I am admittedly on the fence about this one. I personally wouldn't take any job that makes people think I'm out trying to have contact with kids for this very reason, but honestly, when would a person making a delivery to a back dock of a building have contact with anyone inside a school?The amount of coverage this article gives to this story is astounding.
https://www.nwestiowa.com/news/sex-offender-stops-school-milk-deliveries/article_7a34c080-5a16-11e9-950c-b344753d071b.html
Sex offender stops school milk deliveries
Mark Mahoney mmahoney@nwestiowa.com Apr 8, 2019 Updated Apr 8, 2019
REGIONAL—A registered sex offender is no longer delivering milk to three N’West Iowa schools.
Up until about March 20, Christopher James Driesen of Inwood had been delivering milk since last fall to the George-Little Rock and Rock Valley school districts and to Western Christian High School in Hull.
The 35-year-old Driesen had been delivering milk to the schools for Rock Valley-based Scott’s Dairy, which is owned by his father, Scott Driesen.
However, what the younger Driesen was doing is illegal, said special agent Scott Lamp of the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation’s Iowa Sex Offender Registry Unit.
By delivering milk to schools, Driesen — who had to register as a sex offender in Iowa for felony sex-abuse crimes against juvenile females he was convicted of 11 years ago in Sioux County — violated Iowa Code Section 692A.113.
Lamp described Iowa Code Section 692A.113 as “the exclusion zones law under the sex offender code.”
According to one part of Iowa Code Section 692A.113, a sex offender who has been convicted of a sex crime against a minor shall not “operate, manage, be employed by, or act as a contractor or volunteer at a public or nonpublic elementary or secondary school, child-care facility or public library.”
‘You can’t do that’
“In no certain terms, he cannot be an employee or a subcontracted employee at any time on school property, regulated day-care property or library property,” Lamp said of Driesen. “He can’t loiter within 300 feet of those properties.”
Lamp said a school district superintendent or a school’s head administrator may give written permission for a registered sex offender like Driesen to attend school activities, but not for employment on school grounds.
“A superintendent can write a letter for somebody that is a sex offender with a minor victim who wants to attend, let’s say, a Friday night football game,” Lamp said.
“Presence upon school property is for school activities,” he said. “Presence upon school property does not apply to employment.”
Lamp again referred to Iowa Code Section 692A.113, specifically pointing out that employment includes volunteering, according to state law.
“Volunteering means employment in the Code,” Lamp said.
In March, Lamp’s office in Sioux City received complaints through the Iowa Sex Offender Registry website about Driesen delivering milk to N’West Iowa schools.
“I had sent an e-mail out to a couple of different schools,” Lamp said. “I basically told these superintendents that if they know anybody that has these types of agreements, it’s done.”
He re-emphasized that a school district superintendent or a school’s head administrator cannot authorize employment authorization to a registered sex offender who has sexually abused a minor victim.
“If you have those agreements for presence upon school property for the delivery of milk, you can’t do that because the superintendent doesn’t have the authority when it comes to employment,” Lamp said.
“If you have those agreements on file, they need to be rescinded immediately,” he said. “You should do it in writing.”
‘Clarified expectations’
George-Little Rock superintendent John Eyerly confirmed that Driesen had delivered milk to what he called “non-student areas” at the district’s elementary school building in George and combined elementary/middle school structure in Little Rock.
“It was just right into the door of that lunchroom area and to a cooler and then back out,” Eyerly said of Driesen’s milk deliveries to George-Little Rock. “Again, it was just inside the door, bring it to the cooler and then out — not in any student areas.”
Eyerly spoke with Lamp for the first time on Wednesday, April 3, about Driesen delivering milk to George-Little Rock school buildings.
“He clarified expectations for schools,” Eyerly said. “He sent me the statute. The agent clarified the information about the statute and the expectations for schools.”
Lamp had sent an e-mail to George-Little Rock nearly three weeks ago about the Driesen situation, but Eyerly said he never received it until Lamp sent it again on Wednesday, April 3.
“He had sent it to other schools on March 19, but I didn’t get anything — and he didn’t send it to me,” Eyerly said, noting that Lamp’s e-mail had been sent to some sort of generic George-Little Rock e-mail address. “It never came to me.”
“He clarified some things back on March 19,” Eyerly said. “I wasn’t in the office on March 19, but when I got back on the 20th, I didn’t see anything like that.”
After his conversation with Lamp, Eyerly rescinded the written permission Driesen previously had been given for being on school grounds while delivering milk.
“I want to stress that at no times were there any safety issues for students,” Eyerly said.
