Convicted child sex offender Bill Fuery. Photo / Channel 9, 60 Minutes
Convicted child sex offender Bill Fuery. Photo / Channel 9, 60 Minutes
Where do you put the people whose crimes make society's collective blood boil and skin crawl?
In Florida, you put them in a caravan park with their own kind.
That's where Liam Bartlett went on Sunday night's episode of 60 Minutes and what he found makes for difficult viewing.
In St Petersburg on Florida's west coast he met with some of the convicted rapists, child sex abusers and child pornography addicts — and not all of them are sorry for what they've done.
One resident of the facility set up for the worst of the worst told him he sees nothing wrong with enjoying the images that put him there in the first place.
Others know they are sick and wish that help came sooner.
60 Minutes' Liam Bartlett said his visit to a caravan park full of paedophiles in Florida was "one of the most confronting places I've ever been". Photo / Channel 9, 60 Minutes
"I did what I did. I know why I did it. I know how I did it," convicted child sex offender Bill Fuery told the program.
"I know how I went about it. It was a set-up, a predatorial action. I was a predator. I did that."
He's glad he was put away for 20 years and he's glad he has somewhere to live now that protects the outside world from him and vice versa.
"I know before I got arrested, there were many, many times when I wished there was some help," he said.
"I knew there was something wrong with me but if I go in to a doctor, and say, 'Look, I'm thinking about molesting little girls', by law, he has to report me.
"By law, I gotta get locked up. So, the only way I can get any help is go out and hurt somebody. And I'm not blaming the system for what I did. Don't get me wrong. But wouldn't it be awesome, if you could just go get some help, before you let it affect another human being."
The facility was set up in 2009 to enforce Florida legislation forbidding convicted paedophiles from living within 300 metres of kids.
"Over the years, it's become a safe-haven for society's most hated human beings," Bartlett said.
Bobby, 79, is not sorry. Photo / Channel 9, 60 Minutes
He called it "one of the most confronting places I've ever been — a trailer park that's entirely inhabited by paedophiles and other sex offenders".
Bartlett spoke with 79-year-old Bobby who said he "doesn't see anything wrong with looking" at child pornography. But others are more open to getting help. They can't be fixed, but the hope is that they can be prevented from offending again.
"What we do need to do is we need to start getting the message out that if you do have these feelings, you need to be reaching out, and as a society, we need to be providing a safe place," Fuery said.
"And it's not about normalising paedophilia either. It's about just understanding you are the way you are."
