Broward Palm Beach News Blog

Sex offender Epstein: A long way from Pahokee

​Look at a map of zones where sex offenders are allowed to live in Palm Beach and Broward counties, and the picture bears a creepy resemblance to old-style European ghettos. A Broward task force took up the problem in July and found that a new proposal to prohibit sex offenders from living within 2500 feet of a school, park, playground, daycare center, or school bus stop would effectively eliminate anyplace for sex offenders to live in unincorporated Broward County. Similar ordinances have created enclaves of homeless sex offenders living under bridges like the one under Miami's Julia Tuttle Causeway.

But if you happen to be a fabulously rich sex offender, like billionaire *Jeffrey Epstein (Epstein was given a slap on the wrist for his assignations with 14-year-old "prostitutes" --  his plea deal will be unsealed and released next week), you'll have no problem moving into a manse with an ocean view just about anywhere on the island of Palm Beach. That long strip of insanely valuable land separated from the rest of us by the intracostal is a predator's playground.

Maps like this one published in the Sun-Sentinel show Palm Beach as an almost uniformly red zone, meaning offenders can live there legally. Just about the only area closed to predators on the island is at the very tip of the north end, the heel of the boot, and in the downtown commercial district.

Sex offenders on tighter budgets have less room to romp. They're crammed together in neighborhoods like this one in Pahokee, where more than 30 offenders have moved -- so many that school bus routes have had to be diverted.

*UPDATE: The Palm Beach Daily News reported yesterday that Epstein was fined for walking out of a deposition last Wednesday. He was apparently put off by a question about the shape of his penis. The penis in question is reportedly egg-shaped. Eeewww.