[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 96 (Thursday, July 20, 2006)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8012-S8031]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       CHILDREN'S SAFETY AND VIOLENT CRIME REDUCTION ACT OF 2006

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senate will now proceed to the 
consideration of H.R. 4472, which the clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 4472) to protect children, to secure the 
     safety of judges, prosecutors, law enforcement officers, and 
     their family members, to reduce and prevent gang violence, 
     and for other purposes.


                           Amendment No. 4686

                (Purpose: In the Nature of a substitute)

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Cornyn). Under the previous order, the 
Hatch amendment at the desk is agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 4686) was agreed to, as follows:
  (The amendment is printed in today's Record under ``Text of 
Amendments")
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah is recognized.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I thank my colleagues for granting 
unanimous consent to pass the most comprehensive child crimes and 
protection bill in our Nation's history--H.R. 4472, the Adam Walsh 
Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006.
  This bill started in the House of Representatives by a courageous and 
ambitious Congressman from Florida, Mark Foley. Mark is with us in the 
Senate Chamber today, and I want to thank him, again, for getting this 
ball rolling and for fighting like a champion on behalf of our 
children. I appreciate his tenacity and enthusiasm--we would not be 
here without his devotion and hard work.
  I also thank Senator Biden, who joined me in sponsoring the original 
Senate version of this bill. Senator Biden and I have worked together 
on so many bills, none more important than what we are accomplishing 
today for our children. Senators Frist, Specter, and Reid thank you for 
making this bill priority and for getting this bill through.
  The bill we are about to pass, the Adam Walsh Child Safety and 
Protection Act, represents a collaboration between the House and Senate 
to include the strong provisions of S. 1086, the Sex Offender 
Registration and Notification Act, and H.R. 4472, The Child Safety Act. 
It creates a National Sex Offender Registry with uniform standards for 
the registration of sex offenders, including a lifetime registration 
requirement for the most serious offenders. This is critical to sew 
together the patch-work quilt of 50 different State attempts to 
identity and keep track of sex offenders.
  The Adam Walsh Act establishes strong Federal penalties for sex 
offenders who fail to register, or fail to update their information, 
including up to 10 years in prison for non-compliance.
  The Adam Walsh Act imposes tough penalties for the most serious 
crimes against children, including a 30 year mandatory penalty for 
raping a child and no less than 10 years in prison for a sex 
trafficking offense. In fact, this bill creates a series of assured 
penalties for crimes of violence against children, including penalties 
for murder, kidnapping, maiming, and using a dangerous weapon against a 
child. And the bill allows for the death penalty in the most serious 
cases of child abuse, including the murder of a child in sexual 
exploitation and kidnapping offenses.
  The bottom line here is that sex offenders have run rampant in this 
country and now Congress and the people are ready to respond with 
legislation that will curtail the ability of sex offenders to operate 
freely. It is our hope that programs like NBC Dateline's ``To Catch a 
Predator'' series will no longer have enough material to fill an hour 
or even a minute. Now, it seems, they can go to any city in this 
country and catch dozens of predators willing to go on-line to hunt 
children.

[[Page S8013]]

  Laws regarding registration for sex offenders have not been 
consistent from State to State now all States will lock arms and 
present a unified front in the battle to protect children. Web sites 
that have been weak in the past, due to weak laws and haphazard 
updating and based on inaccurate information, will now be accurate, 
updated and useful for finding sex offenders.
  There are more than a half-million registered sex offenders in the 
United States. Those are the ones we know. Undoubtedly there are more. 
That number is going to go up. Over 100,000 of those sex offenders are 
registered but missing. That number is going to go down. We are going 
to get tough on these people. Some estimate it is as high as 150,000 
sex offenders who are not complying. That is killing our children.
  Another important part of this bill will help prevent the sexual 
exploitation of children through the production of sexually explicit 
material. Every day we hear new stories about how pornographers and 
predators take advantage of new technology to exploit children in new 
ways. It is very difficult for legislatures even to keep up, and when 
we do pass new legislation, it is often stymied in the courts.
  Federal law requires producers of some sexually explicit material to 
keep records regarding the identity and age of performers and to make 
those records available for inspection. The current statute, however, 
was enacted before the Internet existed and covers only some sexually 
explicit material. The provisions in the act before us brings key 
definitions in the law up to date, extends the record keeping 
requirement to more sexually explicit material, and makes refusal to 
permit inspection of these records a crime.
  I want to thank John Walsh, host of ``America's Most Wanted,'' and 
his wife, Reve--who have waited nearly 25 years for this day. Next 
Thursday, July 27, 2006, marks 25 years since the abduction and 
subsequent murder of their son Adam--for whom this bill is named. And 
on that 25th anniversary the President will sign into law legislation 
that will help law enforcement do what John has been doing all along--
hunt down predators and criminals. I want to thank the National Center 
for Missing and Exploited Children for their tireless work and for 
their assistance with crafting this legislation.
  This is smart legislation and I am very proud of the Adam Walsh Act. 
I am determined that Congress will play its part in protecting the 
children of my home state of Utah and America. I have never been more 
excited to see a bill signed into law.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.
  Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, I begin speaking to this legislation by 
thanking my buddy. And I know that is a colloquial expression in this 
formal place we work when I say ``my buddy,'' but Senator Hatch and I 
have worked together for a long time. It is hard for me to believe we 
have been here as long as we have. I have actually been here a couple 
years longer than he has. We have our differences in philosophy. We 
have never had any differences personally. We have never had any 
differences in terms of our relationship.
  The two things I am proudest of that we have both done is we have 
both--and I say this somewhat self-serving, I acknowledge--we both 
always hired staff that is respected. I do not think there has ever 
been a time that Orrin has not had a staff and staff members who my 
staff completely, totally trusted. I think it is fair to say that is 
the case on Orrin's side as well.
  That makes a gigantic difference because I think the work that Ken 
Valentine, the fellow sitting to Orrin's right, did--a loner, Secret 
Service guy from the administration, from the executive branch--and a 
fellow I am very proud of, whom I will mention in a moment--the work 
they did with John Walsh and others, to overcome the hurdles that get 
thrown in the way of good legislation because everybody has their own 
agenda.
  Everybody knows that for Orrin and me--and I would add my friend from 
North Dakota--that some of us have had this as sort of a--I have been 
accused of this being a hobbyhorse for me, this, all the work we have 
done for so long on dealing with child predators and abused women and 
abused children. But what happens sometimes is that good legislation 
gets stuck because other Senators, who do not have that as the same 
priority--although they are for it--attach a lot of extraneous things 
because there is something they feel is even more critical than the 
legislation, and they see it, to use the Senate jargon, as a vehicle to 
get their views heard and their legislation passed.
  Well, as to the work that Dave Turk of my staff did and Ken Valentine 
did in order to sort of clear the way for this, I think everyone who 
has worked on this, including John Walsh, would acknowledge is 
extraordinary.
  So I want to personally--there are others, I am sure. There are 
others. I do not mean, by mentioning these two individuals, to in any 
way denigrate the incredible work done by so many others. But I think 
sometimes the public wonders why we pay staff members--all of whom can 
make a lot more money if they did something else--the kind of salaries 
they get paid, in relative terms. It is because they are so good. They 
are so dedicated. They are so talented.
  In my experience of being here 33 years, I have found that when a 
staff member, no less than a Senator, has an intellectual as well as an 
emotional commitment to what they are doing, it is even more effective.
  I know for my friend and staff member, Dave Turk, who is a father, 
and for Ken Valentine, whom I have only gotten to know personally 
recently, this is more than legislation, this is more than passing this 
piece of legislation. This is the stuff of which your life's work is 
viewed as being worthwhile.
  I remember Jerry Brown, when he used to be the Governor of 
California, once said when he was cutting pay--I am not making a 
judgment of whether he should have or should not have--when cutting the 
pay of State employees, he made a statement only Jerry Brown could 
make, 20 years ago: Well, they have the psychic remuneration of living 
in California. I do not know about that. But I can tell you that the 
psychic remuneration for Orrin Hatch and Joe Biden and Ken Valentine 
and Dave Turk, and many others who worked on this, makes this job 
worthwhile.
  The two things of which I am most proud that I have done in 33 years 
are dealing with this issue in particular and culminating in this 
legislation, the Adam Walsh Child Protection Safety Act, and the 
Violence Against Women Act--which, I might add, one of only seven guys 
who jumped out front in 1994 to get that done was also Orrin Hatch.
  So, Senator Hatch, I thank you. We have been in the minority, the 
majority, the minority; we have switched places back and forth, but it 
has never changed our relationship, never changed how we have worked 
with each other, and never changed the good work I think we and many 
others can say we are proud to have participated in.
  Mr. President, I wish to talk a few minutes about the actual act. 
Congress has done a good deal over the last 25 years--and I might add, 
starting with, God love him, our old and deceased friend, Senator 
Thurmond from South Carolina--to protect kids. We created the National 
Center for Missing and Exploited Children in 1984. We enacted the crime 
bill in 1994. We enacted the Amber Alert system in 2003.
  But every time we have done something significant, the bad guys have 
figured out a way to take advantage of it, to find a loophole, to find 
an opening. And that is what this is about--and I wish he had floor 
privileges because he could speak to it better than any of us--but this 
is about, to paraphrase John Walsh, with whom I had dinner the other 
night--this is about closing the door. This is about uniting 50 States 
in common purpose and in league with one another to prevent these 
lowlifes from slipping through the cracks. So we recognize that what we 
have done in the past did not do all we wanted to do.
  I might add one more thing. Joe Biden and Orrin Hatch come from 
different sides of the political spectrum on a lot of things. But I can 
assure you, not only is this tough, but the civil liberties of 
Americans are not in jeopardy with this. This is not--this is not--a 
case where in order to get bad guys we have had to in any way lessen 
the constitutional protections made available

[[Page S8014]]

to good guys. So I think it is a proud piece of work.
  The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, as Senator 
Hatch has indicated, estimates there are over 550,000 sex offenders 
nationwide, and more than 20 percent of them are unaccounted for. I 
would argue that there are a whole lot more than 550,000, who never get 
caught up in the criminal web for a thousand different reasons that I 
do not have time to explain. But at a minimum, this means there are as 
many as 150,000 of these dangerous sex offenders out there, individuals 
who have already committed crimes and may, unless we do something, 
continue to jeopardize the most vulnerable among us.
  The Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act takes direct aim at 
this problem. Plain and simple, this legislation, I can say with 
certainty, will save children's lives.
  Sexual predators must be tracked, and our cops and our parents have a 
right to know when these criminals are in their neighborhoods. That is 
what we do here.
  First--an important point--let's start at the beginning. This 
legislation requires sex offenders to register prior to their release 
from prison, to make sure we give them absolutely no opportunity to do 
what happens now: fall through the cracks between the moment the prison 
door opens and before they set up a residence.
  We also make sure we are keeping tabs on everyone who poses a threat 
to our kids. Advances in technology are a great thing, but many times 
there is a dark side. The Internet, for example, puts the knowledge of 
the world at a child's fingertips, but it can also be and is abused by 
sexual predators causing kids harm. To steal a phrase from my son, who 
is a Federal prosecutor, he told me: Dad, it used to be you could lock 
your door or hold your child's hand at the mall and keep them out of 
harm's way.
  But today, in my son's words, with a click of a mouse, a predator can 
enter your child's bedroom in a locked home and begin the pernicious 
road to violating that child. That is why this legislation adds the 
``use of the Internet to facilitate or commit a crime against a minor'' 
as an offense that could trigger registration.
  And once someone is on a sex offender registry, we make sure they 
can't go back into hiding in the shadows. Under this bill, child 
predators would be required to periodically and in person check in with 
the authorities.
  They also would be required to update their photographs so law 
enforcement and parents will know where these folks are and what they 
look like now and not solely what they looked like years ago that is 
unrecognizable now.
  And if a registered offender fails to comply with any of these 
requirements, he or she faces a felony of up to 10 years in prison. If 
an unregistered sex offender commits a crime of violence, the offender 
will face a 5-year mandatory prison sentence in addition to any other 
sentence imposed.
  A noncompliant sex offender will also face U.S. Marshals who have 
been brought in under this bill to lend their expertise and manpower to 
help track down these dangerous individuals.
  John and I were talking about it at dinner. These guys saddle up, to 
use his phrase. They are the most underrated, underestimated part of 
American law enforcement. They do the job incredibly well. They want to 
get in on this, and they are now part of this. We now have designated 
their expertise and manpower to track down these individuals.
  One of the biggest problems in our current sex offender registry 
system happens when registered sex offenders travel from one State to 
another.
  Delaware has worked hard to keep track of the 3,123 sex offenders 
registered to my State. But there are other States that are not so 
advanced and whose systems are not so sophisticated.
  This bill fully integrates and expands the State systems so that 
communities nationwide will be warned when high-risk offenders come to 
live among them. And we target resources under this bill at the worst 
of the worst and provide Federal dollars to make sure States aren't 
left holding the bag.
  We also require the U.S. Department of Justice to create software to 
share with States in order to allow for information to be shared 
instantly and seamlessly among them. When a sex offender moves from New 
Jersey to Delaware, for example, we have to be absolutely sure that 
Delaware authorities know about it.
  This bill also mandates a national sex offender Web site so that 
parents can find out who is living in their neighborhoods. Parents will 
now be able to search for information on sex offenders by geographic 
radius and ZIP Code.
  Do we have a silver bullet, a foolproof system here? I have been 
around too long to know the answer to that question is no. What we do 
have is a slew of commonsense ways for fixing our current problem.
  As I mentioned earlier, it has taken us months and years to get to 
the point of enacting this important bill into law. Again, I give 
credit where credit is due, as has already been mentioned, to John and 
Reve Walsh. I know we are not supposed to--and I will not--violate 
Senate rules by pointing out who is where. But the fact is, if I were 
sitting next to them in the gallery now, I suspect if I put my hand on 
his arm, I would feel the tension in his arm.
  This has to be a very bittersweet moment for John Walsh. For what are 
we doing here today? We are naming a bill that will save the lives of 
hopefully thousands of other young people after a beautiful young boy 
who was victimized and killed.
  The thing I find most amazing about John and Reve is, I don't know 
how anybody who has lost a child can have the courage to do what they 
have done. I know from my own experience, which I will not speak to, 
there are certain circumstances I cannot walk into because it reminds 
me of one of my children I lost.
  I could never do what John and Reve did. I could never do what they 
did. And we could have never done today what we are doing without them. 
That is not hyperbole; that is the God's truth. We could never have 
gotten this done without John and Reve Walsh.
  It has to be one god-awful bitter moment, for the 27th of this month, 
if I am not mistaken, will be the 25th anniversary.
  A lot of people on this floor, including one of my colleagues I am 
sitting with, have lost children. It doesn't matter whether it is 2 
years past, 10 years, 25 years, or 50 years past. That part never 
passes. I thank John and Reve for their courage, courage way beyond 
anything I could possess.
  I have known John for many years. We go way back to 1984, working 
together to create the National Center for Missing and Exploited 
Children along with Senator Hatch. He has been at it year after year, 
pushing the Congress to do more.
  John, you have been an inspiration. You continue to be. Don't 
underestimate it. You have been doing it so long, don't underestimate 
how many thousands of people take solace from what you do and what you 
have done.
  It has not been my style in 33 years to take the floor to speak in 
such personal terms, but this is ultimately personal. It is the 
ultimate, ultimate personal thing, your child.
  Earlier this week I had a chance to sit down with Ed Smart whose 
daughter Elizabeth--what a magnificently beautiful, poised, gracious 
young woman--then 14 years, was abducted at gunpoint from her family in 
Salt Lake City while her parents and four brothers slept. She was found 
9 months later. The strength of that family's character, its resilience 
is remarkable.
  I have taken too much of the Senate's time. Let me again thank my 
colleague from Utah. I also thank our committee chairman and all the 
members of our committee. They also deserve a great deal of credit.
  Other Senators, including my colleague on the floor, who has been 
relentless, absolutely relentless, Senator Dorgan; he added a major, 
important piece to this legislation. I thank him for that. Senator Bill 
Nelson, Chuck Grassley, all contributed important parts to this bill. 
They each took tragedies that happened in their States and used them as 
a call to action.
  Senators Frist and Reid--our majority and minority leaders--also 
deserve all our thanks by ensuring that this important bill was treated 
with the priority it deserved.
  Congressman Foley has worked tirelessly on this bill in the House for