‘In place of his dad’
From what interim Western Christian principal Harlan De Vries could recall, Driesen’s father, Scott, had a stroke last fall and was unable to deliver milk to the N’West Iowa schools that Scott’s Dairy serves.
“Chris came around shortly after that occurred and informed me that he was listed with the sex abuse registry in the state of Iowa, but wanted to know if I would allow him on the grounds to deliver milk to the school in place of his dad,” De Vries said. “We were trying to be helpful to the family.”
De Vries granted Driesen written permission in mid-October and Driesen started arriving between 5:30 and 6:30 a.m. to Western Christian’s kitchen area on the couple of days a week he delivered milk for the school’s lunch program.
“There’s never a student on campus at that time,” De Vries said. “The head cook, for example, has mentioned he oftentimes — if not always — had another adult with him, so that was somewhat reassuring to me, too.”
Driesen’s milk deliveries to Western Christian stopped as of March 20, when De Vries received an e-mail from Lamp that said what Driesen was doing was not allowed by Iowa Code Section 692A.113.
“That came as a surprise to me because I was not aware of that at all,” De Vries said. “Once I received notice of that, I issued a letter to the Driesens — to his parents — informing them that I had to renege on the letter that I had sent to them earlier and that he was no longer allowed on our premises.”
He confirmed that Western Christian will continue to receive milk from Scott’s Dairy through the end of the 2018-19 academic year.
“We’re contracted with them for the year,” De Vries said.
When asked to comment for the story, Rock Valley superintendent Chad Janzen responded in an e-mail:
“I don’t have any comment other than that we have followed all the directives of local law enforcement. When this issue was brought to our attention, we followed the directives of law enforcement.”
‘It needs to stop’
When reached by phone Thursday evening, April 4, Judith Driesen, Scott Driesen’s wife, confirmed that her husband had a stroke in October.
She said he has not been delivering milk since then.
Scott’s Dairy delivers milk to 17 schools in the northwest corner of Iowa.
When asked about their son Christopher Driesen helping out with milk deliveries to N’West Iowa schools, Judith Driesen said, “You know what? I’m not even going there, OK?”
She hung up the phone shortly thereafter, ending the conversation.
When reached by phone Friday morning, April 5, Scott Driesen said his family did not know that his son delivering milk to the grounds of N’West Iowa schools was illegal until recently.
“It was approved by his parole officer,” Scott Driesen said. “He got approved by the Lyon County Sheriff’s Department, Sioux County Sheriff’s Department and every superintendent in every school that I deliver to.
“Chris was only going by his parole officer,” he said. “He did everything he was supposed to do.”
Sioux County Sheriff’s Office chief deputy Nate Huizenga said his department did not give Christopher Driesen special permission to deliver milk to the grounds of schools in the county.
“Not that I’m aware of,” Huizenga said. “We never gave him any permission to do that.”
The sheriff’s office was only made aware of Christopher Driesen delivering milk to N’West Iowa schools by an e-mail from Lamp in March.
“We hadn’t gotten any complaints that this was occurring,” Huizenga said.
Regarding a registered sex offender like Christopher Driesen working in Sioux County, Huizenga said, “They’re required to check in with us if they’re working in our county.
“They have to know what their rights are,” Huizenga said. “They have to know what they can or can’t do. If they violate those, they can be charged.”
Lamp confirmed he spoke with Christopher Driesen on March 19 about him delivering milk to N’West Iowa schools.
“He personally knows who I am,” Lamp said. “He knows my status as a law enforcement officer assigned to the DCI, especially the sex offender registry unit.
“With that in mind, I had a conversation with him,” he said. “I said, ‘We’re hearing complaints. If that’s the case, it needs to stop — immediately.’”
Lamp could have arrested Driesen — a full-time construction worker, according to Lamp — on a charge of failure to register as a sex offender.
“It’s called an exclusion zone violation under 692A.113,” Lamp said. “It’s an aggravated misdemeanor for a first offense and a Class D felony for a second offense. It’s based upon the registrant’s criminal history.”
Lamp has been part of the Iowa DCI’s Iowa Sex Offender Registry Unit since August 2007. His territory covers 22 counties in the northwest part of the state.
He could not recall dealing with a similar situation like the Driesen one. Lamp has been in Iowa state law enforcement since 1994.
“It’s pretty explicit what the Code says,” Lamp said, though he conceded that Iowa Code Section 692A.113 “is not an easy read.
“It’s just like any other portion of the Iowa Code — if you want to read it, you might have to read it two times,” he said. “There may be some miscommunication on what a superintendent is allowed to do.”
