D.C. Sex Offender Registry Adds Searchable Map

The Washington Post's Paul Duggan has a story up detailing new improvements to the Metropolitan Police Department's Sex Offender Registry. The main addition is a new map that allows users find registered sex offenders within either a .25 or .50 mile radius of any address in the city. Previously, users could only search by PSA, or police service area. The map can be found at sexoffender.dc.gov.

In a brief test run, the searching function works well, with results displayed as clickable yellow dots on the map, in addition to showing a blue outline of the area searched. Once you click on a yellow dot, a window pops up with the offender's name, address and photo. One flaw in the design is that there is no function to close the result window once you've opened it, though clicking on one of the directional arrows at the top left within the map does clear the selection. Results are also displayed in a list below the map.