[[Page S8015]]

years, and Congressman Pomeroy was by his side. And Chairman 
Sensenbrenner guided this bill through the House of Representatives.
  I don't think there is one of us on this floor who wouldn't trade 
away this bill for being able to bring back to life all those innocent 
lives that were lost that allowed us, in a bizarre way, to produce this 
legislation.
  We cannot redeem the dead, but we can, in fact, protect the living. I 
think this bill, with the many parts I didn't mention, including DNA 
testing and a whole range of other things, is fair, decent, and 
honorable. Most important, there is not a single thing we can do that 
is more worthy of our effort than protecting our children. That is what 
all of us on this floor--and many who are not--today are playing a part 
in doing.
  Again, I close by thanking John Walsh.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. DORGAN. Is there an order of speaking this evening, if I might 
inquire of the manager.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that we go back and 
forth so long as we have people on both sides. So the distinguished 
Senator from North Dakota will be allowed to speak next and then the 
distinguished Senator from Virginia.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I will pick up where the Senator from 
Delaware left off and the Senator from Utah, also thanking John Walsh 
and his wife Reve for their tremendous contribution to our society but 
in particular for this piece of legislation. We all have to deal in 
life with tragedies, struggles. It is the measure of a person to see 
how that individual responds.
  Given the nature of the tragedy they experience, it could have easily 
destroyed them. They took this horrific incident and turned it into a 
tremendous good. As Senator Biden says, who knows personally, I can't 
think of anything worse than losing a child. Losing a child in such an 
incredibly tragic situation has to be more than you can possibly bear. 
To take that emotion and channel it into a positive course for the 
benefit of other children is an incredible legacy for Adam. I know John 
and Reve do it for that reason, to build this incredible legacy. This 
legacy is added to today by naming this bill the Adam Walsh Child 
Protection and Safety Act.
  Not only is this a great thing they are doing for society, they are a 
great model for so many who experience tragedies every single day. 
People can look at them and see how something that I am sure brought 
them to their knees can be turned around to do so much good for so 
many. So they are not only helping the children, helping those who are 
victims of crime, but they are helping those who are victims of life's 
tragedies that befall us all and giving them an inspiration to move 
forward and turn tragedy into triumph. This is another triumph. It may 
not even be the biggest triumph they have experienced, but it is 
certainly a triumph and a positive thing to add to that legacy.
  I rise to talk about two pieces of this bill I have been working on 
and of which I am the author. One is called Project Safe Childhood. The 
second is called the Schools SAFE Act. I introduced Project Safe 
Childhood a couple months ago after learning of a program at the 
Justice Department called Project Safe Childhood.
  The Justice Department, in reviewing and seeing the incredible 
proliferation of child exploitation crimes, basically being 
proliferated through the Internet, took on a new program within the 
Department. This new program was in response to what we see of sexual 
predators on the Internet and with other types of sexual trafficking, 
again, as a result of the Internet and other places. They developed a 
program which is a very good program. It has five main purposes:
  First, it seeks to integrate Federal, State, and local efforts and 
investigate and prosecute child exploitation cases.
  Second, the project allows major case coordination between the 
Department of Justice and other appropriate Federal agencies.
  Third, it increases Federal involvement in child exploitation cases 
by providing additional investigative tools and additional penalties 
that are available under Federal law that State and local governments 
may not have.
  Four, the project provides increased training for Federal, State, and 
local law enforcement regarding the investigation and prosecution of 
computer-facilitated crimes against children.
  Finally, it promotes community and educational programs to raise 
national awareness about the threat of online sexual predators and to 
provide information to families on how to report violations.
  As the father of six children, I can tell you that what Senator Biden 
said about what parents used to feel they could do to protect 
children--locking doors and being with them--has gotten a lot more 
complex, with that fiber optic tube that runs into your house that 
allows the entire world to come crashing into your home and allows sick 
people to be able to prey on members of your family. We need to do more 
to educate parents. This is like pointing a loaded gun at your child, 
in many cases, and asking them to get on and play. This is a dangerous 
tool.
  Yes, there are wonderful things on the Internet. There is a 
tremendous world of knowledge and adventure on the Internet. But as we 
know, too often the major traffic on the Internet is not those 
wonderful and informative sites. They are sites that prey on our 
failings and weaknesses, prey on the unsuspecting, on the innocent, in 
many cases. We as parents have to be better armed to deal with these 
people who want to reach into our homes and corrupt members of our 
families, corrupt everything that we are trying to teach them not to do 
and, worse yet, potentially could opt them into behavior that could 
risk, ultimately, their lives.
  So this program is very important that the Justice Department is 
engaged in. I contacted the Department and worked with them to develop 
an authorization bill so we could provide a stable stream of funding 
for Project Safe Childhood and expand the program in a way that the 
Department on its own could not do.
  For example, increasing penalties for registered sex offenders, child 
sex trafficking and sexual abuse, and other child exploitation crimes, 
which this does. It creates a children's safety online awareness 
campaign and authorizes grants for child safety programs. So in 
addition to what the Justice Department program does, we add those 
provisions to help with better coordination between State, local, and 
Federal prosecutors and investigators.
  I had a meeting in the western district of Pennsylvania with our U.S. 
attorney, Mary Beth Buchanan, and State and local officials. They were 
talking about it--just the practical difficulties of assigning police 
and investigators and detectives and prosecutors on a local level and 
the support they need and the overlapping jurisdictional issues. So 
this will help them be able to create seamless teams of people to go 
after these child abusers, as well as to project into the community 
information that is important to prevent these crimes from happening.
  So I am grateful that Senators Specter, Hatch, and Leahy have worked 
to include that provision in the bill. I think it will take us a step 
forward in protecting our children from these predators and from 
exploitation.
  The second piece of legislation is called the Schools SAFE Act. We 
spend a lot of time on the Senate floor talking about how we can 
improve the quality of education. But it almost goes without saying 
that when you drop your child off at school, at a bare minimum, you 
expect that the people who interact with them at school will not harm 
them. You would think that would be almost a given. But, unfortunately, 
in our country today we actually have a very poor system of checking as 
to whether people who are hired in schools are, in fact, safe for the 
children with whom they interact.
  Obviously, the vast majority of teachers and people who work in 
schools are good and decent people and are there because they want to 
help children, not because they want to harm children. But like 
anything else, if you are someone who is a sexual predator, and you are 
looking to harm children, what better place to go than a place where 
there are children every single day you could possibly exploit.

[[Page S8016]]

So it is important that we have sufficient checks in place to make sure 
that these predators are not in educational settings where they can 
harm and corrupt our children.
  The current state of play is basically a mishmash of different State 
laws and different participation in a system created to help schools 
access information about criminal background checks. Some States 
require, for example, only a State background check, while other States 
require an FBI background check. With these disparities, individuals 
continue to find opportunities to evade safeguards that have been put 
into place.
  In Pennsylvania, an FBI background check is only required for 
individuals applying to schools for work and have lived in the 
Commonwealth for less than 2 years. So if you lived in the Commonwealth 
for several years and you committed a crime someplace else, 
Pennsylvania would not have the ability to check that out.
  Beginning in 2007, Pennsylvania will require applicants who have 
lived in the Commonwealth for more than 2 years to also undergo FBI 
background checks.
  So we are addressing that issue in Pennsylvania.
  I think it just goes to show you that there is no good system out 
there. What we need to do is allow States to access a database that was 
established by Congress in 1998 in the National Crime Prevention and 
Privacy Compact. This compact allows States to share background 
information on individuals seeking employment in a school district. 
This is an important thing to have all the States participating in. I 
will not go through all of the problems, but there are all sorts of 
memoranda and agreements and data-sharing information. As a result of 
that, only roughly half of the States--26 States--participate in the 
compact. Even States that have joined the compact don't always get 
access to the information they need. This is a problem.
  You could have a man from Pennsylvania who committed sex crimes in 
Pennsylvania and moved to Nevada. Nevada is a compact State. Nevada 
could do the compact based check of whether this person has committed 
crimes against children and find nothing, because Pennsylvania does not 
participate in the compact. So they could be hired in Nevada schools 
without any knowledge of the individual's problems in Pennsylvania.
  This is obviously a great threat to our children. So what this bill 
does is give schools across our Nation an essential resource when 
making hiring decisions. They will be able to access this database and 
conduct fingerprint-based background checks on individuals who are 
seeking work with or around children in schools. So this is another 
important step in protecting our children, in addition to all of the 
other provisions in this bill--protecting our children in this case in 
our schools.
  I thank, again, the chairman and ranking member for their tremendous 
assistance to me in getting this legislation in the final package. 
Again, I congratulate all who have been involved in this very important 
legislation.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that 3 minutes be 
yielded to the Senator from Georgia, and then we go back to the Senator 
from North Dakota, and then to Senator Allen, and that would be it for 
now.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Georgia is recognized.
  Mr. ISAKSON. Mr. President, I thank the Senators for their courtesy. 
I thank Senator Hatch from Utah and his committee for incorporating in 
this very important bill provisions known as Masha's law. I was 
privileged to join, as an original cosponsor, with Senator Kerry on 
Masha's law.
  Masha is a young lady who, at an early age in Russia, was adopted by 
an American citizen who became her custodian. He brought her to the 
United States and, systematically and over a protracted period of time, 
abused her and put her photographs over the Internet in enormous 
numbers. Masha, fortunately, after a sustained period of time, was able 
to escape his custody. A case was filed against him. He was indicted 
and convicted and today is incarcerated in Massachusetts.
  Masha is, fortunately, now living in a loving home in Georgia and has 
a wonderful mother who is truly an angel of adoption in every way.
  In researching this case, we found that young Masha, and many others 
like her who have been abused in their lives, could not even recover 
under the laws as they existed. What Masha's law does, and what is 
incorporated in here, is it changes ``any minor'' to ``any person,'' so 
that if a minor is depicted in photographs pornographically that are 
distributed over the Internet, but by the time the abuser is caught, 
the minor is an adult, they can still recover. They cannot now, and 
that is ridiculous. It makes sure that recovery on the part of a minor 
can take place when they become an adult, whether or not the guilty 
person is incarcerated. It raises from $50,000 to $150,000 the penalty 
for which that individual can be recompensated if, in fact, someone who 
depicts that picture and puts it on the Internet and uses them is 
caught and convicted. That compensation is to be paid to the 
individual.
  Although I don't think there is any price too high to cost an 
individual who would take advantage of a minor, I think it is only 
appropriate to triple that penalty and make sure that reaching the age 
of adulthood does not exempt someone from recovery. It is a tribute to 
continuing to do what this bill does, and that is look after the 
protection of minors and ensure that those who violate them are caught 
and punished and have to pay to the maximum extent.
  I thank the Senator from Utah for allowing me the time, and I thank 
the Senators from North Dakota and Virginia as well.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota is recognized.
  Mr. DORGAN. First, let me say to the Senator from Utah, as well as to 
my colleague, the Senator from Delaware, that their leadership has been 
very important on this legislation. They will not know the names of 
those whose lives are saved, but lives will be saved because this 
legislation has passed. I very much appreciate their diligence and hard 
work.
  This is a piece of legislation about protecting children. I don't 
know what is second place in the lives of many people, but I know what 
is in first place, and that is the protection of children. They cannot 
protect themselves. It is our responsibility as parents; it is our 
responsibility in this country to do the things necessary to protect 
our children. There are so many stories that it is almost hard to 
begin, and you don't know where to stop.
  My interest in this goes back some long ways. My colleagues have 
described John Walsh and the tragic loss of his son Adam Walsh. Those 
of us who have lost children understand that pain, but it must be 
enormously compounded by the pain of someone who loses a child who has 
been abducted.
  My experience, especially with respect to North Dakota, a couple of 
years ago was to learn one day that a wonderful young woman had been 
abducted in a parking lot of a shopping center in Grand Forks, ND, a 
young woman named Dru Sjodin, and, we later found, murdered.
  There is a trial underway for someone charged with murder in that 
case, but that case is like so many cases, it seems to me. It is the 
case of Adam Walsh, it is the case of 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford, it 
is the case of a 12-year-old girl named Polly Klaas. It is the case of 
Sarah Michelle Lunde, age 13.
  Pull back the curtain and then ask the question: Who is it abducting 
these children? Who are the sexual predators killing these children?
  This is not some mystery. We know the answer to this. The answer is, 
in most cases, that these murders and these abductions are done by 
those who have been in our criminal justice system and who have 
abducted and murdered before.
  I held a meeting in Fargo, ND, following the abduction of Dru Sjodin 
and the introduction of legislation I call Dru's law. What brings me to 
the floor of the Senate today is the components of Dru's law have been 
included in this legislation. So, finally, it will become law.
  The Senate has passed Dru's law twice on its own. We have not gotten 
it

[[Page S8017]]

through the U.S. House. Now it will be through the U.S. House and 
Senate as a part of this Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act, 
and it will become law.
  A meeting I held in Fargo, ND, to discuss Dru's law is a meeting at 
which I showed this poster. This meeting was just over a year and a 
quarter ago now. I held the meeting at the city hall in Fargo, ND.
  Prior to the meeting, I searched the computer for a registry of sex 
offenders to find out who was living within 1 mile of where we were 
meeting at city hall in Fargo, ND, who had previously been convicted as 
a sexual predator--who were they? I would share the names with the 
folks who came to that meeting to say: Here is a registry in North 
Dakota of sexual predators. There is no national registry; this is 
North Dakota's registry.
  This is a poster that I showed the folks who came to Fargo that day 
as an example of someone who lived within a mile of where we were 
having the meeting. His name is Joseph Duncan, first-degree rape. He 
raped a 14-year-old boy at gunpoint, burned the victim with a 
cigarette, made the victim believe he was going to be killed by firing 
the gun twice on empty chambers; terminated from treatment; served a 
lengthy prison sentence; paroled, then absconded; had a long history of 
sexual aggression as a youth.
  That is his sheet from the registry in North Dakota.
  What I didn't know that day was that 1 month before the meeting I was 
having in Fargo, this same man had been charged with molesting a 6-
year-old boy at a playground in Detroit Lakes, MN, just across the 
border. Someone in Minnesota checking the registry of sexual predators 
would not have found his name. He was just miles away living in Fargo, 
ND, but, in fact, he went over to Detroit Lakes, MN, and was charged 
with molesting a 6-year-old boy.
  That is why we need a national registry. Strangely enough, in April 
of last year, he appeared on those charges, and a county judge set the 
bail at $15,000, and he was released after posting cash, promising to 
stay in touch, and he absconded and that is it. The judge said he 
didn't know he had this record.
  Then 2 months later, this man we know now from intense media coverage 
was arrested in Idaho for kidnaping 8-year-old Shasta Groene and her 
brother, 9-year-old Dylan. The children had been missing for well over 
a month--2 months actually--when the bound and bludgeoned bodies of 
their mother, their older brother and their mother's boyfriend were 
found at their rural home. This man is now charged with three 
additional murders and the kidnaping of two children that he held and 
sexually abused for a number of months.
  Dylan's remains were later located, and Shasta Groene, the young 
girl, was spotted in a Denny's restaurant by a sharp-eyed waitress who 
called the police, and she was saved.
  This case is an example of why there must be a national registry.
  Dru's law, which I introduced, has three components. One is the 
creation of a national registry of sex offenders. The underlying 
legislation improves on that by not only requiring the national 
registry but also standardizing the information that will be in the 
national registry.
  Second, Dru's law requires that when a violent, high-risk sex 
offender is about to be released from incarceration, the local 
authorities must be notified, the local States attorney must be 
notified. There is such a high risk to the population of this high-risk 
offender being released that perhaps there is cause to seek additional 
civil incarceration, civil commitment, but they can't do that if they 
don't know about the impending release.

