About two dozen registered sex offenders in ankle bracelets have started spending their nights sleeping at the corner of Northeast 79th Street and 10th Avenue in the northeast Miami neighborhood of Shorecrest, the Miami Herald reports.
Multiple campers said they were directed to the location by probation officers when they were released from prison, reports CBSMiami. Local lawmakers don’t want a repeat of the infamous sex offender camp under the Julia Tuttle Causeway of several years ago, and are considering filing a lawsuit against the Florida Department of Corrections.
“I’m shocked. It makes me crazy. We worked very hard to make sure this crap didn’t happen again,” Ron Book, chairman of the Miami-Dade Homeless Trust and a lobbyist, told the Herald.
The potential lawsuit could be on the agenda as soon as the city’s March 22 commission meeting, Miami New Times reported.
Sex offenders have had a notoriously difficult time finding a place to live because of the county’s rules. Florida requires that registered sex offenders not live within 1,000 feet of a school while Miami-Dade extended it to 2,500 feet in 2005. Miami Beach goes as far as not allowing sex offenders to live within that distance to any location where children are. This sent as many as 100 offenders to live under the Julia Tuttle Causeway, causing a "public health and safety crisis," according to the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida.
In 2010, the Tuttle shelter was broken up and the Miami-Dade Homeless Trust paid for temporary housing at apartments for those who were actively looking for jobs and housing.
WATCH: Newsweek reports on sex offenders living under the Julia Tuttle Causeway: