Word: laws
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...soon as North Carolina's law went into effect in December, Katy Parker, legal director for the state's American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) chapter, started fielding calls. Offenders wanted to know if the law prevented them from going to church; pastors worried it would keep worshippers away...
Parker says the law was so vague that she couldn't offer advice, but she did put out the word to defense attorneys that should they wind up representing someone accused of breaking the law, the ACLU wanted to hear about it. Nichols' March apprehension is one of two religion-based arrests that Parker is aware of. (See pictures of spiritual healing around the world...
...others think the ACLU is missing the point. The premise of the law is sound, says Laurence Tribe, a constitutional-law expert at Harvard. "If the moment you enter a church you don a cloak of immunity from the rule of law, then churches would become sanctuaries for crime," says Tribe. (Read "The Vatican Rethinks Laws on Abuse...
Only time - and judges' decisions - will determine whether the new law bars offenders from attending any church (where children might attend) or just those with child-care facilities. What is clear is that those who hammered out the small print of the legislation are sticking...
...law is named for Jessica Lunsford, the Florida girl who was kidnapped and killed in 2005 by a convicted sex offender. Lunsford was born in Hoyle's district and attended school in the tiny town of Dallas, where Hoyle lives. He still talks to her father regularly; her cousin will serve as a senate page for Hoyle next year...