  In fact, when a high-risk offender is released from prison, they 
can't just say: So long, good luck. That is exactly what happens in too 
many cases.
  Martha Stewart is thrown in jail. They put Martha in jail for 6 
months, and when she gets out of Federal prison, she gets out of 
Federal prison wearing an ankle bracelet, an electronic bracelet that 
allows law enforcement to track her whereabouts.
  I can give you an example of a very violent sex offender let out of 
prison with no maintenance, no monitoring, no electronic bracelet, 
just: So long, see you later; you served your time. Yes, we will see 
them again when they create another violent crime, another rape, 
another murder, another abduction. That is why I support passing this 
kind of legislation.
  This legislation is going to save lives. Again I ask the question, 
and it is so fundamental: If we send Martha Stewart home with an 
electronic bracelet on her ankle, we can't do that to violent sex 
offenders when the psychiatrists at the institute of incarceration have 
said, ``We believe this person to be at high risk for real offending''?
  Nearly three-quarters of the violent sex offenders are going to 
repeat that offense when released from prison. We know that from 
statistics. Do we have an obligation to protect children? The answer 
is, you bet we do, and it is long past the time. That is why this 
legislation is so very important.
  As I said when I started, there is so much here that is partisan in 
this Chamber and the other Chamber, and there is so much that swirls 
around all of us in politics that we don't like very much about today. 
But there are times when we do things that will make a difference, and 
we do things working together, Republicans and Democrats. This is one 
of those moments of which we can be proud.
  Senator Hatch and Senator Biden did a wonderful job. They mentioned 
their staffs, and that is important. It is always the case that 
politicians take the bows, but it is important to understand that staff 
plays a very significant role in helping us write legislation, do the 
research to get it correct and get it passed.
  I thank my colleagues, and I especially say to the parents of Dru 
Sjodin: I believe that in honor of her memory we have, in this 
legislation, done something significant. Section 120 is the Dru Sjodin 
national sex offender public Web site. We create the three elements in 
Dru's law in this legislation, and I believe, in her memory, we will 
save other lives.
  There are many parents out there today who have lost children, some 
to the horror of abduction by sexual predators. If this legislation 
will--and I believe it will--prevent others from experiencing that 
horror, and if this legislation will--and I believe it will--save 
children, then we will have done significant work here tonight. It is 
perhaps little noticed by some. We don't have on legislation of this 
type perhaps filled Chambers and substantial attention to it, but while 
it is perhaps little known publicly, what transpires here in the Senate 
tonight will have a significant influence on the future of children in 
this country.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Chafee). The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
distinguished Senator from Virginia speak next, but also after him, the 
distinguished Senator from Texas and then the distinguished Senator 
from Washington, Ms. Cantwell.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Virginia.
  Mr. ALLEN. Mr. President, I rise this evening in strong support of 
the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006. I commend 
Senator Hatch for his steadfast leadership, his wisdom, and 
perseverance in finally getting this measure to the floor for a vote. 
It is long overdue.
  I have always believed that one of the very top, most important 
responsibilities of government at the Federal, State, or, for that 
matter, the local level is the safety and security of our people, 
particularly the most vulnerable people in our society--our children.
  When I was Governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia, I made the 
protection of the people of Virginia, including our children, our top 
priority. We worked with the legislature to abolish the lenient, 
dishonest parole system in Virginia that was releasing criminals after 
serving as little as one-fifth of their sentence. We instituted truth 
in sentencing in Virginia, and by doing that, when you read in the 
newspaper or see in the news that a felon has gotten a 20-year 
sentence, he is serving 20 years, not 4 or 5 years to come back out and 
prey upon innocent law-abiding citizens again.
  Clearly, the abolition of parole, truth in sentencing, and longer 
sentences for

[[Page S8018]]

felons has made Virginia safer. The crime rates are down, and there are 
tens of thousands of people who will not be victims of crime.
  I am going to talk about Adam Walsh, but there are a lot of other 
victims of crimes. I remember when we were trying to get the 
legislature and people behind the abolition of parole and truth in 
sentencing, listening to the stories of loved ones, of parents who 
would tell their stories, of people released early and where they have 
preyed upon, killed, or raped again.
  I will always remember a lady talking about being raped, and then 
right after her, another woman was talking about being raped again, a 
second time, by that same person. That rapist was released early.
  I remember talking about a police officer with young children. The 
police officer was killed on Father's Day in Richmond by someone 
released early. The story of a young person working in the bakery in 
Richmond who was killed by someone released early. The story of a 
mother talking about a violent assault and then the smothering with a 
pillow of her daughter, and then having to go back to the parole board 
to recount why that criminal, that murderer, should not be released 
once again.

  Before I became Governor in Virginia, pedophiles were serving an 
average of 3\1/2\ years in prison. Now, with the abolition of parole, 
and truth in sentencing, their sentences are 26 years rather than 3\1/
2\ years. Not surprisingly, there are now fewer victims of crime in the 
Commonwealth of Virginia. However, there continue to be child predators 
who lurk in the shadows of our society.
  Studies show that there are more than 550,000 registered sex 
offenders in the United States, and there are an estimated 100,000 sex 
offenders who are missing from the system. Loopholes in this current 
system have allowed some sexual predators to evade law enforcement and 
place our children at risk. That is why the national registry aspect of 
this bill is so important.
  Some may wonder, why is there such a focus on sex offenders? Why is 
there such a focus on pedophiles and sex offenders and rapists? The 
reason is, if you look at the statistics--and it is not unique to 
Virginia; it is the way it is across this country--the highest 
recidivist rate, or the highest repeat offender rate of any crime--even 
higher than murderers, even higher than armed robbers--is sex 
offenders. That is why it is so important we have the registry. When 
someone is caught, first, they are getting a long sentence, and the 
best way to protect people is having these sex offenders behind bars 
rather than lurking in a parking garage or trying to lure young 
children. That is why the focus on sexual predators is so important, in 
that they have the highest repeat offender rate.
  Now, these days, child predators have increased their ability to 
inflict harm on our children by exploiting new communications 
technologies, including the Internet. Please understand: I believe the 
Internet is the greatest invention since the Gutenberg press for the 
dissemination of information and ideas. It is a wonderful tool. And 
ever since I have been in the Senate, I have been working to make sure 
that avaricious State and local tax commissars don't impose 18-percent 
taxes on the Internet in monthly charges. We don't want the Internet 
monthly bills to look like a telephone bill. Ron Wyden from Oregon has 
been a good ally on this.
  But the Internet also can create new opportunities for criminals, 
especially child predators. It is vitally important that we as parents 
and as elected leaders take the necessary steps to make the Internet as 
safe as possible for our children, as safe as possible for our children 
when they are at home, as safe as possible for them at schools, as well 
as in libraries.
  I recently introduced a bill called the Internet Tax 
Nondiscrimination Act. This bill makes permanent the Internet tax 
moratorium, which is scheduled to expire next year. This measure also 
increases the ability of parents to protect their children from 
Internet predators. In fact, this is still law today. We want to keep 
this going.
  In our bill, we impose a responsibility on Internet service providers 
to offer customers filtering technology. The ISPs, or Internet service 
providers, need to limit access to material that would be harmful to 
minors. This feature will create a powerful, and does create a 
powerful, financial incentive for ISPs to provide the filtering 
technology that parents need. Once parents are empowered with this 
technology, I guarantee you they will use it to protect their young 
sons and daughters. I am pleased the Senate Commerce Committee approved 
this bill as part of the telecom reform bill on a vote of 19 to 3.
  However, we as a legislative body have much more work to do, 
especially when it comes to increasing penalties on Internet predators, 
by giving law enforcement officials the tools they need to catch 
Internet predators and convict them. This is a key reason I have signed 
on as a cosponsor of the Adam Walsh Act. This legislation is vitally 
needed. As I said, it should have been passed many years ago. This 
legislation honors the memory of a 6-year-old boy named Adam Walsh who 
was kidnapped and murdered nearly 25 years ago. This bill also 
recognizes the tireless efforts of his parents, John and Reve Walsh, 
who have been outstanding advocates for children all across America, in 
making sure we have some common sense when we are combating violent 
criminals.
  The Adam Walsh Act--and I want to focus on one title--this bill in 
title 7 includes what is called the Internet Safety Act, sets out 
several provisions that will dramatically increase Internet safety, 
including tough new penalties for child exploitation enterprises and 
repeat sex offenders. This title also creates a new crime--and this is 
important--a new crime for embedding words or digital images on to the 
source code of a Web site with the intent to deceive a person into 
viewing this obscenity. This is vitally important for all people. I 
tell you, it is important for families and children. This section is 
going to help stop pornographers from tricking children into visiting 
their sites with words that are designed to attract innocent young 
people.
  The Internet safety provisions in this measure also fund Federal 
prosecution resources, including 200 new Assistant U.S. Attorney 
positions to help prosecute persons for offenses related to sexual 
exploitation of children, and 45 more computer forensic examiners. 
These are the experts who will be helpful within the regional computer 
forensic laboratories in the Department of Justice. They include 10 
more Internet Crimes Against Children task forces. These are also 
important. There is some good work being done in Bedford County, 
Virginia, in between Lynchburg and Roanoke. The sheriff, Mike Brown, in 
Bedford County has instituted Operation Blue Ridge Thunder which works 
on this, but the State and local folks can certainly use the assistance 
and help of the forensic experts and U.S. attorneys. After all, a lot 
of this is across State lines. All of these resources are absolutely 
necessary for the investigation and the prosecution of child sex 
offenses.
  The Internet safety provisions in this bill also expand the civil 
remedy available to children who have been sexually abused and 
exploited.
  This is vitally important, commonsense legislation that is going to 
protect and, indeed, it is going to save lives. It is perfect that we 
pass a bill named after Adam Walsh, a child who lost his life at age 6 
to a child predator. It can be Adam Walsh, but to all the parents who 
are out there who lost a young child to a sexual predator, it can be 
their name put in here as well. The parents of Adam Walsh have 
dedicated their lives to making sure there are not other parents 
grieving with the loss of their son or their daughter. Adam's spirit 
lives on and the inspiration for action is in this measure, action that 
will save lives. More children will be able to grow up with the 
innocence they deserve and the safety they deserve, thanks to the 
efforts of Adam Walsh's parents and also the wisdom, on a bipartisan 
basis, of the Senate not to dawdle, but to act. I commend the Senate 
for acting, particularly those in the committee. I am honored to be a 
cosponsor, and I look forward to the passage of this act, the signing 
by the President, and the protection of children all across America.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas is recognized.
  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I too rise to support the Adam Walsh Child

[[Page S8019]]

Protection and Safety Act of 2006. This act represents landmark, 
bipartisan legislation to protect the most vulnerable among us: our 
children. Over the last several months, the House and the Senate met, 
negotiated, and finally reached agreement on this important measure.
  I want to note and, in doing so, commend the tremendous leadership 
Chairman Specter and Senator Hatch, our immediate past chairman of the 
Senate Judiciary Committee, and their respective staffs, as well as the 
House Judiciary Committee chairman, Jim Sensenbrenner and his staff, 
for all their tireless dedication to this legislation. Many people have 
devoted time and effort to see this bill through, ensuring that we do 
everything within our power to protect our children.
  The crimes of child abuse and child exploitation are astounding but, 
unfortunately, all too prevalent. The recent wave of child abductions 
in this country demonstrates the need for this type of response from 
the Congress. There is only one way to deal with those who prey on 
children: They must be caught sooner, punished longer, and watched 
closer than they are today.
  Before I came to the Senate, I was honored to serve as the chief law 
enforcement officer of the State of Texas as Texas attorney general. 
There, I instituted a new specialized unit known as the Texas Internet 
Bureau which was designed to coordinate and direct efforts to fight 
Internet crimes such as fraud, child pornography, and address privacy 
concerns, among others. As others here have noted, the Internet is a 
remarkable tool which has revolutionized the way we live, the way we 
communicate, and the way we receive information. The problem is, 
though, there is a dark underbelly to the Internet, and the Texas 
Internet Bureau was designed to specifically identify Internet 
predators who were then caught, prosecuted, convicted, and taken off 
the streets. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to work with my 
colleagues in the Senate to help continue on this important initiative 
and to make it available to more and more of our children and, thus, to 
make America a safer place for our children to grow up.
  I want to take a moment to highlight another very important 
participant in these negotiations who has been noted and praised for 
his efforts, but I think we can't say enough to recognize his 
contribution. John Walsh has a long-standing commitment to fighting for 
child victims and measures to protect children across this country. As 
has been recounted, his son Adam Walsh was kidnapped from a mall in 
Florida and murdered in 1981. Since that day, John Walsh has dedicated 
his life to helping victims of crime, and he has been enormously 
successful and influential in doing so. It is only appropriate that 
this bill honors the inspiration he has given to us all in the life of 
his son Adam Walsh in the process.
  As many of you know, John Walsh is the host of ``America's Most 
Wanted'' and has spent a lot of time and effort working on this bill. 
This is not the first time he has invested his efforts and expertise in 
helping Congress address child crime legislation. In the previous 
Congress, we passed legislation that included the Code Adam Act, which 
required Federal buildings to establish procedures for locating a child 
who is missing in Federal buildings.
  The title of this current bill appropriately honors Mr. Walsh's 
efforts, and I am told the President will sign the bill, if we pass it, 
on July 27, marking the 25th year since the day Adam was abducted.
  I do not pretend to understand the pain and trauma the Walsh family 
or others have had to endure as a result of these terrible crimes 
against children. But I am eternally grateful for the way John Walsh 
has used this pain and this trauma to improve the lives of other people 
and to ensure we take every step within our power to protect our 
children against like crimes committed against Adam Walsh.
  I wish to take a second to highlight other important measures 
contained in the bill which will enhance existing laws, enhance 
investigative tools, criminal penalties, and child crime resources in a 
variety of ways. This bill requires sex offenders to register and, in 
the case of the most serious offenders, to do so for up to the length 
of their entire lives. It requires them to report in person at least 
once each year to update personal information and to take a new 
photograph. It requires public posting for public access on the 
Internet of information about sex offenders so it is widely available, 
and so parents can take steps necessary to protect their children. It 
forces States to comply with this program or, I should say, persuades 
them to comply with the program by linking participation to Byrne grant 
funding, and it punishes with imprisonment up to 10 years those who 
fail to register, and if they commit a violent crime while 
unregistered, they can be punished for up to 30 years consecutive to 
any underlying conviction. It requires the Attorney General of the 
United States to create Project Safe Childhood, which will integrate 
Federal, State, and local efforts to prosecute the crime of child 
exploitation. It increases punishments for any crime of violence 
against a child, and authorizes grants to States to implement these 
important programs, and provides them grants to do so.
  It also includes many of the provisions of the Internet Safety Act 
which I cosponsored with Senator Jon Kyl and others which, among other 
things, creates a new crime outlawing child exploitation enterprises, 
and would imprison for a mandatory minimum sentence of 20 years those 
who act in concert to commit at least three separate violations of 
Federal child pornography, sex trafficking, or sexual abuse laws 
against multiple child victims. It also enacts various other important 
provisions, including making the failure to register as a sex offender 
a deportable offense for aliens and preventing sex offenders from 
taking advantage of our immigration laws.

