No child is truly safe these days

A convicted sex offender manages to infiltrate area schools, passing himself off as a 12‑year‑old boy.

 A New River man convicted a decade ago of sexually molesting a 15‑year‑old girl is behind bars again for allegedly molesting another young girl.

Three teenage boys allegedly engaged in sexual misconduct with 11 girls at a local middle school–in the presence of a teacher.

These incidents prove this much: No child is truly safe despite the extraordinary lengths our society has gone to over the past 17 years to protect our children and punish offenders.

Sex offenders were first required to register with local police starting in 1990 as part of Washington state’s Community Protection Act.

Four years later there was the Jacob Wetterling Act, which made it mandatory for all states to register individuals convicted of sex crimes against children. Two years after that came Megan’s Law, which required states to make personal data on registered offenders available to the public.

Most, if not all, of our institutions that hire people or seek volunteers to work with children conduct extensive background checks.

Predators, though, are exactly as the label implies–they are predatory.

They find new and inventive ways to slip through the cracks.

Having said all that, perhaps we need to reaffirm this much: The best protection we can provide our children does not come by way of new laws. It comes from attentive, involved and informed parents.