Last month the San Francisco Chronicle published an article by staff writer Jaxon Van Derbeken that really should be read by every law enforcement official in the country, “Cops searched home, but didn’t see . . . .”

Briefly, Van Derbeken explains that Philip Garrido was fairly continuously in contact with authorities from at least 1976 until his arrest last month. He was a known, violent, sex offender. He was on parole when arrested and regularly saw a parole officer. Neighbors made several complaints against him. As a registered sex offender, in July of 2008 county authorities searched his home and property, saw a wall in the backyard, and didn’t bother to ask him what was behind the wall.

So, what are we to make of this?

I can’t believe that all of the law enforcement officials with whom Garrido dealt for three decades were remarkably stupid or poorly trained. Clearly, the law functioned as it was designed to do: for some of his crimes he was apprehended, convicted, paroled, registered, and monitored. At every turn, Garrido was afforded his Constitutional rights, as well.

But, the cops “didn’t see” anything wrong in the household. They saw an orderly household with an elderly mother and a respectable-looking wife – even after neighbors told them there was something very wrong with it.

Garrido’s wife apparently posed as the 11 and 15-year-olds’ mother: no one wondered why they were blond but she is brunette and in her mid fifties. I suppose it’s fairly common these days for women in their forties to have children, but this didn’t even raise an eyebrow although the woman was married to a registered sex offender.

Garrido frequently took his young daughters out of the house with him to distribute “religious” literature. “Reasonable people” such as customers of the Garrido printing business, thought the girls were “cute” and behaved quite normally. Then there’s the way Garrido is said to have heard God speak to him from a box and the way he rambled incoherently in public: did these witnesses who saw nothing ever wonder why the girls were cheerful even though their dad was obviously insane?

One woman even went so far as to tell the CBS Early Show that she thought Garrido’s victims should “step forward” and clear both Garrido’s name and hers (she apparently visited in the Garrido home and knew the children). This woman’s reaction is so inappropriate it boggles the mind, doesn’t it?

I’d really like to know how something like this could happen in an era when no one has any privacy any more.

My credit card records document most of what I buy and where I travel; my grocery store “discount” cards record everything I buy to clean my house, groom myself, and eat. My DMV records – well – they know everything about my auto purchases and movements. Each time I pass through a tollbooth, my car is identified. Amazon.com knows what I read and consequently most of what I think. Google knows everything else there is to know about me. IRS … Social Security … passport … Do I have any secrets?

But Philip Garrido – a convicted felon and known violent sex offender was permitted to keep everything he did secret – even when he did it in plain sight and out in his back yard.