Baton Rouge Senator Regina Barrow will not move forward with a bill that would give judges the authority to sentence a convicted sex offender to surgical castration if the victim is under the age of 13. Barrow says she’s heard several different concerns, including what happens if the castration happens, but it turns out to be a wrongful conviction.
“The judge has decided to castrate them because of a charge,” said Barrow. “I said well there will just be something missing. But on the serious side that will be hard to deal with if someone was convicted wrongly.”
Morgan Lamandre is the legal director for a group called sexual trauma awareness and response. Lamandre told the Senate Judiciary C Committee that surgical castration does not serve as a deterrent.
“And in fact makes things more dangerous for survivors, because when you don’t have that as a tool to hurt survivors, you use objects, you use things that are more deadly,” said Lamandre.
Barrow says she’ll study the issue and plans to file a surgical castration bill for child rapists next year. Baton Rouge area Senator Bodi White says he’s watched video that sex crime prosecutors have where young children are raped and he can’t wait to vote for this legislation.
“I think people that are against your bill should have to look at that, it’s the most repulsive thing I’ve ever watched in my life, I went to the garbage can and threw up,” said White.
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