Judge urges review of 'civil confinement' program

In a ruling beginning to get notice, a judge said there are serious doubts that New York's "civil confinement" law is providing meaningful treatment for sex offenders or just ignoring them.

  Civil confinement, adopted nearly a decade ago, allows the state to keep some offenders imprisoned once their sentence is up. Supreme Court Justice James Tormey of Syracuse, who said he's handled hundreds of civil confinement cases because many are housed at a state facility in nearby Marcy, said in a recent case that state examiners essentially were going through the motions in a recent defendant's case and called their testimony about treatment programs "not credible."

 Tormey urged state legislators to review the law to develop serious treatment plans.