  This is one of those fine times in the U.S. Congress where we have 
come together on a bipartisan basis to do something that rises above 
partisanship and is enormously significant in terms of improving our 
quality of life and protecting those who are most vulnerable among us. 
This Congress continues to act on measures that benefit our Nation and 
protect our children. It has long been said that societies are 
ultimately judged on how they treat their elderly and their young. This 
bill is an important step toward improving the safety of those who are 
our youngest and most vulnerable.
  Finally, Mr. President, I would like to specifically express my 
gratitude to the many dedicated staff who worked tirelessly on this 
bill for some time, including Matthew Johnson and Lynden Melmed from my 
own staff. Additionally, I would like to thank the following staff:

       Allen Hicks, Mike O'Neill, Matt Miner, Todd Braunstein, 
     Brett Tolman, Lisa Owings, Bruce Artim, Ken Valentine, Tom 
     Jipping, Dave Turk, Bradley Hayes, Joe Matal, Nicole 
     Gustafson, James Galyean, Amy Blankenship, Jane Treat, Sharon 
     Beth Kristal, Julie Katzman, Noah Bookbinder, Christine 
     Leonard, Lara Flint, Marianne Upton, Preet Baharara, Melanie 
     Looney, Anna Mitchell, Gabriel Adler, Alea Brown, Bradley 
     Schreiber, Mike Volkov, Sean McLaughlin, Bobby Vassar, and 
     Greg Barnes.

  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington is recognized.
  Ms. CANTWELL. Mr. President, I rise to speak about the Adam Walsh 
Child Protection and Safety Act. I thank the Senator from Utah for his 
leadership on this legislation over the last several years, and I thank 
his staff for their hard work and perseverance in pushing this 
legislation to the Senate floor tonight.
  Last June, the entire Nation was horrified by the kidnapping and 
murders of the Groene family and the tragic crimes upon little Shasta 
Groene.
  Joseph Duncan was a convicted sex offender who beat Brenda Groene; 
her 13-year-old son, Slade; and her boyfriend, Mark McKenzie to death. 
Their bodies were found in their home in Idaho on May 16, 2005. The 
killings captured the national headlines and prompted a massive search 
for the two Groene children, 8-year-old Shasta and her 9-year-old 
brother, Dylan.
  Six weeks later, on July 2, restaurant workers in Idaho recognized 
Shasta and called the police. Dylan's remains were found later in 
western Montana.
  This did not have to happen.
  In 1980, Duncan was convicted of rape in Washington State. He was 
sentenced to 20 years in prison and began his sentence in a treatment 
program. After he was terminated from the program, he

[[Page S8020]]

served his sentence in prison until he was released on parole in 1994.
  In 2000, he moved to Fargo, where he registered with the North Dakota 
Sex Offender Registry, but before long he had moved again and both the 
North Dakota and Washington State registries lost track of him.
  In April of 2005, a Minnesota judge released Duncan on bail after he 
had been charged with child molestation.
  Duncan promptly skipped town.
  Minnesota issued a warrant for his arrest that May because he had not 
registered as a sex offender in that State, but by that time it was too 
late.
  On May 16, the Groene family was found dead and it wasn't until July 
2 that Shasta was recovered.
  Joseph Duncan was essentially lost by three States. He moved from 
State to State to avoid capture.
  No one knew where he was nor even how to look for him.
  I say again, this did not have to happen.
  There is no worse crime than a crime against a child, and one crime 
against a child is too many. That is why I have cosponsored the Child 
Protection Safety Act, because we need better information. We need a 
better system to keep that information accurate, and we need better 
standards to keep that system from breaking down when we need it most. 
The Senate must pass this bipartisan legislation to improve the 
national sex offender database, to link State tracking systems, and to 
prevent sex offenders from escaping and moving to other States.
  Today there is far too much disparity among State registration 
requirements and notification obligations for sex offenders. Yes, there 
is already a National Registry, but it is based on often outdated 
listings from all 50 States. Worse, there are currently no incentives 
for offenders to provide accurate information, which helps to undermine 
the system.
  Child sex offenders have exploited this stunning lack of uniformity, 
and the consequences have been tragic. Twenty percent of the Nation's 
560,000 sex offenders are ``lost'' because State offender registry 
programs are not coordinated well enough.
  We take these numbers very seriously in Washington State. In 
Washington State we have over 19,000 registered sex offenders and 
kidnaping offenders; more than 2,900 Washingtonians are currently 
incarcerated for these sex crimes. But we must be tough on these 
criminals because the national statistics are staggering.
  One in five girls is estimated to be a victim of sexual assault. One 
in ten boys is estimated to be a victim. Only 35 percent of these cases 
are ever reported to the police. That is why this spring, Washington 
State passed a tough law that is new in mandating that sex offenders 
from other States must register with authorities within 3 days upon 
moving to Washington State. The previous law had been 30 days.
  We also established a minimum sentence for certain sex crimes and 
tougher registration rules. Back in 1990 we were the first State to 
enact a sexual predator involuntary commitment law that ensures 
predators who are about to be released after serving their time can be 
prevented from being released if mental health officials believe that 
they will endanger the community.
  This law has become a national model for other States to follow. 
Today, these sexual predators are housed on McNeil Island where they 
cannot hurt our children.
  Here is what I know. Local law enforcement needs the tools and 
information that this legislation will give them to defend our 
children. It will help us close the gap between Federal and State sex 
offender registration and notification programs. Every State needs to 
update one another and the national registry in real time, and we need 
to recognize that tough punishment today will prevent terrible costs 
tomorrow.
  We must keep our communities safe, and I know that is why the Senate 
is going to act on this legislation tonight. The Adam Walsh Protection 
and Safety Act creates this registry on a national level that is so 
long overdue. It provides strong, practical tools for law enforcement 
The new registry will expand the scope and duration of sex offender 
registration and notification requirements. It will keep track of all 
sex offender information--addresses, employment, vehicle, and other 
related information. And, as my colleague from North Dakota talked 
about, with his hard work, it also has a national sex offender Web site 
registry, the new Dru Sjodin National Sex Offender Web site, so that 
every American can stay informed.
  Now the public will be able to search for sex offender information by 
geographic radius and zip code, and the bill also, as my colleague from 
Texas just mentioned, increases the penalties for violent sex crimes 
against America's children.
  It requires that the sex offenders register prior to their release 
from prison or supervised programs.
  America needs this legislation. I am so proud of my colleagues in 
joining in a bipartisan effort to give law enforcement the tools they 
need to protect our families and our communities. Let's give them the 
information and the resources they need to get tough with sex 
offenders. Let's pass the Adam Walsh Child Protection Safety Act to not 
only honor John Walsh and his family, but also for all those who have 
been victims of this hideous crime, and to show that we are willing to 
work together to be aggressive in taking action and helping to make 
America safe for our children.
  I will yield the floor.
  Mr. PRYOR. Mr. President, I rise today to support the Adam Walsh 
Child Protection Safety Act of 2006, H.R. 4472. I say that as an 
Arkansan because I know people in Arkansas want to protect our 
children. I say that as a former attorney general because I know we 
worked with John Walsh and other people who dealt with missing and 
exploited children all over the country. We tried to be as active as 
possible in the attorney general's office in Arkansas. Thirdly, and 
most important, I say it as a father because I want my children 
protected like everybody else here and everybody around the country who 
wants their children protected.
  Senator Frist made a statement a few moments ago about child 
predators on the Internet. It is a real problem. It is something we in 
the Congress are trying to deal with in this legislation. It is 
something we need to keep focused on even though we passed this 
legislation. We need to keep focused on it so we can make sure that 
what we have on the books works. I am very proud of the Senate tonight 
for considering this. I am very proud of the Congress for the way they 
have handled this and moved this through the process.
  I also wish to say another word. There is a program around the 
country called Code Adam. Actually, an Arkansas company started this--
Wal-Mart--several years ago, where they have a little blue sticker on 
the door of every Wal-Mart. They do a Code Adam procedure in the store 
if a child is reported missing in the store. I cannot tell you how many 
children have been saved in Wal-Marts but also in other retail stores 
that use Code Adam. Wal-Mart has given this idea to anybody who wants 
to do it. It has worked and it has probably saved dozens, if not 
hundreds, of children. It is named after Adam Walsh because he was 
abducted and murdered several years ago.
  Lastly, my friend, Colleen Nick, whom I met through my time in the 
attorney general's office in Arkansas--her daughter Morgan Nick was 
abducted from a ballfield in Alma, AR, several years ago when Morgan 
was about 5 years old. Colleen has devoted her life to missing children 
issues. So I am proud that this passed tonight for Morgan and Colleen 
and the Nick family because I have talked to them and spent a lot of 
time with the Nicks. I know the void it creates in a parent's life and 
in a family's life when one of their children is missing and never 
found.
  Mr. President, I am very proud to support this legislation. I believe 
it makes America better, stronger, and it puts some teeth in the law 
that we need. It is something of which we can all be proud.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I rise today in strong support of the 
Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act. I am proud to be a 
cosponsor of this bill and am even prouder that we have been able to 
work across party lines and in both Houses to come up with a bill that 
we all can support and that will genuinely help protect our children 
from sexual predators.

[[Page S8021]]

  My commendations and heartfelt sympathy go out to John and Reve 
Walsh, Mark Lunsford, and all the other parents and loved ones of 
children who were taken so violently from those who loved them so 
dearly. Without the tireless efforts of these folks, this bill might 
not be on the floor here today, as we near the 25-year mark of the 
disappearance and murder of Adam Walsh.
  The urgency of passing this legislation is clear. The murders of 
Jessica Lunsford, Sara Lunde, Tiffany Souers, and Jetseta Gage, who was 
from my home State of Iowa, have been thoroughly covered in the news in 
recent times. Each of these murders was committed by a repeat sex 
offender. These cases should open our eyes to the necessity of passing 
a bill that will protect children from monsters who commit these crimes 
and ensure that those who do commit the crimes will receive tougher 
penalties.
  As I mentioned, Jetseta Marrie Gage was from my home State of Iowa. I 
would like to take a moment to talk about the beautiful 10-year-old 
girl who was sexually assaulted and murdered last year.
  On March 24, 2005, Jetseta went missing from her home. Within 12 
hours of her disappearance, even before a body had been found, law 
enforcement officials took Roger Bentley into custody.
  Bentley had been previously convicted for committing lascivious acts 
with a minor. Unfortunately, this man only served a little over 1 year 
in prison for his previous sex crime conviction. Two days later, due to 
a tip received by a woman responding to the Amber Alert, Jetseta's body 
was found stuffed in a cabinet in an abandoned mobile home. She had 
been sexually molested and suffocated with a plastic bag. I can't help 
but wonder whether Jetseta would still be alive today had her killer 
received stricter penalties for his first offense. It breaks my heart 
to hear about cases like this, but it is even more disheartening when 
you know that it might have been prevented with adequate sentencing and 
that hers is just one tragic story in a long list of horrific crimes 
committed every year.
  Child sex offenders are the most heinous of all criminals. I can 
honestly tell you that I would just as soon lock up all the child 
molesters and child pornography makers and murderers in this country 
and throw away the key. As it should all of us, the thought of what 
these predators do to our innocent children literally makes me sick to 
my stomach. The thought that we might not do what we could to deter 
them but also to prevent the same people from committing the same 
crimes against other children is unacceptable. According to a study 
funded by the Department of Justice, 5.3 percent of sex offenders were 
rearrested within 3 years following their release for another sex 
crime. Also, compared to non-sex offenders released from State prisons, 
released sex offenders were four times more likely to be rearrested for 
a sex crime. Even more troubling, according to several federally funded 
studies, child molesters have an even higher rate of rearrest than 
rapists.
  Three years ago, we passed the PROTECT Act, a bill I worked on with 
my colleagues to provide the judiciary with the necessary tools to 
ensure that our children and grandchildren grow up in a safe community, 
free from child predators. This bill complements the process we started 
with the PROTECT Act, and adds much needed additional protections for 
children and for our communities.
  The bill before us today includes parts of the Jetseta Gage 
Prevention and Deterrence of Crimes Against Children Act, a bill that I 
introduced last year to strengthen penalties for criminals who commit 
sex offenses against children. It ensures that those who commit heinous 
crimes against our children are appropriately punished and that anyone 
thinking of committing similar crimes will think twice about the 
repercussions. The bill increases penalties for sexual offenses against 
children, including sexual abuse, murder, kidnapping, sex trafficking, 
and various activities relating to the production and dissemination of 
child pornography.
  This bill goes far beyond these penalty increases, however. It 
establishes sex offender registration and notification requirements, 
essential to aid parents in monitoring their children's environments. 
It strengthens child pornography prevention laws and sets up grants, 
studies, and other programs for the safety of children and communities. 
It delves into Internet crimes, an area that is becoming increasingly 
important in light of the dangers posed to children and the lack of 
knowledge on the part of parents, which hampers their ability to 
protect their children. My good friend from Arizona, Mr. Kyl, 
introduced the bill this section is based on and which I cosponsored.
  As the elected representatives of the American people, our foremost 
duty is to protect those who cannot protect themselves. Child rapes and 
murders are now being reported on our news programs on a regular basis. 
We have the power to prevent so many of these crimes by creating 
stronger deterrents and letting parents know where these sex offenders 
lurk after they are released. When crimes are committed, the least we 
can do is ensure that the rapists and murderers won't get the 
opportunity to hurt another child.
  It is a tragedy that it took so many stories like those of Adam 
Walsh, Jetseta Gage, and Jessica Lunsford for a law of this nature to 
be proposed. I strongly believe that a vote for this bill can save the 
lives of children in the future. We have an obligation as legislators 
to protect our citizenry. We have an obligation as adults to protect 
our youth. We have an obligation as parents to protect our children. I 
urge my colleagues to join me in doing just that by voting in favor of 
this bill.
  Mr. NELSON of Florida. Mr. President, the Congress will soon pass 
important legislation that will better protect children around the 
country from those who seek them harm. The Adam Walsh Child Protection 
and Safety Act, H.R. 4472, named after the son of John and Reve Walsh 
who was killed in Florida almost 25 years ago, is the toughest and most 
comprehensive sex offender bill in recent years.
  This legislation includes a number of changes to safeguard children, 
including tougher sentences for crimes committed against children, a 
publicly accessible national database of sex offenders, and a Federal 
requirement for convicted sex offenders to register their locations 
with law enforcement officials. The bill also includes a provision, 
which I authored, to track released sex offenders.
  Sadly, events of the recent past highlight the need for us to know 
the location of convicted sexual offenders if they are released back 
into our communities.
  In my State of Florida, two young girls, Jessica Lunsford and Sarah 
Lunde, were both murdered by convicted sex offenders within weeks of 
each other in 2005.
  Jessica Lunsford of Homosassa, FL, was a 9-year-old girl who was 
abducted from her home, raped, and then buried alive by a convicted sex 
offender who lived 150 feet from her home. Law enforcement had lost 
track of him and they did not know that he worked at the school that 
Jessica attended, despite his being a registered sex offender. A few 
weeks later, 13-year-old Sarah Lunde of Ruskin, FL, was murdered by her 
mother's ex-boyfriend. He is also a convicted sex offender.
  In response to these tragic events, Florida enacted a law that 
provides tougher sentences for child sex offenders and aids law 
enforcement in effectively monitoring those sex offenders. The law 
requires sex offenders, released back into our communities, to wear a 
device to allow authorities to track them via a global positioning 
system.
  My provision in the Adam Walsh Act provides Jessica Lunsford and 
Sarah Lunde grants to aid States and local government in purchasing 
electronic monitoring systems, such as global positioning systems, that 
will provide law enforcement with real time information on the 
whereabouts of sex offenders released from prison to within 10 feet of 
their location. Law enforcement will be able to restrict the movements 
of sex offenders by programming these systems to alert authorities if a 
sex offender goes to a park, amusement park, elementary school or other 
areas determined to be off limits. The ankle bracelets used to monitor 
their movements are tamperproof and will alert law enforcement in the 
event that an offender has removed it so law enforcement can 
immediately act to apprehend the offender.

