HOUSTON (AP) — A Houston-area judge has ordered that two violent sex offenders be placed in state custody once they complete prison sentences for sex offenses committed in other states after being banished from Texas.
A judge in Montgomery County this week issued the order for 58-year-old Melvin Cody Whipple and 44-year-old Lloyd Joseph Wilson. The Houston Chronicle reports (http://bit.ly/1u6SRxN ) the two were ordered out of Texas in 2004, an apparent violation of the state constitution, after completing prison terms for sex crimes.
But Whipple was later convicted in Utah of fondling a boy while Wilson was imprisoned in Virginia for raping a teenager.
The banishment order brought further scrutiny of a controversial Texas agency, the Office of Violent Sex Offender Management.
Law experts have questioned whether the judge’s order carries legal weight.
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Information from: Houston Chronicle, http://www.houstonchronicle.com
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