tad.dickens@roanoke.com 981-3236

Billy G. Perkins entered a Roanoke courtroom in a wheelchair. He could not hear well, and his mind was affected by dementia.

But Perkins, 71, is a sexually violent predator and will be subject to extreme supervision when he is transferred to a nursing home or similar housing, according to an agreement he reached with the Virginia attorney general's office.

That agreement makes him the second man in Roanoke to be classified as sexually violent under the state's civil commitment process, aimed at high-risk sex offenders nearing release from prison.

But unlike the first, James Rodney Lester, Perkins will not be sent to a state facility devoted to treating sex offenders upon release from prison. The attorney general's office asked for what it calls a limited commitment, which will place severe restrictions on Perkins. He was convicted 11 years ago of sodomizing a preteen boy in Roanoke.

He is the third person in Virginia to agree to a limited commitment, Assistant Attorney General Jill Ryan said after a short hearing in Roanoke Circuit Court. In at least two other cases, judges released defendants under conditions of monitoring and treatment.

Attorney General Jerry Kilgore has filed 29 motions statewide to have convicted violent sex offenders placed in civil commitments. Virginia law defines such a predator as anyone convicted of a sexually violent offense, or charged with one but found permanently incompetent to stand trial.

If a court classifies a defendant as a sexually violent predator, it can commit that person to a state mental facility until officials determine that his condition has changed enough that he will not be a risk to public safety.

Conditions of Perkins' agreement with the state include the following:

He must live in a closely monitored setting - probably a nursing home - where he will not have access to children and where no children will be left unsupervised. The state will inform administrators and staff and others who will see him regularly about "Mr. Perkins' history of sexual predation of young boys," according to court documents.

He must have no access to sexually explicit materials or unsupervised Internet access.

Perkins, an alcoholic, must participate in substance abuse treatment as well as sex offender treatment, though officials agree his dementia may limit his participation. He must participate in Alcoholics Anonymous.

A state probation and parole officer will monitor him frequently, as will others who live or work around him. He must have a chaperone.

He must join the Sex Offender and Crimes Against Minors Registry.

Also Thursday, the attorney general's office announced that it had filed a civil commitment petition in Martinsville Circuit Court against convicted rapist Robert Delano Jones, 42, who is scheduled for release in October after about 23 years in prison.