Teen taken off sex offender list

A teenager who challenged Illinois' sex offender law has had his name removed from the state's public registry under a provision allowing local judges to determine if youths are still a threat to the public.

The teen, formerly of South Elgin, had filed one of the first legal tests of the state law that requires juvenile sex offenders to register as adults when they turn 17, igniting a debate over attempts for rehabilitation vs. the public's right to know.

His case had been mired in an appellate court but ended in his favor April 1 after Kane County juvenile court Judge Wiley Edmondson granted a request to pull the teenager's identity from the state's public sex offender list.

The decision was up to the judge after state lawmakers last fall overrode Gov. Rod Blagojevich's veto of a plan that allowed county judges to say whether young sex offenders can be removed from the adult registry.

"This basically gives juveniles a chance to be productive adults," the teenager's attorney, D.J. Tegeler of Geneva, said Monday.

The teenager was 13 when he pleaded guilty in 2002 to grabbing a girl's breasts in a prank -- an agreement that netted five years of probation but kept him off the public's adult sex offender list.

When requirement to register as an adult took effect in 2006, two months before his 17th birthday, he challenged the law, or at least wanted to be able to withdraw his guilty plea.

When the challenge was filed, Tegeler argued adding the teenager to the public registry amounted to a scarlet letter and the teenager would face trouble finding employment, housing and an education.

The teenager's move faced opposition from public registration advocates who said parents had the right to know whom their children were dating or who lived next door.

The teenager is now a 19-year-old college student and, having completed his probation, is considered a low risk to commit a similar offense, Tegeler said.

The law requires teenage sex offenders to register as adults when they turn 17, switching their identities to a public list instead of a registry typically reserved for police, schools and day care organizations.

The legislature's vote last fall allows juveniles to petition a judge to be removed from the registry five years after being sentenced for felonies and two years for misdemeanors.