Bella Vista Sex Offenders
By: Whitney Ray
Updated: June 25, 2007
As the population of northwest Arkansas’s newest city booms, so does the number of sex offenders calling Bella Vista home. Its a never ending job keeping track of the sex offenders living in the city. Detective Barb Shrum knows. It’s been her job for three years. When the detective began keeping tabs on sex offenders there were only 11 of them living in Bella Vista. Now there are 27.
One reason more sex offenders live in Bella Vista is the citys lack of schools. Sex offenders must live more than 2,000 feet from a school. There’s only one school in Bella Vista.
“Bentonville, Rogers, and Springdale are getting so many schools so the offenders are making there way further out and coming to Bella Vista where we only have one school." Shrum said.
Sex offenders are required to re-register with police every six months or anytime they move. When a sex offender moves into a neighborhood police take a report, complete with the offender’s picture and description of his crime, to his neighbors. When the offender is a level 3 or higher, police contact everyone within a mile radius of the offenders’ house.
