Deputies Warn Residents About Child Molester

RANCHO SANTA MARGARITA â€”  Sheriff’s detectives launched a door-to-door campaign here Tuesday to warn residents of a convicted child molester in their midst, in accordance with Megan’s Law, while urging them not to take vigilante action against their neighbor.

Beginning at 7 a.m., about 40 detectives fanned out near the 30600 block of Santa Margarita Parkway, passing out fliers about Thomas Lee Gering, 59, designated by the state Department of Justice as a “high-risk� offender.

When evening arrived, they redeployed from a mobile command center set up at a nearby parking lot to continue knocking on doors.

Gering, who owns a condominium in the area, was last convicted of a crime a decade ago, detectives told residents in one-on-one sessions designed to reduce any hysteria the notification might cause. He is currently not wanted for any crime, nor is he a suspect in any incident, Sheriff’s Lt. Ron Wilkerson said.

“This notification is not intended to induce fear; rather it is our belief that an informed community is a safer community,� the flier said. “Citizen abuse of this information to threaten, intimidate or harass sex offenders will not be tolerated.�

The flier, which under law cannot be duplicated or distributed without permission from the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, called Gering “a registered sex offender who has targeted adolescent boys.�

The notification met with mixed reaction in the clusters of peach condominiums and apartments that blanket the north side of Santa Margarita Parkway.

“It does bother you. But he’s done his time, and as long as he hasn’t committed any other crimes, you do have to forgive,� said Jeff Miller, 30, as he cradled his 9-month-old son and his 4-year-old daughter sat silent on the sofa.

Miller, who lives in the same complex as Gering, immediately showed the flier with Gering’s photograph on it to his daughter.

“We explained to her that he doesn’t look like a bad person, but he is,� said Miller. The notification has taught him to inquire with local law enforcement before choosing a new neighborhood, he said.

In a more distant apartment complex, another man who declined to give his name was far less tolerant.

“I’ll be looking for him,� the man said. “I hope they throw his ass in jail and leave him there, and I plan to see to it that they do if I ever see him around here bothering anyone.�

Gering, who has lived in the neighborhood for at least eight years, was not home Tuesday afternoon. A neighbor, Tammy Lachmann, described him as “very friendly, always talking to people.�

The Sheriff’s Department invoked Megan’s Law on the same day the Orange County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to devote more resources to tracking convicted sex offenders living in Orange County.

Megan’s Law permits law enforcement agencies to warn residents of high-risk sex offenders living nearby. A high-risk offender is defined as a registrant who has been convicted of three felonies, at least two of them violent, Wilkerson said. Gering is the only such offender within Sheriff’s Department jurisdiction.

The board approved $225,588 to fund the new Sexual Offender Notification and Registration (SONAR) Team, which will dedicate two investigators to interview, register, track and--if they are not in accordance with the law--arrest registrants.

The SONAR team will work closely with other Orange County police agencies and, at the request of those agencies, will also help track registrants living outside the sheriff’s jurisdiction, Wilkerson said.

The board’s action and the timing of the Rancho Santa Margarita activities were a coincidence, Wilkerson said, but both highlight the growing attention given to sex criminals in the community following the passage of Megan’s Law.

The door-to-door campaign marked the fourth use of Megan’s Law in Orange County. In each jurisdiction where the controversial law was invoked, community members rallied to oust the identified offenders from their neighborhoods.

Wilkerson said those examples led in part to the effort to limit the circulation of fliers to about 1,200 and to have investigators meet one-on-one with residents.

“We’re not plastering these everywhere,� Wilkerson said. “This is, we hope, a reserved approach.�

He added that abuses of the information given out under the law, such as duplicating fliers or using them to launch harassment campaigns, may endanger the law.

“It isn’t a tool to run people out of town, that isn’t the intent,� Wilkerson said. “It is a way for people to protect themselves against a possible threat.�

Wilkerson said the announcement followed a two-year effort to track down every registered sex offender in the sheriff’s jurisdiction.

In February, the survey turned up 83 convicted sex offenders who were not living at the address listed by the registry--a felony or misdemeanor violation for each of them, depending on the level of their original offense. The survey also showed that only one of the 600,000 residents living in the sheriff’s jurisdiction was a high-risk offender: Gering.

There are 335 registered sex offenders living in the sheriff’s jurisdiction, and about 3,700 countywide. Only 77 of those throughout the county are designated “high risk� and could be subject to Megan’s Law.