A Miami law is forcing many of the city's sex offenders to sleep rough under a bridge, reports Emilio San Pedro for the BBC's Americana program.
70 convicted sex offenders have ended up living in a makeshift tent city under one of Miami's causeway bridges because of a local law which prohibits those who have sexually abused minors from living within 2,500 ft of anywhere where children congregate, such as schools, libraries and parks. After the local laws were enacted, Florida's correctional authorities found there was virtually nowhere else for these people to live and began dropping them off at the bridge. Some of them have even been issued with driving licences with the bridge listed as their home address.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU),and others like Dr Pedro Jose Greer, the Dean of Florida International University's Department of Humanities, Health and Society- who believe the offenders have already served their time in prison and deserve the right to attempt to get on with their lives - the camp's existence and the desperate conditions there serve as a troubling reflection of the values of modern-day Miami.

This article is an adaptation of a feature that was originally broadcast on BBC Radio 4's Americana programme. Americana is broadcast at 1915 BST every Sunday on BBC Radio 4 FM.


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