By Paula Tracy
New Hampshire Union Leader
CONCORD, N.H. — Parole and corrections officials said they are having an increasing number of problems with some mandatory parolees under the provisions of the new law known as Senate Bill 500 who have nowhere to go, but do not want to comply with the rules of halfway houses.
Alexander Grady, unit manager of the North End House, a halfway house in Concord, said sex offender Arthur Garneau, 61, is an example of an offender who is in a “Catch 22" because of the new law that requires all offenders to be released to intensive treatment nine months before the end of their sentence.
If they have no home they are being forced to go to halfway houses until they either find a home or complete their sentence.
And some would prefer to serve out their time in jail.
Yesterday, Garneau was before the board to complain he has arthritis in his hip and doesn’t want to go out in the cold every day to look for a job.
“Who wants to hire a 61-year-old sex offender when they can hire someone who is 20?” he said. “I didn’t mind it in Berlin,” he said of the North Country Corrections facility.
He was hoping he would be found in violation so he could be returned to Berlin for at least 90 days more.
Garneau was found guilty of four counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault on a 13-year-old girl in Nashua.
He received a 7 1/2 to 15 year sentence in prison in 2005. Because he refused sex offender treatment he was never paroled.
Under the legislation that went into effect this fall, Garneau had to be released to intensive treatment nine months before the end of his sentence.
But Garneau was homeless and his plan to move to Vermont to live with his sister-in-law still needs to be worked out with authorities there.
“We can’t excuse you from the rules. You have to follow the rules,” Parole Board member Megan DeVorsey told him, refusing to find him in violation so he could go back to Berlin.
Asked if he would at least try to find a job, Garneau said he would reluctantly “give it a go” but he would prefer to just “go back to Berlin.”
John Eckert, administrator for the parole board told Garneau that just wasn’t an option for him or for them.
“Probably we would have kept you (incarcerated) if it wasn’t for this new law, but we have no choice,” he said.
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