[[Page S8022]]

  The grants will provide a total of $15 million to State and local 
government to help implement laws in order to get tougher on sex 
offenders released back into their communities with electronic 
monitoring technology. The bill will provide for $5 million in grants 
for fiscal years 2007 through 2009. The bill then directs the Attorney 
General to provide a report to Congress assessing the effectiveness of 
the program and making recommendations as to future funding levels.
  In the United States, there are an estimated 380,000 registered sex 
offenders, although thousands have disappeared, according to 
authorities. We have over 30,000 of these sex offenders in the State of 
Florida. Laws, such as the one in Florida, and the Adam Walsh Act, 
which will be passed by Congress, are necessary to protect our 
children. I believe it is important that the Federal Government be 
appropriately supportive of State and local governments that are 
addressing this problem. To be effective, tough laws on sexual 
predators of children must be properly funded, and I believe these 
tough laws being passed by Federal and State legislatures are worth 
properly funding when they will protect our children.
  Children are our most important treasure and protecting them is one 
of our most sacred responsibilities. I hope this bill will serve as a 
living memorial to all the children and serve as some comfort to their 
families. I hope the Jessica Lunsford and Sarah Lunde grants provided 
in this bill will allow law enforcement to help prevent other families 
from suffering similar tragedies.
  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, today the Senate passed the Adam Walsh 
Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006, which will help prevent the 
child exploitation by, among other things, creating a national system 
for the registration of sex offenders. Included in this legislation is 
a very important provision that I authored with Senator Isakson called 
Masha's Law. Masha's Law is named after a very brave 13-year-old girl--
a Russian orphan who was adopted by a Pennsylvania man at the age of 5 
and sexually exploited from the moment she was placed in his care. 
Masha suffered unspeakable atrocities in the hands of her abusive 
father, a man with a history of child exploitation. She continues to 
suffer as photographs of this abuse, taken by her father and posted on 
the Internet, are downloaded every day. Yet Masha does not cower in 
fear. She is taking a stand. She is using her experiences to 
demonstrate why the law must change. And it is because of her that we 
are now closing unacceptable loopholes in our child exploitation laws.
  Masha's photographs are among the most commonly downloaded images of 
child pornography. Law enforcement estimates that 80 percent of child 
pornography collections contain at least one of her photographs. In 
fact, it was the high volume of images being distributed by this one 
individual that raised suspicions and led law enforcement officials to 
the home of Masha's adopted father. While he is currently in jail 
accused of sexual abuse and facing Federal charges, the damage to Masha 
continues every day as her pictures continue to be downloaded. Masha 
has sought compensation through a little used provision in the Child 
Abuse Victims' Rights Act of 1986 that provides statutory damages for 
the victims of sexual exploitation. Nothing will ever compensate Masha 
for the horrific experiences she has had, but the penalties provided in 
current law are embarrassingly low--they are one-third of the penalty 
for downloading music illegally.
  According to the Center for Missing and Exploited Children, child 
pornography has become a multibillion dollar Internet business. With 
the increasingly sophisticated technology of digital media, child 
pornography has become easier to produce, transfer, and purchase. We 
are not doing enough to deter those who post and download child 
pornography.
  Masha's Law would do two things; first it would increase the civil 
statutory damages available to a victim of child exploitation; and 
second, it would ensure that victims of child pornography whose images 
remain in circulation after they have turned 18 can still recover when 
those images are downloaded. The injuries do not cease to exist simply 
because the victim has turned 18. They continue and so should the 
penalties.
  These changes are long overdue. I am proud that the Senate has passed 
this important legislation, and I am grateful to Masha for having the 
courage to stand up and make her voice heard.
  Mr. DeWINE. Mr. President, I am proud to be a cosponsor of the Adam 
Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006, which provides law 
enforcement officers with several important tools to protect our 
children. In the past three decades, we have all seen and heard about 
the many tragic cases of children being assaulted and killed by sex 
offenders. These are absolutely horrifying events, and as legislators, 
we have an obligation to do all we can to prevent such crimes in the 
future. We need to improve and enhance sex offender registration and 
tracking laws and increase penalties for those who violate them, which 
this act will accomplish.
  There are several prongs to this act, which is what will make it 
successful. The core of this bill establishes a national sex offender 
registry. Although each State has a registry, there are no uniform 
standards. There is no easy way to access information from different 
jurisdictions. This act creates a uniform Federal standard which 
divides offenders into tiers, depending upon the offense for which they 
were convicted. It establishes registration guidelines for each tier, 
including how long a person would need to be registered and how often 
he or she must come in for a personal verification of the registration 
information. The act also creates community notification requirements 
and will make it a felony for sex offenders to fail to register and 
update their information on a regular basis. The Dru Sjodin National 
Sex Offender Public Web site will allow the public to search for 
information on sex offenders by ZIP Code and geographic radius.
  All of these changes will help make our tracking laws more effective 
and will allow parents and members of the local community to be 
vigilant about the potential dangers of sex offenders in their 
neighborhoods.
  But before we can put a predator can appear on the registry, he needs 
to be caught and prosecuted. The Adam Walsh Act includes urgently 
needed resources to assist law enforcement in these endeavors. This act 
establishes 10 new task forces dealing with Internet crimes against 
children, 45 new computer forensic examiners to deal exclusively with 
child sexual exploitation, and 200 new Federal prosecutors--all 
designated to combat child sexual exploitation.
  This act also tries to protect children from being victimized in the 
first place. It provides grant money for educating parents and children 
about those who use the Internet to prey upon children. It funds Big 
Brothers and Big Sisters and includes my bill for the reauthorization 
of the Police Athletic Leagues. These two programs provide kids with 
supervision and role models and mentors who can help protect them from 
predators. In addition, it mandates that potential foster and adoptive 
parents go through a thorough criminal background check before a child 
can be placed with them.
  Also incorporated in this bill are aspects of the Internet Safety Act 
which I proudly cosponsored. These include establishing new criminal 
penalties to keep up with the constantly increasing level of depravity 
among pedophiles--for example, the child exploitation enterprises 
provision to prosecute the ``molestation on demand'' child pornographic 
industry that has sprung up in recent years. Sexual predators of 
children are among the worst kind of offenders, and it is only right 
that there are sentencing enhancements for registered sex offenders who 
reoffend.
  This is a good piece of legislation. I am pleased so many of my 
colleagues support it, and I look forward to its pending passage.
  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, in May, the Senate passed the Sex 
Offender Registration and Notification Act to standardize and 
strengthen registration and monitoring of sex offenders nationwide. 
Since its passage, the House and Senate have worked closely to resolve 
their differences and to improve the overall quality of the 
legislation. The bill before us today contains difficult compromises, 
but it has achieved that goal.

[[Page S8023]]

  This legislation is critically important to safeguard victims of 
sexual abuse from harm. It will help protect innocent people from 
violent offenses. It recognizes the victims and all the suffering both 
they and their families have endured.
  With this legislation, we are recognizing the loss of Molly Bish from 
Warren, MA. At 16, Molly was abducted from her position as a lifeguard, 
and her family endured terrible uncertainty until her remains were 
found 3 years later. Molly was a typical teenager who took great joy 
from life. Her nickname was Tigger, because she was always on the move. 
She is survived by her parents, John and Magi Bish; her sister, 
Heather; and her brother, John, Jr., who work every day to keep 
children safe, honoring her life and her legacy.
  With this bill, we also remember with sadness another Massachusetts 
resident, Alexandra Zapp. Ally was 30 years old when she was attacked 
and murdered in a public restroom by a repeat sex offender in 
Bridgewater, MA, in 2002. Ally's friends described her as a strong, 
smart, and independent woman. She had worked at the USA Sailing 
Association of Portsmouth, RI, where she was a keelboat training 
coordinator. Ally is survived by her mother and sister, Andrea and 
Caroline, and her father and stepmother, Ray and Linda. This 
legislation is dedicated to her memory, along with the memories of 
Molly Bish and the many other victims of terrible crimes.
  Several changes have been made to this legislation as a result of our 
work with the House. It is important to make sure that information on 
offenders who pose a potential threat is available to the public at 
large, and this bill provides for Internet listing and community 
notification about such individuals.
  At the same time, in order for the registry to be effective, it 
should be targeted toward those who present the highest risk to our 
communities. The current version takes a more sweeping approach toward 
juvenile offenders by expanding their registration requirements. The 
Senate bill allowed each State to determine whether a juvenile should 
be included on the registry. This compromise allows some offenders over 
14 to be included on registries, but only if they have been convicted 
of very serious offenses. For juveniles, the public notification 
provision in this bill is harsh given their low rate of recidivism, 
which is less than 8 percent according to the most recent studies. For 
this reason, it is especially important that the bill includes funding 
for treatment of juvenile offenders. These provisions recognize that 
juvenile offenders, who have much lower rates of recidivism and have 
been shown to be much more amenable to treatment than their adult 
counterparts, shouldn't be lumped together with adult offenders.
  The bill also provides increased funding for programs to prevent 
these offenses before they occur. It also authorizes funding for sex 
offender treatment and management within the Federal prison system. 
These provisions will be helpful in reducing the future risks to 
society by convicted sex offenders. If Congress is serious about 
addressing this problem, it must commit itself to fully funding the 
legislation.
  All States currently have registration requirements for sex 
offenders, but this bill will create a system of national tracking and 
accountability that preserves the ability of individual States to 
provide additional procedures to assure the accuracy and usefulness of 
the registries.
  Massachusetts has a system that works. We are already doing most of 
what this bill requires, but our system goes beyond these basic 
requirements by providing individualized risk assessments of each sex 
offender who goes on the registry. These individual assessments, 
combined with hearings allowing offenders to challenge their 
classification, help ensure that States like Massachusetts can provide 
the highest quality of information on potential threats to the 
community while respecting the tremendous impact that community 
notification can have on offenders' lives. I am pleased that this 
legislation respects the right of individual States to innovate in this 
area and does not penalize States who go the extra mile to improve 
their registries.
  For this reason, section 125 of the compromise is very important. 
Each State will face challenges in the implementation of these new 
Federal requirements, and States should not be penalized if exact 
compliance with the act's requirements would place the State in 
violation of its constitution or an interpretation of the State's 
constitution by its highest court.
  The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has concluded that offenders 
are entitled to procedural due process before being classified at a 
particular risk level and before personal information about them is 
disseminated to the public. Massachusetts has been vigilant in 
implementing a comprehensive and effective sex offender registry, and 
it should not lose much needed Federal funding where there is a 
demonstrated inability to comply with certain provisions of this new 
Federal law.
  No State should be penalized and lose critical Federal funding for 
law enforcement programs as long as reasonable efforts are under way to 
implement procedures consistent with the purposes of the act. It is 
essential that the Federal Government continue to collaborate and to 
provide support for State and local governments, including the 
prevention, intervention, and enforcement of antigang and antidrug 
activities as a result of this bill.
  At the same time, the new mandatory minimum sentences in the act 
aren't justified by any empirical data or sound policy. Mandatory 
minimums prevent prosecutors and judges from doing what they do best--
making individual determinations on sentencing, based on the 
circumstances of individual cases. With more than 2 million Americans 
in prison or jail--including 12 percent of all African-American men 
between the ages of 20 and 34--no one can seriously argue that there is 
an epidemic of leniency in Federal sentencing. This latest batch of 
mandatory minimums undermines more than two decades of legislative work 
devoted to striking a sensible balance between consistent sentencing 
and the need to provide judges with the discretion to make sure each 
sentence fits the crime.
  Although it is important to have strong penalties for crimes against 
children, I have major reservations about the broad expansion of the 
death penalty in this compromised legislation. It is clear that 
continued imposition of the death penalty will inevitably lead to the 
wrongful execution of more and more people. Justice Marshall, in 
particular, wrote powerfully on this issue. He believed that if our 
citizens knew the truth about the death penalty, ``its disproportionate 
imposition on racial minorities and the poor, its utter failure to 
deter crime, and the continuing likelihood of executing the innocent,'' 
it would be rejected as morally reprehensible.
  Last year, the Supreme Court struck down the death penalty for 
juveniles--persons 17 years old or younger. The Court's ruling was 
significant. It was long past time to erase that stain from our human 
rights record. The basic injustice of the death penalty is obvious. 
Experience shows that imposition of the death penalty inevitably leads 
to wrongful executions. Many of us are concerned about the racial 
disparities in the imposition of capital punishment and the wide 
disparities in the State in its application. The unequal, unfair, 
arbitray, and discriminatory use of the death penalty is completely 
contrary to our Nation's commitment to fairness and equal justice for 
all, and we need to do all we can to correct this fundamental flaw.
  Finally, the national registry of substantiated cases of child abuse 
in this bill should not be implemented until Congress has a full 
understanding of its scope and effectiveness. The proposed registry 
raises serious implementation challenges and could create an additional 
and unnecessary burden for States. Not all States maintain the same 
registry information, and most States maintain different rules on 
disclosure. Tribal entities, which are included in this proposed 
registry, currently maintain no registries at all.
  I am concerned that this registry raises serious privacy concerns by 
including information on cases without the opportunity for due process. 
For this reason, it is important that the study on establishing data 
collection standards be completed before such a

[[Page S8024]]

registry is established. Current standards for inclusion in child abuse 
registries vary greatly, with some requiring credible evidence and 
others requiring no standard other than the judgment of the case 
worker.
  During the most recent reauthorization of the Child Abuse Prevention 
and Treatment Act, we improved current child abuse systems to ensure 
that law enforcement has the information it needs to pursue and 
prosecute cases.
  A new provision was added to require States to ``disclose 
confidential information to any Federal, State, or local government 
entity, or any agent of such entity, which has a need for such 
information in order to carry out its responsibilities under law to 
protect children from abuse and neglect.'' Rather than developing 
additional registries and reporting requirements, States need Federal 
assistance to effectively carry out their roles and responsibilities 
under CAPTA. I am concerned that this new registry will have limited 
value in improving or standardizing State recordkeeping for child abuse 
and neglect cases.
  Despite these provisions, I commend the work that has been done on 
this bill. Without further delay, it is important that we get this bill 
to the President so that it can be signed on July 27th, the 25th 
anniversary of the abduction of Adam Walsh, and to honor all of the 
work his parents have done in his memory to protect children in 
communities across the country.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, the foundation of democracy lies in a 
government that reflects the voice of its citizens. The Constitution, 
the beloved document that chartered our system of government, makes 
this clear. ``We the people'', are the very first words of our 
Constitution: ``We the people.'' This is no mistake, for our Founders 
sought to create a government that would reflect the will of those who 
send us here.
  Voting is the underpinning of our democratic process. In an address 
to Congress, President Lyndon B. Johnson said that, ``In a free land 
where men move freely and act freely, the right to vote freely must 
never be obstructed.'' With the act of casting one's ballot, each 
citizen has ensured a place in the democratic process, fulfilling the 
civic responsibility that each and every one of us must safeguard and 
cherish. All citizens deserve this right, and all should utilize it.
  Like so many worthwhile initiatives, safeguarding the freedoms of 
democracy can sometimes exact a heavy toll. Wars have been fought on 
our own soil to ensure these freedoms, and our country's history has 
been blemished with the events of a less enlightened time. But even 
through strife and toil, our democracy emerged intact, our Republic 
strengthened by the sacrifices made by the citizens who fought for 
equality and the right to vote.
  I met yesterday with Mr. James Tolbert, President of the West 
Virginia NAACP, and other members of the West Virginia NAACP 
delegation. They were here in Washington D.C. as part of a national 
effort to spearhead the reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act. I was 
proud to assure them of both my cosponsorship of the measure and my 
support for the reauthorization.
  While the various reauthorizations of the Voting Rights Act have 
forged the pathway to the polls for all Americans, the ability to vote 
is but half of the process. Democracy works best when the people are 
vigilant in protecting of their rights, and engage in the electoral 
process. Our democracy is strongest when there is free and open access 
to the polls for everyone, and when the people embrace the vote as both 
a right and a responsibility.
  Indeed, the decades that have followed the initial passage of the 
Voting Rights Act have witnessed the progress of our Nation. To 
continue in our efforts, we have only to look to past successes for 
inspiration. To be ardent in the defense of our democracy is to 
preserve it for the generations to come.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I rise to speak in strong support of 
the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006. This bill will 
strengthen our power to keep America's children safe from sexual 
predators and creates the National Sex Offender Registry, which will 
keep track of all sex offender information nationwide. It will also 
create the Dru Sjodin National Sex Offender Public Web site, so that 
every American will have the ability to search for information on 
potential sexual predators in their own community.
  I have had a personal interest in children's welfare and child-safety 
issues for many years, predating my time in the Senate, in fact. Before 
being elected to this Chamber, I served as judge-executive of Jefferson 
County, KY, from 1977 to 1984. Jefferson County contains Louisville, my 
hometown, and the judge-executive position was the county's chief 
executive.
  In 1981, we hosted in Louisville the first-ever national conference 
on rescuing missing and exploited children. Ernie Allen, who was on my 
staff at the time and organized the conference, is today the head of 
the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. And that 
conference was keynoted by John Walsh. At the time, Mr. Walsh was not 
yet the television fixture and hero to millions of parents he is today 
but a private citizen whose 6-year-old son, Adam, had been tragically 
kidnapped and murdered earlier that same year.
  That event began a decades-long friendship between John and me, 
centered around this issue. Together, we lobbied Congress--and I remind 
you, I was not yet a Senator at this time--for legislation that would 
create a nationwide organization to track missing kids. In 1984, our 
efforts bore fruit, and President Ronald Reagan signed the bill 
creating the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children as a 
public-private partnership.
  I believe government must do all it can to support groups such as the 
NCMEC and others and our law enforcement agencies in their efforts to 
find missing children, return them to their families, and shield them 
from sexual predators. The work these groups do is vital to protecting 
families, and I applaud their dedication and compassion.
  Passage of this bill will further the mission of comforting parents 
everywhere and protecting our children. The National Sex Offender 
Registry will contain up-to-date data on all sex offenders nationwide, 
and there are harsh penalties for any offender who does not register.
  The bill imposes tougher penalties for sex offenses and violent 
crimes against children. It also allows for civil commitment procedures 
for any sex offenders who demonstrate while incarcerated that they 
cannot be trusted to be unleashed on society.
  The bill addresses child exploitation over the Internet with 
stringent Internet safety provisions. It also contains several worthy 
programs, grants, and studies to address child and community safety.
  I would especially like to note that the bill strengthens the 
pornography recordkeeping and labeling requirements passed by Congress 
in 1988 to protect children from exploitation by pornographers. These 
provisions were originally part of S. 2140, the Protecting Children 
from Sexual Exploitation Act of 2005, sponsored by my good friend from 
Utah, Senator Hatch.
  I was pleased to join him as a cosponsor of that bill and am doubly 
pleased now to see these provisions included in this bill, which I feel 
confident in saying will soon reach the President's desk and receive 
his signature.
  Finally, the portion of this legislation that parents may find the 
most comforting is the creation of the Dru Sjodin National Sex Offender 
Public Web site. Parents will now have the power to search for sex 
offenders in their own community. The good that can come from this 
power to arm parents with the right information cannot be measured.
  I ask my colleagues to join me in commending John Walsh for his 
commitment to this important issue. His drive to see that the tragedy 
that befell his own family does not fall on another has not diminished 
in the 25 years I have known him. I am glad that we can honor John by 
naming this important legislation after his beloved son.
  Those who would prey on the weakest among us--our children deserve to 
feel the full weight of the law brought down on them. It is hard to 
imagine a crime that does more to destroy families or dreams of a 
bright future. This legislation will ensure that kids, parents, and law 
enforcement agencies have the tools they need to fight child predators 
and sexual criminals. For that reason, I am proud to support its 
passage.

