Three registered sex offenders have been arrested in New Jersey for violating
their parole by accessing social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook,
although a state’s new law restricted their use of the Internet, authorities
said Friday.
The sex offenders were discovered by police officials who
had set up accounts on the above mentioned websites, posing as teenagers, in
order to monitor them.
The new law adopted by the state in January restricts
Internet use for registered sex offenders who committed their original sex
crime using the web to lure their victims. The law does not involve computer
work done as a job or search for employment. Violators of the law can face up
to 18 months in jail.
Stanton Ulmer, 32, of Neptune, Felice Black, 24, of
Paterson, and Pietro Parisi, 34, of Westville, Gloucester County,
were all arrested, and detectives also confiscated their computers, a webcam
and a cell phone.
The State Police said the three men had set up accounts on MySpace
and Facebook under their own names, but they hadn’t been found guilty of any
improper behavior.
"We're not alleging at this time they were actively
engaged in any kind of suspicious or illicit actively," said Lt. Keith
Halton, assistant bureau chief of the Computer Crimes and High Tech
Surveillance Bureau, according to The Star-Ledger. "We're going after them
be cause they were engaged on these social networking sites."
Halton further explained that, even if the three defendants
were not involved in any suspicious activity, the fact that they had been
previously convicted was alarming.
The three were arrested after a four-month investigation by
the State Police Digital Technology Investigations Unit, helped by the State
Parole Board.
According to the Ledger, last year authorities found at
least 268 registered New Jersey
sex offenders with MySpace accounts.
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