Anthony Picente Jr. and Rob Maciol, Oneida County Sheriff, Announce Program to Monitor Sex Offenders in Oneida County

Program Will Regularly Advise Residents Offender’s Addresses

Oneida County Sheriff Robert Maciol and Oneida County Executive Anthony Picente will announce that the Oneida County Sheriff’s Office will join over 1500 law enforcement agencies nationwide and more than 40 New York agencies in using the OffenderWatch® Program. This will make available, across several local law enforcement and government agency’s websites - a citizen-friendly, easy to use, Oneida County sex offender registry enabling citizens to search for the presence of registered sex offenders and predators in proximity to their homes, place of work, schools and day cares.   

This information is being provided to the citizens via the nation’s leading sex offender registration and notification solution, OffenderWatch®.   Citizens may enter any address and see a map and listing of offenders within a user defined radius (of .25 miles out to 2 miles) of that address.  Then, they may register the address to be continuously monitored by the Sheriff and local law enforcement agencies.  If an offender or predator should register an address within their specified radius of their address citizens will be alerted. Citizens may confidentially register as many addresses as they like. Anytime an offender changes their address, a postcard size notification will be mailed out to every residence within the defined radius of the offender.

The purpose of the program is to lessen the anxiety of citizens by proactively alerting them should an offender move within proximity to them, and to enhance the security and safety of Oneida County citizens.   The program also enables the Sheriff and local law enforcement agencies to verify that offender addresses do not violate any safety buffers and helps the Sheriff and local law enforcement schedule compliance checks for verifying offender information.  Citizens will soon be able to access the OffenderWatch® registry 24 hrs a day, 7 days a week at the Oneida County Sheriff’s Office website (www.oneidacountysheriff.us), the Oneida County website (www.ocgov.net), the websites of the participating local law enforcement agencies, and the OffenderWatch® web page (communitynotification.com ).

According to Sheriff Maciol, “Anything my office can do to keep the people of Oneida County safer and increase the efficiency of law enforcement, while at the same time sharing crucial information with those same citizens an a way they can really use,  is certainly welcomed by me.”

Oneida County Executive Anthony Picente said, “I commend the Oneida County Sheriff for taking this proactive stance towards public safety. We have to continue to look for new approaches to government, and this technology is a perfect example. This will keep all of Oneida County safer and more informed.”

The Program is expected to be up and running throughout the county within 30 to 60 days.