[[Page S8025]]

  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I rise today to comment on the Adam Walsh 
Child Protection and Safety Act. This legislation will create a 
national sex offender registry that will make it possible for law 
enforcement and concerned citizens to track sexual predators. The bill 
also includes tough penalties that will ensure that these individuals 
will actually register. There currently are over 100,000 sex offenders 
in this country who are required to register but are ``off the 
system.'' They are not registered. The penalties in this bill should be 
adequate to ensure that these individuals register. In addition to 
allowing up to 10 years in prison for an offender who fails to 
register, the bill also imposes a mandatory 5 years in prison for an 
offender who has neglected his obligation to register and commits a 
crime of violence.
  I would like to focus my remarks on legislation that I have 
introduced that has been incorporated in this final bill. I am 
particularly pleased to see that the bill maintains the ChildHelp 
National Registry of Cases of Child Abuse and Neglect. Section 663 of 
the bill instructs the Department of Health and Human Services to 
create a national registry of persons who have been found to have 
abused or neglected a child. The information will be gathered from 
State databases of child abuse or neglect. It will be made available to 
State child-protective-services and law-enforcement agencies ``for 
purposes of carrying out their responsibilities under the law to 
protect children from abuse and neglect.'' The national database will 
allow States to track the past history of parents and guardians who are 
suspected of abusing their children. When child-abusing parents come to 
the attention of authorities--when teachers begin to ask about bruises, 
for example--these parents often will move to a different jurisdiction. 
A national database would allow the State to which these parents move 
to know the parents' history. It will let a child-protective-services 
worker know, for example, whether he should prioritize investigation of 
a particular case because the parent has been found to have committed 
substantiated cases of abuse in the past in other States. Such a 
database also would allow a State that is evaluating a prospective 
foster parent or adoptive parent to learn about past incidents of child 
abuse that the person has committed in other States.
  I am also proud to see that the Internet SAFETY Act, which I 
introduced with several colleagues earlier this year, has been 
incorporated as title VII of this bill. This title includes the 
following important provisions:
  Section 701 makes it a criminal offense to operate a child 
exploitation enterprise, which is defined as four or more persons who 
act in concern to commit at least three separate violations of Federal 
child pornography, sex trafficking, or sexual abuse laws against 
multiple child victims. This offense is punished by imprisonment for 20 
years up to life.
  Section 702 provides that if an individual who is required to 
register as a sex offender under Federal or State law commits specified 
Federal offenses involving child pornography, sex trafficking, or 
sexual abuse against a minor victim, the offender shall be imprisoned 
for 10 years in addition to any penalty imposed for the current 
offense.
  Section 703 makes it a criminal offense to embed words or digital 
images into the source code of a Web site in order to deceive people 
into viewing obscenity on the Internet. Offenses targeting adults are 
subject to up to 10 years imprisonment; offenses targeted at child 
victims are subject to up to 20 years imprisonment.

  Section 704 authorizes appropriations for the U.S. Attorney General 
to hire 200 additional Assistant United States Attorneys across the 
country to prosecute child pornography, sex trafficking, and sexual 
abuse offenses targeted at children.
  Section 705 authorizes appropriations for the hiring of 30 additional 
computer forensic examiners within the Justice Department's Regional 
Computer Forensic Laboratories, and 15 additional computer forensic 
examiners within the Department of Homeland Security's Cyber Crimes 
Center. The additional computer forensic examiners will be dedicated to 
investigating crimes involving the sexual exploitation of children and 
related offenses.
  Section 706 authorizes the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency 
Prevention to create 10 additional Internet Crimes Against Children, 
ICAC, Task Forces.
  Finally, section 707 of the Internet SAFETY title expands the civil 
remedies for sexual offenses by allowing the parents of a minor victim 
to seek damages, and by allowing a minor victim to seek damages as an 
adult.
  Title II of today's bill also includes a number of penalty increases 
and other improvements to Federal criminal sex offenses. Many of these 
provisions appeared in the Internet SAFETY Act, as well as in the 
Jetseta Gage Act, which was introduced by Senator Grassley in 2005 and 
of which I was an original cosponsor. Section 211 suspends the statute 
of limitations for all Federal felony offenses of sexual abuse, sex 
trafficking, or child pornography. Other provisions of title II 
increase penalties for coercion and enticement by sex offenders, 
conduct relating to child prostitution, aggravated sexual abuse, sexual 
abuse, abusive sexual contact, sexual abuse of children resulting in 
death, and sex trafficking of children. Title II also makes sexual 
abuse offenses resulting in death eligible for the capital punishment, 
and expands the predicate offenses justifying mandatory repeat-offender 
penalties for offenses involving child pornography and depictions of 
the sexual exploitation of children. Finally, title II adds sex 
trafficking of children to the set of repeat offenses that are subject 
to mandatory life imprisonment.
  Another provision that I have pursued during this Congress and that 
is included in this final bill is section 212, which extends several of 
the guarantees of the 2004 Crime Victims' Rights Act to Federal habeas 
corpus review of State criminal convictions. Because such cases involve 
Federal courts but State prosecutors, this extension is limited to 
those provisions of CVRA that are enforced by a court--Congress cannot 
compel State prosecutors to enforce a Federal statute. The victims' 
rights extended by section 212 to Federal habeas proceedings are the 
right to be present at proceedings, the right to be heard at 
proceedings involving release, plea, sentencing, or parole, the right 
to proceedings free from unreasonable delay, and the right to be 
treated with fairness and with respect for the victim's dignity and 
privacy.
  The bill also makes some technical improvements to the DNA 
Fingerprint Act, which Senator Cornyn and I introduced last year and 
which was enacted into law as an amendment to the reauthorization of 
the Violence Against Women Act at the beginning of this year. Section 
155 of today's bill modifies the authority granted to the Federal 
Government by the DNA Fingerprint Act to collect DNA samples from 
Federal arrestees. Under current law, the Federal Government may 
collect a DNA sample from any person arrested for a Federal offense, 
but the authority to collect DNA from persons convicted of a Federal 
offense is limited to felonies and certain misdemeanors. Section 155 
corrects this anomaly by including convictions in the Federal sample-
collection regulatory authority, thus allowing the Federal Government 
to collect DNA from all persons convicted of a Federal crime. The 2006 
Act also allows DNA to be collected from all arrestees, but in the case 
of persons detained under Federal authority this authority is limited 
to non-U.S. persons--i.e., foreign visitors who are neither U.S. 
citizens nor permanent residents. Problems might arise in the case of 
U.S. persons who are detained and facing Federal criminal charges, but 
who were not arrested by Federal authorities. Examples include persons 
who are being prosecuted federally but were arrested by the State 
officers participating in a joint Federal-State task force, and persons 
who turn themselves in to Federal authorities without being formally 
arrested. Arguably, the 2006 act's arrest authority should extend to 
such individuals--they are constructively arrested. Section 155 
eliminates any ambiguity and possibility of litigation over these 
matters by expressly granting the Federal Government the authority to 
collect DNA samples from individuals facing Federal charges.
  Finally, I would like to take a moment to recognize all of the staff 
who worked so hard to see this bill through to completion. Please allow 
me to

[[Page S8026]]

thank Ken Valentine and Tom Jipping of Senator Hatch's staff, Dave Turk 
of Senator Biden's staff, Julie Katzman and Noah Bookbinder of Senator 
Leahy's staff, Nicole Gustafson of Senator Grassley's staff, as well as 
Chad Groover, who has since left Senator Grassley's office but who 
played a critical role in developing many of the penalty enhancements 
included in title II, Christine Leonard of Senator Kennedy's staff, 
Lara Flint of Senator Feingold's staff, Nate Jones of Senator Kohl's 
staff, Sharon Beth Kristal of Senator DeWine's staff, Reed O'Connor of 
Senator Cornyn's staff, Jane Treat of Senator Coburn's staff, Greg 
Smith of Senator Feinstein's staff, Marianne Upton of Senator Durbin's 
staff, Bradley Hayes of Senator Sessions's staff, Bradley Schreiber of 
Mr. Foley's staff, and last but not least in this group, Brooke Bacak 
of my Republican Policy Committee staff.
  I would especially like to thank Allen Hicks and Brandi White of 
Senator Frist's staff, who were very helpful in securing the inclusion 
of the Child-Abuse Registry in this bill, Matt Miner of Senator 
Specter's staff, who played a critical role in negotiating the final 
bill, and Mike Volkov, Sean McLaughlin, and Phil Kiko of Mr. 
Sensenbrenner's staff. The bill that we have today would not exist were 
it not for the professionalism, expertise, and dedication of the 
Sensenbrenner staff. Often it is easy in Congress simply to pass any 
bill dealing with a subject so that we can say that we have addressed 
the problem. This is not such a bill. This is a strong, tough bill that 
will make a difference in the safety and security of our Nation's 
children. It is a bill of which we can all be proud, and Mr. 
Sensenbrenner's staff deserves recognition for their contribution to 
that result.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, back in May 2005, with the leadership of 
Senator Specter, Senator Biden, Senator Kennedy, and others, the Senate 
Judiciary Committee approved an important child safety bill, S. 1086. 
The committee worked tirelessly to craft a prudent, bipartisan bill 
that would assist States in their ongoing efforts to protect children 
through tighter monitoring of known sex offenders. It was a good bill, 
and it passed the full Senate in May of this year by unanimous consent.
  Now, extensive bipartisan discussions with the House have produced a 
revised version of the bill, which the Senate is voting on today. The 
new bill is better in a few ways than the Senate-passed bill that we 
produced and also, regrettably, takes some steps backward. While this 
new bill is not the bill I would have written, I intend to support it 
and expect that it will pass.
  As a former prosecutor, and as a father and grandfather, I know that 
there is no higher duty than to protect our society's children, to take 
every step possible to prevent them from coming to harm, and to punish 
those who attempt to or succeed in harming them. We have never debated 
whether children should be protected. Of course they should. The only 
debate is about how they should be protected, and how best to deploy 
and utilize limited resources to deter and punish those who would prey 
on them.
  Over the last 30 years, I have worked closely with others to write 
and enact legislation aimed specifically at protecting children and 
assisting victims. In the last Congress, Senator Hatch and I joined to 
introduce the PROTECT Act, which provided prosecutors and law 
enforcement with tools necessary to combat child pornography and human 
trafficking. The final legislation passed by Congress included a number 
of provisions that I had either authored or supported, such as the 
National AMBER Alert Network Act; the Protecting Our Children First 
Act, which reauthorized funding for the National Center for Missing and 
Exploited Children; and legislation to amend the Violence Against Women 
Act to provide transitional housing assistance grants for child victims 
of domestic violence.
  In addition, I am pleased that the Senate has acted on other 
legislation for children and crime victims that I have sponsored. These 
include the 21st Century Department of Justice Appropriations 
Authorization Act, which among other things included important grant 
funds for the Boys and Girls Clubs of America, and established the 
Violence Against Women Office in the Justice Department. In 2004, the 
President signed into law the Justice For All Act, a package of 
criminal justice reforms that, among other things, authorized funds to 
reduce rape kit backlogs and enumerated crime victims' rights.
  I am glad that this new consensus legislation to protect children 
honors the efforts of John and Reve Walsh, who have worked so hard to 
ensure that other families would not experience the tragedy that befell 
their family. It has been my privilege to work for many years with the 
Walshes and with the National Center for Missing and Exploited 
Children, in which they have played such an instrumental role, to take 
many important steps to keep children and families safe. I commend and 
thank John Walsh once again for his passionate advocacy on behalf of 
the Nation's children over many, many years.
  I am also glad that members of both parties in both bodies ultimately 
agreed with me and with the distinguished Senate Republican and 
Democratic leaders that we should prioritize finishing and passing 
legislation to protect children from sexual predators, without tying 
this crucial legislation to other more difficult issues. The Senate has 
passed court security legislation, for which I was a principal 
cosponsor, as part of S. 2766, and we have been working to settle 
differences between our legislation and the other body's court security 
proposals. Court security legislation should pass this year, but it 
would not have been right to endanger either the court security bills 
or this crucial child protection legislation by tying them together.
  Gang legislation is on a separate track entirely. It is just getting 
started in the Senate. Passing legislation to protect children from 
sexual predators has been my first priority. Seeking simultaneously to 
resolve extensive differences over provisions in the gang bill and 
other crime legislation could have caused us to miss this chance. It is 
commendable that, in the end, both bodies chose to focus on passing sex 
offender legislation and not to jeopardize this by tying this bill to 
more controversial measures.
  The gang bill is just now before the Judiciary Committee, which is 
the appropriate place to start work on a complex and important piece of 
criminal justice legislation. It is a new and very different version of 
this bill. It will be important to hold a hearing on this bill to 
listen to the Federal, State, and local law enforcement officers who 
are combating gang violence on a regular basis, and from the 
organizations that are working to keep kids out of gangs. Gang violence 
is a disturbing and difficult menace in our communities, and as we 
craft solutions to help address these issues we should strive to get it 
right. We have done the right thing by finalizing this important child 
protection legislation first, before turning to that and other 
difficult tasks.
  When S. 1086 was first introduced in May 2005, serious concerns were 
raised by members of the Judiciary Committee, State attorneys general, 
the Department of Justice, and others. Through an impressive, 
bipartisan effort these concerns were largely addressed. I appreciate 
that Senators, and now House Members, of both parties took these 
concerns to heart and revised this bill in ways that will increase the 
protection of children from the most dangerous sex offenders, while not 
overwhelming the States with requirements that could hinder their own 
efforts. I believe that this new bill takes a few unfortunate steps 
back from the well thought out Senate version, but it still achieves 
many of the crucial goals we identified. The resulting bill ensures 
that each State will have an effective sex offender registry and that 
all States will share registry information--all of which will help keep 
our children safer.
  I am glad that this bill addresses my concerns and that of many 
others of both parties in the Senate in giving significant discretion 
to the States in the handling of juvenile offenders. Juvenile justice 
has always been a province of the States, and State legislatures, 
prosecutors, and judges have developed significant expertise in 
distinguishing which juvenile offenders represent a continuing threat 
to society and which juveniles, with appropriate treatment and 
monitoring, can turn

[[Page S8027]]

themselves around and become contributing members of society.

