PREDATOR RUN OUT OF TOWN JUDGE ORDERS 'SURROGATE STALKER' TO STAY AWAY FROM CALIFORNIA KIDS.

Byline: BARBARA CORREA and BETH BARRETT

Staff Writers

Jack McClellan -- the self-proclaimed, high-profile pedophile -- flew out of Los Angeles on Friday hours after a judge barred him from coming within 30 feet of any minor child anywhere in California.

The temporary restraining order issued by Chatsworth Superior Court Judge Melvin D. Sandvig makes it nearly impossible for him to continue living in California.

In a telephone interview before the ruling, McClellan told the Daily News that his notoriety had led to threats and prompted him to decide to leave the Los Angeles area.

"I don't think there's anywhere I can go," he said.

The court order was sought by a Valencia attorney on behalf of his daughter after McClellan was spotted last month at a Santa Clarita bowling alley.

"The judge clobbered Jack McClellan," said a jubilant Anthony D. Zinnanti.

"Jack McClellan is not to be around any minor child in the state of California. He is not to loiter, follow, stalk, threaten, harass, shadow, photograph, anything. Jack, stay away from the kids, or you're going to jail."

The ruling Friday morning set off a feverish race by attorneys to serve the order on the elusive McClellan, who did not appear in court.

By midafternoon, Zinnanti had tracked McClellan to Los Angeles International Airport, where airport police pulled him off an American Airlines plane about to leave for Chicago, said attorney Richard Patterson, who joined Zinnanti in pursuing the case.

After being escorted back to the terminal, McClellan was served with the order and allowed to get back on the plane.

It was unclear late Friday why McClellan was heading to the Windy City, but he must return for an Aug. 24 hearing on a preliminary injunction, a step toward making the order permanent.

Nowhere to go?

In the telephone interview with the Daily News, McClellan said he had been thinking about leaving the Los Angeles area since the Santa Monica Police Department posted his mug shot online last week.

He said he might consider returning to the Seattle area, although pressure from parents there helped drive him from Washington state.

"I've been getting recognized everywhere now ... This guy on the bus threatened to mess me up," he said. "This car has been completely identified, especially with the Washington plates.

"I was thinking of maybe going to San Diego, but I don't think there's anywhere I can go."

McClellan said he spent Friday morning at the Culver City Public Library recharging his cell phone, which had been without power for two days.

He said that by the time he retrieved his voice-mail messages, it was too late to attend the Friday morning hearing in Chatsworth.

McClellan, 45, has not been convicted of any crimes relating to pedophilia, but he operated a Web site that listed and rated various locations for watching children. He also has admitted in television interviews that he is sexually attracted to young girls.

McClellan, who relocated to Southern California this year, said Friday that he lives in his car and collects about $950 a month in Social Security income for mental disabilities.

While McClellan's Web site has been shut down, Southern California parents quickly banded together last month after McClellan was spotted in the bowling alley and the children's section of a Santa Monica library.

In issuing his order, Sandvig went significantly beyond the attorneys' request to protect children in Santa Clarita from McClellan.

In their petition, Patterson and Zinnanti had emphasized they were seeking to restrain "abhorrent" conduct, not free speech.

"We left a big, open space for the judge to write in what he thought was just," Zinnanti said.

But some legal experts criticized the judge's ruling and predicted it would be found unconstitutional.

"There's no showing he's done anything wrong. ... You can't punish somebody unless you've proven they've done something wrong. You can't restrain them unless you can show there's a substantial likelihood they'll engage in harmful behavior," said Erwin Chemerinsky, a professor at Duke Law School.

Chemerinsky said that while society's concern over pedophiles is warranted, the order goes to "absurd lengths."

Bethan Tuttle, director of legislation and policy at the Washington branch of Mothers Against Sex Predators, also said the judge's order could set a troubling precedent if states begin to force pedophiles deeper into the shadows of society.

"As outrageous as his behavior has been, it doesn't warrant his expulsion from a state," Tuttle said. "He's not a criminal until he commits a crime, or there's legislation that formalizes society's objection to his behavior."

She said turning pedophiles into outcasts could backfire.

"The more you marginalize people, ... the more likely they are to actually commit crimes. They don't feel associated with the society that rejected them, so why keep society's rules?"

But on Friday, some Santa Clarita parents celebrated the judge's order.

Chris Campbell, who was at the courthouse with her 5- and 8-year-old daughters, said the order was a huge relief and reflected the community's stance against McClellan: "We're not going to take it."

And Jane Thompson, a co-founder of Mothers Against Sexual Predators of California, called the order a tremendous victory.

"Everyone was floored -- in a good way," said Thompson, who attended the hearing and was among mothers who in June began circulating fliers with McClellan's picture at parks in the region.

"I feel like it is evidence that stay-at-home moms, or moms in general, can make a difference in enacting social change."

Bill targets 'stalking'

Lena Smyth -- who formed the group with Thompson and is the wife of Assemblyman Cameron Smyth, R-Santa Clarita -- said the order is a victory for the organization.

Assemblyman Smyth has begun drafting a bill that would criminalize "surrogate stalking" -- providing information that helps pedophiles perpetrate crimes against children.

On Friday, Assemblywoman Sharon Runner, R-Lancaster, said she is working on emergency legislation that would make it a crime for any person to establish or maintain a Web site that gives pedophiles a way of locating and stalking children.

"We want to go on and get the legislation passed so that others like Jack McClellan cannot be surrogate stalkers of our children," Lena Smyth said.

"We know who Jack McClellan is -- now this goes beyond him and we want to continue the effort."

beth.barrett(at)dailynews.com

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(color) Jack McClellan, left