Bermuda does not quite have the right handle on the treatment of sex offenders, experts say.

Clinical psychologist Wells Hively told The Royal Gazette that locking people up may protect society for a limited amount of time but a more effective alternative involved public scrutiny and supervision of the offender within the community.

His wife, Ann Duncan, a clinical psychologist with Ashton Associates, who also has a doctorate in law, lost her client to a three-year prison sentence last week. The pair have been practising in Bermuda for the last three years.

Dr. Hively says that the alternative to prison does not necessarily translate into cuddling child molesters.

"I'm advocating something which may be even harder (than prison) for an individual to take. I am advocating public knowledge," he said. "Light jail terms and no treatment is not helpful."

Dr. Hively is the clinical supervisor at the Family Learning Centre where his specialities include dealing with sex offenders.

Dr. Duncan deals mainly with their victims.

Researchers have found that treatment of sex abusers in prison is not effective, Dr. Hively said. "They could not really see that it affected the likelihood of reoffending. Treatment in the community is more effective but not the kind of traditional treatment we think about. It is certainly not enough to be put on parole and go to somebody like me once a week.

"What is needed is an intense community programme where everyone in the person's life is aware, including his wife, his employers... Everyone knows he is trying to change his behaviour and they look out for him. It is a full fledged community support system and the man has to agree with it. If he does, it has been proven to be effective."

He added: "You cannot learn not to molest children by talking about it and never seeing a child."

Such treatment would also include regular lie detector tests. "Questions like `did you have sex with children this week ?' and `did you have any urges to have sex with children?'."

He said while he had not had been involved in such treatment in Bermuda, the Island's small size meant that it was possible. "But as of now, everyone is very careful not to offend their neighbour."

Dr. Hively does individual counselling with sex offenders to help them devise management strategies and focussing on other, healthy ways for them to meet their sexual needs. "We work on his understanding of power relationships and judgment," he added. But he had no success rate data. "That's the problem. You cannot tell for ten years. You can say `so far so good' - as the man said while falling off the Empire State Building."

The community treatment model he described was an extreme form but could be adapted to suit the evolution of a particular community.

"It could be done in, not all of Bermuda, but just a part of Bermuda or a neighbourhood. I think the idea would be most intriguing and scary to most people."

He agreed that many would consider the community treatment option putting more children at risk. "That's the catch. That's why you have to be very closely supervised."

Dr. Duncan's client, a 40 year old married man with two young children had admitted molesting a 12 year old boy who came to his private school for lessons. She was hesitant to give her reaction to the news that her client will have to spend the next three years in jail. In the United States, where prosecutors often make their names by treating child molesters harshly and people are "violently opposed" to sex with children, the man could have been put away for 40 years, her husband said.

Attitudes in Bermuda differ in that "there's a feeling that it's not that terrible for a young man to have sex with a 12-year-old girl if the girl wanted it," he continued.

"It is a reflection of the culture's standard," was all Dr. Duncan would say when asked her thoughts about the punishment meted out to her client.

But while she spends more time working with victims and not perpetrators of sex crimes, she and her husband are both hoping that the culture's standard will evolve a bit more rapidly.

"The courts need to reflect in their sentencing the type of offender they are dealing with," she said. "That's a dream of mine anyway."

Dr. Duncan explained that there are four or five basic categories of sex offenders: "seducers," who are under the illusion that they are actually having an emotional relationship which is beneficial to the child, "regressed offenders", who only offend under high stress conditions such as losing their job, "impulse" offenders who take advantage of an opportunity and "predators" who stake out the child before making their move.

Little mention was made of Dr. Duncan's treatment of her client during the sentencing hearing other than his condition was treatable.

And defence lawyer Richard Hector did not call Dr. Duncan to testify on his behalf. The likelihood of child molesters reoffending is greater where the victim is male, a stranger to the perpetrator and if he has committed the offence before, according to latest research.

Re-offence is also more likely the younger the perpetrator is.