  This bill correctly allows the States, in many cases, to use their 
expertise--and they know more about these issues than we do here in 
Washington--to decide which juveniles should be on sex offender 
registries, to what extent, and for how long. It also appropriately 
requires the States to include the most egregious juvenile offenders, 
who do represent a threat to others, on their sex offender registries. 
I think the bill goes too far in a few cases in limiting States' 
discretion to determine which juveniles should be placed on registries 
and to allow those juvenile offenders who have lived cleanly and turned 
their lives around to get off of registries. But overall, this bill 
strikes an acceptable balance on this issue, and I am glad that those 
of us who were concerned about appropriate deference to the expertise 
of the States spoke out and were heard to some extent.
  This bill takes a good if small first step toward what should be one 
of our most important priorities in keeping our children safe from sex 
offenders: treatment. While the most dangerous sex offenders may be 
predisposed to re-offend and should be treated accordingly, many 
studies have shown that people who commit less serious sex offenses 
often, with appropriate treatment, do not present a significant risk of 
recidivism and can become responsible members of society. One of the 
best ways to protect our children is to help as many low-risk offenders 
as possible turn their lives around, so that our scant law enforcement 
resources can be focused on those dangerous offenders who are a 
demonstrable threat to our children. In addition to the Bureau of 
Prisons Program included in S. 1086, the current bill includes a new 
program directed specifically to the treatment of juvenile sex 
offenders, who have been proven to be especially responsive to 
treatment. This is a welcome addition to the bill, and one we should 
build on in the future.
  I want to direct the attention of my colleagues to title V of the 
bill, which makes substantial amendments to section 2257 of title 18. 
By way of background, Congress passed the original version of section 
2257 in 1988, as a means to help ensure that minors were not being 
exploited by the adult, hard-core pornography industry in violation of 
the child exploitation laws. In 1989, the District Court for the 
District of Columbia found that this original version violated the 
first amendment. In 1990, Congress responded to the District Court 
decision by significantly narrowing the scope of section 2257.
  The House bill proposed an expansion of section 2257 beyond what was 
held unconstitutional before the 1990 amendments, and beyond the 
pornography industry and those who exploit children. The proposed 
expansion of section 2257 gave rise to legitimate concerns, expressed 
by groups as far-ranging as the Chamber of Commerce, the Motion Picture 
Association of America, the American Hotel and Lodging Association, the 
American Library Association, and the American Conservative Union, that 
its record-keeping and labeling requirements, and associated criminal 
liability, might now affect an array of mainstream, legitimate, and 
first-amendment-protected activities and industries. These industries 
are leaders in protecting children employed in their industries and are 
far removed from the problem that the legislation purportedly sought to 
address. Subjecting them to the burdens of a recordkeeping and labeling 
statute intended for the pornography industry would create substantial 
burdens of compliance without any added benefit in the wholly 
legitimate and vital cause of actually safeguarding the security and 
welfare of children.
  Because the focus of these requirements is adult pornography and the 
protection of children, not mainstream visual depictions and activities 
that do not threaten children, the new bill includes provisions 
intended to limit the reach of these requirements to those who are 
actually exploiting children. Most notably, section 2257A(h) enables 
law-abiding, legitimate businesses, which create and commercially 
distribute materials that are not, and do not appear to be, child 
pornography, to certify to the Attorney General that, pursuant to 
existing laws, labor agreements, or industry standards, they regularly 
and in the normal course of business collect the name, date of birth, 
and address of performers employed by them. This recognizes that such 
legitimate, law-abiding industries in fact routinely collect the 
information necessary to demonstrate their compliance with the child 
protection laws and that for this reason they were never intended to be 
the focus of this more extensive recordkeeping and labeling statute. 
Businesses that so certify and thus exhibit their good faith can avoid 
some of the more onerous requirements, and associated criminal 
liability, rightfully placed on others whose compliance is more likely 
to further the interest of protecting children.
  By way of illustration, the motion picture industry currently 
operates under a panoply of laws, both civil and criminal, as well as 
regulations and labor agreements governing the employment of children 
in any production. They check work permits, require parents or 
guardians to be present at all times during production, and in some 
cases even obtain court approval for the employment of the children in 
films and television shows. It is fair to say that the film and 
television industries are a leader among industries in safeguarding the 
interests of children in the workplace. Yet in the absence of the 
certification provision in section 2257A(h), these studios would be 
subjected to the same extensive recordkeeping and labeling requirements 
as a hard-core pornographer is under this bill, as would a host of 
other legitimate entities throughout the distribution chain for 
mainstream motion pictures and television shows.
  The focus of the underlying statute should remain on helping 
apprehend child predators and not on legitimate businesses that have no 
role in harming children. Under section 2257A(h), motion picture 
companies that certify to the Department of Justice that they collect 
the name, date of birth, and address of all the performers employed by 
them, for purposes of compliance with existing laws, such as filling 
out an I-9 form or W-4s for tax purposes, or pursuant to labor 
agreements or their normal business practices, will not be subject to 
the more burdensome requirements of this statute. Establishing this 
regime will have the additional benefit of allowing the Department of 
Justice to focus their limited resources in areas where they should be 
focused--pursuing those who harm children. This provision has been in 
effect for 18 years and yet has not been used. It is my hope that the 
Department of Justice, having obtained the amendments they sought, will 
begin to enforce the law and focus on those who harm children, and not 
on those legitimate businesses that do not.

  Other exemptions in the bill exclude from the recordkeeping 
requirements and annual certification regime providers of Internet 
access, telecommunications, and online search tools, as well as online 
hosting, storage, and transmission services, so long as the provider 
does not select or alter the content. It is ironic that the broadest 
exemptions are granted to the providers of various types of Internet 
and telecommunications services, even though the advent of the Internet 
is cited in the original version of this bill as greatly increasing the 
ease of transporting, distributing, receiving, and advertising child 
pornography in interstate commerce. Notwithstanding these exemptions, 
nothing in this bill can or should be construed to impair the 
enforcement of any other Federal criminal statute or to limit or expand 
any law pertaining to intellectual property against these entities.
  Regrettably, the core, bipartisan bill to strengthen State sex 
offender registration programs was joined in both the House and the 
Senate to unrelated provisions aimed at creating additional mandatory 
minimum sentences. I agree with the U.S. Judicial Conference and the 
vast majority of Federal judges and practitioners that harsh, 
inflexible mandatory sentencing laws are a recipe for injustice. In its 
letter dated March 7, 2006, regarding the House bill, the Judicial 
Conference, headed by Chief Justice John Roberts, wrote that mandatory 
minimum sentences undermine the sentencing guideline regime Congress 
established under the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 by preventing the 
systemic development of guidelines that reduce unwarranted disparity 
and provide proportionality and fairness in punishment.

[[Page S8028]]

  Mandatory sentences also tie prosecutors' hands in these cases where 
it is most important that they have the discretion to plea bargain, 
especially considering how difficult it can be to prepare children 
emotionally and psychologically to testify against their abusers.
  When addressing this issue in committee last year, Senators from both 
sides of the aisle agreed to limit the imposition of new mandatory 
minimum sentences to the most serious and violent crimes against 
children, rather than to myriad lesser crimes as was originally 
proposed. The new bill backslides from this agreement to an unfortunate 
extent. If we are going to establish mandatory minimum sentences, we 
should at least proceed in a thoughtful and coherent way, with some 
understanding of the range of offense conduct that may be covered and 
the sorts of sentences that are being imposed under current law. 
Instead, we simply pluck ever-higher numbers out of thin air. Congress 
greatly increased the penalties for most sex offenses just 3 years ago, 
in the PROTECT Act. Nothing has changed since then to warrant this new 
round of arbitrary sentence inflation.
  Another controversial measure included in the House-passed bill was a 
proposal to strip Federal courts of jurisdiction to review 
constitutional errors in sentencing that a State court has deemed 
harmless. The Senate Judiciary Committee reviewed this jurisdiction-
stripping provision last year, during its consideration of the so-
called Streamlined Procedures Act, S. 1088. That bill--and this 
provision in particular--was strongly opposed by a broad coalition of 
organizations, including the United States Judicial Conference. 
Following hearings, the committee specifically rejected this provision 
by adopting a substitute amendment that stripped it out in its 
entirety; the substitute then died in committee without further action. 
To include such an extraneous and deeply flawed provision in the 
current bill would have been wrong, and it is a credit to this bill 
that it has been removed.
  Another area of concern is a provision that was also included in the 
Senate's comprehensive immigration bill. The provision prohibits the 
approval of a visa application for the relative of a U.S. citizen or 
legal resident based on the citizen or resident's conviction for any of 
the sex offenses enumerated in the bill. This provision casts a wide 
net, and in many cases will harshly and unnecessarily penalize people 
seeking entry to the United States who have a family member in the 
country, but where the citizen or resident poses no threat to the 
individual seeking entry.
  The bill gives the Secretary of DHS discretion to assess these 
applications on a case-by-case basis and waive the denial, and I hope 
this will turn out to be more than just an empty gesture. Given that 
this bill greatly expands the crimes sufficient to deny an application, 
I urge the Secretary to give thoughtful consideration to each case in 
which a waiver is sought. In a case of a citizen who is on the path to 
rehabilitation or whose crime was relatively minor, denial of a family 
member's support would serve no rational purpose and would undermine 
the goals of family unity. I hope the Secretary will actively use this 
waiver authority to limit the broad reach of this provision to those 
cases where a citizen or legal resident genuinely poses a threat to a 
family member seeking entry.
  This legislation requires the Secretary of Health and Human Services 
to create a national registry of substantiated cases of child abuse and 
neglect which would, when fully implemented over time, serve the 
purpose of enabling child protective service agencies to identify an 
adult's past child maltreatment history in other States, without having 
to check every individual State child protective service central 
registry. Improving the ability of child protective service agencies to 
collect information on prior cases of child maltreatment by a named 
adult is a worthy objective. However, to rush into the creation of such 
a national registry, without deliberate consideration and evaluation 
first of the wide variation in how State child abuse and neglect data 
on substantiated cases identifies the perpetrator of the abuse or 
neglect and the specifics of their maltreatment--what the bill calls 
the nature of the substantiated case--would be reckless.
  For that reason, the legislation also mandates the HHS Secretary to 
conduct a study on the feasibility of establishing data collection 
standards for a national child abuse and neglect registry. Clearly, 
such a study should be completed before the Federal Government begins 
to implement the creation of such a registry and to collect registry 
information from the States. We need to know what we are working with 
before we create a system which might give the public a false sense of 
security or violate the due process rights of children and families 
alike. Caution is advised in moving forward on this matter in order to 
develop an information system which is both fair and reliable.

  The legislation also requires the HHS Secretary to establish 
standards for how, and to whom, this national registry information will 
be disseminated. In view of the sensitivity of this registry, which is 
to include information historically maintained only at the state or 
local child protective service agency level, I urge the Secretary, in 
consideration of these standards and before collecting any national 
registry data, to be cognizant of past congressional concerns related 
to the protection of legal rights of families, as reflected in 42 
U.S.C. 5106(b)(2)(A)(xix), and for a fair appellate process for 
individuals who disagree with a substantiated finding of abuse or 
neglect, as reflected in 42 U.S.C. 5106(b)(2)(A)(xv)(2). Both of these 
are provisions of the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act.
  Significantly, the legislation does not provide any new financial or 
technical assistance to States to improve or standardize their child 
protective services substantiated case recordkeeping systems, or to 
support States in the added burden of preparing for, and transferring 
data to, a new national registry. Not all States maintain the same 
registry information. Some States do not record registry entries by 
name of perpetrator but rather by name of child; some States no longer 
maintain registries at all. Most tribes, which are included in the 
legislation, maintain no registries at all. Without this important 
additional technical and financial assistance to the States, the 
quality of the information collected would likely be uneven and at 
times unreliable. This is a serious deficiency in the legislative 
mandate for the creation of a national registry of child abuse and 
neglect cases, one that I hope will be corrected through a targeted 
appropriation that focuses on helping State child protective service 
agencies upgrade their central registries or comparable systems of 
case-specific data.
  I am pleased that the bill includes my proposal to authorize grants 
to Big Brothers and Big Sisters of America and the National Crime 
Prevention Council. Big Brothers and Big Sisters provides valuable 
mentoring services to young people across the country, and supporting 
their mission is a valuable investment that will reap measurable 
rewards. The National Crime Prevention Council helps communities across 
the country understand and address the causes of crime. Grants to this 
organization help communities become active in crime prevention at the 
grassroots level, and encouraging their continued efforts is something 
we should all strongly support.
  I am also pleased that the sponsors of this bill agreed to 
incorporate S. 2155, popularly known as Masha's Law. This legislation, 
named after a Russian orphan who was sexually exploited by her adoptive 
father, will increase the civil statutory damages available to victims 
of child exploitation. It will also ensure that victims of child 
pornography whose images remain in circulation after they have turned 
18 can still recover when those images are downloaded.
  I am also pleased that the bill includes authorization of $12 million 
for grants to the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network, known as 
RAINN, for operation of its National Sexual Assault Hotline and for the 
other important work RAINN does to assist victims of sexual assault and 
to help prevent and prosecute sexual assault. I want to congratulate 
RAINN for recently logging the one-millionth call to its 24-hour 
telephone hotline.

[[Page S8029]]

RAINN, in helping a million crime victims, has not only made their 
lives better, but has also contributed greatly to the decrease in 
sexual violence in this country. I am honored that RAINN's founder and 
president, Scott Berkowitz, thanked me in connection with this 
important milestone for having supported the establishment of the 
National Sexual Assault Hotline.
  Finally, I want to thank the Vermont Attorney General's Office and 
other concerned Vermont officials for prompt and constructive comments 
on multiple drafts of this legislation. Vermonters have worked hard to 
produce and improve our State's sex offender registry program in 
ongoing efforts to make it useful to law enforcement agencies and the 
general public in providing information regarding individuals who have 
proved a demonstrable threat to the public. In light of the mobility 
inherent in American society, cooperation and coordination among the 
various States improves the effectiveness of each State's registry, and 
the Federal assistance this bill provides will enhance that cooperation 
and coordination.
  Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, I will seek recognition in a moment, but 
for the time being, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, I support the pending legislation to pass 
the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006. This 
legislation is named for Adam Walsh, a child who was abducted and 
murdered. Adam's father, John Walsh, has diligently pursued efforts to 
save other children from the fate which befell Adam by working to enact 
Federal legislation which will establish a national registry for sex 
offenders.
  The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children estimates that 
there are at least 100,000 sex offenders who are not accounted for by 
law enforcement. John Walsh estimates the figure to be higher, 
approximating 150,000.
  Statistics show that sex offenders prey most often on juveniles; that 
two-thirds of the sex offenders currently in State prisons are there 
because they have victimized a child. Compared with other criminals, 
sex offenders are four times more likely to be rearrested for a sex 
crime. It is estimated that some 500,000 children are sexually abused 
each year. According to Department of Justice statistics, child 
molesters have been known to re-offend as late as 20 years after their 
release from prisons.
  There are currently State laws which require registration of sex 
offenders, but unfortunately they have proved to be relatively 
ineffective, which requires the Federal Government to act on the 
national level.

