Federal Judge, State Leaders To Meet On Sex Offender Program Fix

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- In June, Federal Judge Donovan Frank ruled that the state program which houses more than 700 civilly committed sex offenders is unconstitutional.

Judge Frank has asked top elected officials, including Gov. Mark Dayton and House Speaker Kurt Daudt, to attend a conference next Monday to come up with a fix to that program.

Among the issues the elected officials are expected to be discuss with the judge are releasing some offenders and housing others in residential treatment facilities. It's a fix that is expected to cost the state tens of millions of dollars.

A group of media outlets, including WCCO, is preparing to file a motion in federal court to petition Judge Frank to make the conference public. Constitutional Law Professor David Schultz told WCCO the public has a right to know what is going on in such a high profile case.

"The public should have a right to know what's being said and to be able to observe this proceeding because we are going to have the Governor and the major public officials in the state responding to the judge," Schultz said.

Both Gov. Dayton and House Speaker Kurt Daudt say they disagree with the judge and think that conference should be public.

The motion by media outlets calling for that conference to be open to the press and public could be filed as soon as Wednesday.