’t just issue him an official letter which says “This isn’t that Dan Wheeler”.
If that’s the rationale, why doesn’t Dan just change his name?
(Then again, it would be nice if he had a defamation case against the real bad guy, or the state, or both.)