  I first met John Walsh after the disappearance of his son, Adam, some 
25 years ago, when I was chairman of the Subcommittee on Juvenile 
Justice, a subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee. At that 
time, in conjunction with Senator Paula Hawkins of Florida, we took the 
lead in establishing the Missing Children's Act of 1982, which has been 
very successful in locating children, where, in a variety of ways--on 
billboards, on milk cartons, on posters--missing children were 
identified and publicized. Many missing children were recovered.
  In the intervening 25 years, John Walsh has undertaken a national 
crusade. He has been instrumental in advocating and persuading both the 
House and the Senate to move ahead with this legislation. He has had 
very strong support from the leadership of Senator Hatch, the former 
chairman of the Judiciary Committee. Senator Hatch has promoted this 
legislation, has initiated meetings, organized a meeting with John 
Walsh in the last several days in the Office of the majority leader 
where we organized plans to get this bill enacted so that it will be 
ready for signing by the President on July 27th, which is the 
anniversary of the abduction of Adam Walsh.
  It has been a prodigious job to get this bill cleared on both sides, 
not having anything added on to it, and many efforts were made so that 
it would be enacted in time to mark the anniversary of the abduction of 
Adam Walsh. For that timetable, Senator Hatch deserves a great deal of 
credit.
  As is well known, Senator Hatch chaired the Senate Judiciary 
Committee for many years. His leadership is still a very key factor, 
especially on this legislation.
  I compliment my colleague, Senator Rick Santorum, as well as Senator 
Kyl, Senator DeWine, Senator Talent, and others, for their support in 
producing this bill, which will protect children with the assistance of 
some 200 new Federal prosecutors, 45 new computer forensic experts to 
prevent child pornography, 20 new Internet Crimes Against Children Task 
Forces, and the Department of Justice's Project Safe Childhood Program 
and new SMART Office, which are both dedicated to protecting children 
from sex offenders.
  A special note of commendation is due to Senator Santorum for his 
work on two important components of the bill: First, on Project Safe 
Childhood and second, on the Safe Schools Act. These provisions and 
others will help stop sex offenders such as Brian McCutchen, who was 
sentenced last year to 35 to 70 years in a Pennsylvania prison for 
attempting to murder and rape an 8-year-old Philadelphia girl in a 
public restroom. He was a repeat offender. He had been convicted of 
assaulting a 9-year-old girl in a similar public restroom attack in 
Manayunk, PA, in 2001. Had the provisions of the law been in place 2 
years ago, the second crime might not have happened because the 
community would have been on notice of McCutchen's first attack on a 
little girl.
  I know from my work as district attorney of Philadelphia the impact 
of sex crimes on children. To be a victim of a crime is a horrible 
experience for anyone, but to be a child and the victim of a sex crime 
leaves an indelible imprint--hard to shake, hard to forget, traumatic, 
and of gigantic importance in the balance of that child's life.
  We are taking a very important step forward. I thank and commend John 
Walsh for his leadership and again thank and commend Senator Hatch for 
his leadership in the Senate on this important issue. I thank Chairman 
Sensenbrenner, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, for his 
cooperation and coordination, and also to the staffs.
  I will single out especially Michael O'Neill, who is chief counsel 
and staff director for the Senate Judiciary Committee.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, as far as I know, other than the few 
remarks I will make right now, I think Senator Frist is the only 
speaker remaining on our sex offender bill.
  I would feel bad if I did not mention a number of the staff people 
who have helped us on this bill. My own staffer, Ken Valentine, who is 
a Secret Service agent, has been serving as a detailee in my office and 
has really carried the mail on this like few members of the Senate 
staff I have ever known.
  Tom Jipping, on my staff; Dave Turk, on Senator Biden's staff, had a 
great deal to do with this, as well. Bradley Schreiber, with Mr. 
Foley's staff; Mike O'Neill, of Senator Specter's staff; Mike Miners, 
Senator Specter's chief counsel, crime counsel; Todd Braunstein, with 
Senator Specter; Matt McPhillips, with Senator Specter; Julie Katzman, 
with Senator Leahy; Bruce Cohen, Senator Leahy's chief of staff on the 
Judiciary Committee; Noah Bookbinder, with Senator Leahy; Christine 
Leonard, with Senator Kennedy. Senator Kennedy has played a significant 
role here. He was willing to withdraw the hate crimes bill so that this 
bill would pass readily through both bodies. I am very grateful to him.
  Reed O'Connor of Senator Cornyn's staff; Nicole Gustafson of Senator 
Grassley's staff; Sharon Beth Kristal, Senator DeWine's staff; Gabriel 
Adler, of Senator Dorgan's staff; Joe Matal, from Senator Kyl's 
staff; Avery Mann, from America's Most Wanted, who played a significant 
role here; Bradley Hayes, from Senator Sessions' staff; Lara Flint, 
from Senator Feingold's staff; Cindy Hayden, from Senator Sessions' 
staff; Allen Hicks, of course, from Senator Frist's staff; and Brandi 
White, from Senator Frist's staff.

[[Page S8030]]

  Of course, I would like to mention Michelle Laxalt, who took a great 
personal interest in this bill and from the outside helped us a great 
deal. We want to thank the National Center for Missing and Exploited 
Children, especially Ernie Allen, John Libonati, Robbie Callaway, and 
Carolyn Atwell-Davis, who has carried so many balls for us here, and 
Manus Cooney, who used to be chief of staff under me on the Judiciary 
Committee.
  And then I would like to pay respect to just some of the victims who 
really helped with this bill: Elizabeth and Ed and Lois Smart; Linda 
Walker, the mother of Dru Sjodin; Mark Lunsford; Erin Runnion; Marc 
Klass; Polly Franks, Patty Wetterling; and last but not least--really, 
really, we can never thank them enough, John and Reve Walsh.
  So with that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, the Senate is about to take an important 
step to improve the safety of our Nation's children. Very shortly, we 
will pass the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act, also known as 
the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act. I am proud to be a 
cosponsor of this significant legislation.
  The Senate passed an earlier version of this bill by unanimous 
consent on May 4, nearly 2 months ago. Since then, Senators Specter and 
Leahy have conducted bipartisan negotiations with the House, which had 
passed a different version.
  Today, I am pleased to say that negotiations have resulted in a 
strong bill that will soon pass both Chambers and become law. I 
appreciate the willingness of all Members to put aside unrelated 
controversial issues so that we could focus on the core purpose of this 
bill--protecting children.
  Next Thursday, the 27th of July, is the 25th anniversary of the 
abduction and murder of 6-year-old Adam Walsh. Since then, the work of 
Adam's father, John Walsh, demonstrates that a single person can make a 
difference in our country and our world.
  Following the tragic event involving their son, John and Reve Walsh 
founded the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. John 
Walsh's TV program, ``America's Most Wanted,'' has led to the 
apprehension of thousands of criminals. And now John Walsh has been the 
driving force behind this bill.
  The legislation establishes a national sex offender registry which 
will make it easier for local law enforcement to track sex offenders 
and prevent repeat offenses. The bill also authorizes much needed 
grants to help local law enforcement agencies establish and integrate 
sex offender registry systems.
  My home State of Nevada has been a leader in this movement. Our State 
recently made changes to improve the accuracy and reliability of the 
Nevada registry requirements. This Federal bill will strengthen those 
efforts.
  Donna Coleman, past president of the Children's Advocacy Alliance 
based in Henderson, NV, was instrumental in getting our State laws 
changed. She is another example of how one person can make a 
difference, and I applaud her work.
  Not all States have been as vigilant as Nevada, and that is a problem 
when sex offenders cross State lines. The bill before us will establish 
uniform rules for the information sex offenders are required to report 
and when they are required to report it. It will also give law 
enforcement agencies the tools they need to enforce these requirements.
  A number of Senators have been leaders in this legislative effort. In 
addition to Chairman Specter and Ranking Member Leahy, I appreciate the 
hard work of Senators Biden, Dorgan, Hatch, Kennedy, and others. I 
thank the majority leader for making this bill a priority. I hope the 
House will follow suit and send this bill to the President for his 
signature without delay.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Allen). The majority leader is recognized.
  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, 25 years ago this month, Reve Walsh took 
her 6-year-old son Adam shopping with her. They were looking for lamps 
at a local department store--a short mile from their home--when Adam 
was abducted. Sixteen days later, Adam's body was positively 
identified. To date, no one has been indicted for this horrific crime.
  As parents, John and Reve Walsh's worst nightmare had become a 
reality. As a father of three sons, I cannot imagine what pain this 
caused the Walsh family.
  Through their tears and grief, John and Reve Walsh transformed the 
tragedy of Adam's death into a lifelong commitment--a commitment to 
protect children from abduction, abuse, and exploitation.
  John and Reve have been on the forefront of most major child 
protection legislation passed by this Congress over the last 25 years: 
the Missing Children's Act of 1982; the Missing Children's Assistance 
Act of 1984, which founded the fantastic National Center for Missing 
and Exploited Children; the Protect Act of 2003, which established a 
nationwide Amber Alert network to coordinate rapid emergency responses 
to missing child alerts--and, most recently, the Adam Walsh Child 
Protection and Safety Act of 2006, which is before us today.
  This important legislation establishes a national sex offender 
registry, publicly available and searchable by ZIP Code; creates a 
national abuse registry; toughens penalties for crimes against 
children; and cracks down on the growing crisis of Internet predators 
and child pornography.
  John's and Reve's tireless dedication is an inspiration to parents of 
child victims and millions of American families. I am proud to have 
worked with John and the National Center for Missing and Exploited 
Children on this legislation. I am confident that the legislation will 
save the lives of thousands of children.
  I thank John Walsh, Ernie Allen, president of the National Center, 
and Carolyn Atwell-Davis, along with the rest of the dedicated staff at 
the National Center, for the truly amazing work they do, on a daily 
basis, to protect our Nation's children.
  In March, John came by my office to talk about the importance of a 
national sex offender registry. He told me that this was the most 
important piece of legislation he had seen in over two decades of 
advocating for children's issues.
  I promised John then that I would make passing this critical piece of 
legislation a priority. And I am proud to tell John--to tell our 
Nation's children, parents, and law enforcement--that the U.S. Senate 
has not only heard your concerns, but we are acting tonight to address 
them.
  The Adam Walsh bill--so named to honor the upcoming 25th anniversary 
of his death and the memory of other child victims and their families--
has many components designed to protect our Nation's children.
  First, the bill establishes a national sex offender registry. 
Currently, there are more than 550,000 registered sex offenders in the 
United States, and at least 100,000 of them are missing.
  Loopholes in the current system allow some sexual predators to evade 
law enforcement, placing our children at risk. While many States, 
including my own home State of Tennessee, have registries, this 
information is not always shared with other States. By creating a 
national registry, we are closing the loopholes that allow offenders to 
slip through the cracks. And we are encouraging law enforcement at all 
levels--local, State, and Federal--to collaborate and to share 
information.
  The registry will make it easier for law enforcement to act on a tip, 
to identify and intercept offenders before they can strike again, 
before they can repeat their crimes and victimize more children.
  The national registry will be publicly accessible via the Internet 
and searchable by ZIP Code. This empowers parents. It gives them the 
tools they need to learn whether a neighbor down the street has a 
history of sexual violence so they can protect their children from 
harm.
  Further, the bill increases the penalty for failure to register from 
a misdemeanor to a felony. It enhances registration requirements, by 
mandating that offenders register more often and in person, rather than 
by mail.
  By strengthening these requirements, we are sending a message loudly 
and clearly to sex offenders: If you don't register, we will find you, 
and you will go to jail.
  The bill also toughens penalties for violent crimes against children, 
including sex trafficking of children, coercion

[[Page S8031]]

or enticement of child prostitution, and sexual abuse.
  Another aspect of this bill is the creation of a child abuse 
registry. I want to thank Senators Kyl and Enzi for their hard work in 
helping to get this provision included in the bill.
  This legislation was recommended by Childhelp, a children's advocacy 
organization with whom my wife Karyn and many of our Senate spouses are 
proud to be associated.

  Every day, four children die as a result of child abuse, and every 
day Childhelp is on the frontlines working to prevent child abuse and 
treat victims of such abuse. They explained to me that while many 
States have child abuse registries, this information is not shared with 
other States.
  This is especially problematic with child abusers. They often 
relocate when questions are raised by a teacher, a neighbor, or a 
doctor about whether a child is being abused.
  By creating a national child abuse registry, we will tear down the 
information barrier and enable Child Protective Services professionals 
in different States to share information critical to child abuse 
investigations.
  The final component of this bill addresses the sexual exploitation of 
children over the Internet--and the growing crisis of child 
pornography, an estimated $20 billion a year industry.
  The Internet has become the anonymous gateway for child predators to 
make contact with children, to win their confidence, and to victimize 
them.
  Current data show that of the 24 million child Internet users, 1 in 5 
has received unwanted sexual solicitations online--1 in 5. And as a 
recent ``Dateline NBC'' series called ``To Catch A Predator'' vividly 
demonstrated, many of these cyber-stalkers are more than eager to trap 
their young online victims in a real-world nightmare.
  The bill provides additional resources to combat this growing problem 
by adding 200 new Federal prosecutors to prosecute crimes involving the 
sexual exploitation of minors; by creating 10 new Internet Crimes 
Against Children Task Forces, which bring local, State, and Federal law 
enforcement together to collaborate in solving these crimes; by adding 
45 new forensics examiners to accelerate processing of online evidence 
of child exploitation; and by providing grants for programs to educate 
children and parents on Internet safety.
  We must continue to do more to protect our children. American 
families should not have to live in fear of child predators lurking in 
the shadows of our neighborhoods or enticing our children online.
  I want to thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle for their 
efforts, for giving life to this critical piece of legislation. This is 
clearly a bipartisan, bicameral bill that has overwhelming support. I 
am pleased we were able to unite, Democrats and Republicans, in this 
body and, indeed, House with Senate.
  In the Senate, I especially want to recognize my colleague, Senator 
Hatch, for his tireless efforts on this bill--the champion, the leader, 
the one with the bold vision, without whom simply this would not have 
happened.
  I want to thank Chairman Specter and Senators Santorum, Kyl, and 
DeWine, for all their hard work on bringing this legislation to 
fruition.
  Also, I want to thank Speaker Hastert and Majority Leader Boehner and 
Chairman Sensenbrenner and Congressman Foley for their commitment to 
this issue.
  I urge my colleagues to join me in voting for this Adam Walsh bill, 
and look forward to a future that is safer for our children.
  Mr. President, I do not believe there are any further speakers on the 
bill; therefore, I yield back all time and ask unanimous consent that 
the Senate now proceed to third reading and a vote on H.R. 4472, with 
all of the provisions of the agreement remaining in place. I ask 
unanimous consent, after passage, that the title amendment be read and 
agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The question is on the engrossment of the amendment and third reading 
of the bill
  The amendment was ordered to be engrossed and the bill to be read a 
third time.
  The bill was read the third time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The bill having been read the third time, the 
question is, Shall the bill pass?
  The bill (H.R. 4472), as amended, was passed.
  Mr. HATCH. I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. FRIST. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will please read the amendment to 
the title.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       Amend the title to read as follows: ``To protect children 
     from sexual exploitation and violent crime, to prevent child 
     abuse and child pornography, to promote Internet safety, and 
     to honor the memory of Adam Walsh and other child crime 
     victims.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the amendment to the title 
is agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 4687) was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada.
  Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business for 5 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________