Responding to an appeal by Santa Barbara County District Attorney Joyce Dudley, the California Supreme Court on April 23 issued a 60-day stay on the placement of a sexually violent predator in Santa Barbara County.
Dudley said she immediately filed the appeal April 19 after the Third District Court of Appeals in Sacramento denied her request to keep Tibor Karsai, a 58-year-old twice-convicted rapist, from being released into the county as a transient.
“My position was that it was in the best interest of Mr. Karsai and the community for him to have a home, not to have him released as a transient,” Dudley told the Sun. “If he’s going to be able to get the services that he needs in order to help him with his reentry and help him not re-offend, the idea of being a transient can never be good.”
Karsai was found guilty of rape in Santa Barbara County in 1974, and of kidnapping and raping a 16-year-old girl in Placer County in 1980. After being designated as a sexually violent predator and spending the last 14 years in a mental institution, Karsai was scheduled for release on April 16. According to Dudley, had she not appealed to the higher court when she did, Karsai could’ve relocated to Santa Barbara County as soon as April 23.
State law requires paroled sex offenders to be released into their county of “last known domicile,” but the definition of the term has been the a source of debate in Karsai’s case for several months. In November, Placer County Superior Court Judge James D. Garbolino recommended Karsai be released to live with his mother in a home near Blosser and Betteravia roads in Santa Maria. In response, the Santa Maria City Council adopted an emergency ordinance barring convicted sex offenders from living within a 2,000-foot radius of a school, effectively blocking the placement.
Then in March, after considering alternate locations in Placer County and Sacramento, Garbolino ordered Karsai released into Santa Barbara County as a transient, a decision the District Attorney’s Office calls “legally incorrect.”
“His domicile, in our interpretation, is the last place he lived, and the last place he lived was in San Luis Obispo County,” Dudley said.
Over the next 60 days, Dudley said the Supreme Court could ask for written briefs, allow both sides to present their arguments in person, or refuse to look at the issue altogether.
“In a case like this, the clock is ticking because, from Mr. Karsai’s perspective, he’s expecting to be released, so I suspect they’ll [make a decision] sooner rather than later,” Dudley said.
This article appears in Apr 26 – May 3, 2012.
