GPS tracking confirms, but does prevent, murder of teen by sex offender

Though GPS tracking might seem to hold great promise for regulating the activities of certain dangerous offenders upon their release from prison, this local story from Oregon highlights why this technology is not a panacea:

A GPS tracking unit that a homeless sex offender is required to wear corroborates his story that he killed a 13-year-old girl in a Hazel Dell field, investigators said today. According to a probable cause affidavit filed in Clark County Superior Court, Darrin Eugene Sanford was being monitored by the state Department of Corrections, and the GPS unit shows he was in the field when Alycia Nipp was killed Saturday night.

Detectives investigating the case identified Sanford, 30, based on descriptions provided by people who had seen him in the area. The affidavit says that when they questioned him, he confessed. He told detectives he met the girl near some vacant homes and walked with her into the field, where he tried to have sex with her….

Department of Corrections records show Sanford as a Level III sex offender — the category considered most likely to reoffend — and that he had been convicted in Clark County for communicating with a minor for immoral purposes.

Department spokesman Chad Lewis said today that Sanford had been on GPS monitoring because he did not have stable housing. Sanford also had been complying with requirements that he check in daily with his community corrections officer and pay court-ordered restitution, Lewis said. He passed at least his last two drug tests and there was no indication he had tried to tamper with his GPS locator, at least not recently, Lewis said.