Woodbridge , Virginia ( CNN ) -- The police photograph is chilling . In grainy black and white tones , it shows 13-year-old Martin Andrews sitting in a makeshift box , his leg chained . The look in his eyes is one of fear , fatigue and disbelief . He had just been rescued from a nightmare . `` I was abducted by a sexually violent predator by the name of Richard Ausley , who had been twice convicted for sexually assaulting young boys , and he had taken me for eight days , '' Andrews recalled of his ordeal 37 years ago this month . `` I was left to die . '' As a survivor of a sex crime , Andrews is one face of an issue the Supreme Court will revisit Tuesday : civil commitment , which allows the government to keep sex offenders in custody even after they have served their sentences . Twenty states have such laws , including Virginia , where Andrews was held captive and repeatedly assaulted . CNN normally does n't name victims of sex crimes , but Andrews , now a victims ' advocate , agreed to tell his story . On the other side of the debate is the first sex offender released from Virginia 's civil commitment program , and one of just a handful nationwide . `` I served my time for what I did , and I did n't feel like I should be incarcerated again , '' said this man , who asked that his identity not be revealed for fear of retribution . `` It was a scary thing to know that you could be committed to a mental institution for the rest of your life . '' The man said mandatory therapy helped him , but he thinks that could have been initiated while he was in prison . There is widespread disagreement on whether civil commitment is a Catch-22 . In discussions of the effects of sex crimes , nothing is simple or dispassionate . The practice of confinement in mental hospitals or treatment centers for those with severe mental illness has been around the United States since its founding . Around the turn of the 20th century , many laws dealing with sexual psychopaths were passed . Over the decades , the laws were repealed or rarely applied . Then , in 1990 , Washington state became the first to pass an innovative civil commitment law specifically for violent sex offenders . California , Wisconsin and New York , among others , later followed . Such `` predator laws '' focused on risk assessment and prevention of re-offending . It is a concept that the general public may not be aware exists . The Supreme Court has upheld the use of such laws when the individual goal is rehabilitation , not further `` punishment . '' But it has another , broader purpose . `` The primary goal is incapacitation , that is , protecting society from people who are predicted to be dangerous in the future , '' said Eric Janus , author of `` Failure to Protect '' and dean at William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul , Minnesota . `` The second goal is to provide treatment to these individuals . '' Critics of these programs say behavioral rehabilitation centers amount to prisons , are often overcrowded and understaffed , and rarely meet the stated goal of treating the `` worst of the worst '' offenders to the point they can rejoin society . `` The evidence is showing that it 's only becoming a detainment center for people they do not went on the streets , '' said Derek Logue , a sex offender who was released and now advocates for offender rights through his Web site , oncefallen.com . `` They have no hope of getting out , and the odds are stacked against you . '' According to Justice Department statistics , 20 states use civil confinement , involving about 4,000 rapists , pedophiles and other sex offenders nationwide . Estimates are that these programs cost taxpayers more than $ 700 million a year , almost $ 150,000 per individual . That is about four times more than confining them in prison . Virginia passed its civil commitment law in 1999 but had never fully funded it . Andrews found out from a reporter in 2002 that his attacker was just weeks away from being released after 29 years behind bars . Once a victim , now an empowered advocate , Andrews realized he had to act . `` I did n't know about other sex offenders . I did n't know about the extent of the problem . I only knew one , but I knew that one needed to be dealt with , '' Andrews , 50 , said from his northern Virginia home , where he works as a program manger for a defense contractor . State officials , he said , `` all told me there was nothing to be done ; he was going to be set free ; that was it . '' But Andrews mobilized , lobbying lawmakers to quickly fund the program , despite a budget shortfall . It worked , and the state has become a national model , using a tool called `` Static 99 '' that assesses which offenders qualify for civil commitment . Andrews ' attacker remained behind bars but was killed by a fellow inmate before ever going into the treatment program . The catalyst for the state 's change were once-dormant memories for Andrews , who now knew that he had to tell his story . As a teenager in Portsmouth in 1973 , Andrews was walking to the store in snowy weather when a van pulled up and the man inside asked the boy whether he wanted to earn some extra money moving furniture . Andrews agreed but instead was taken to a rural area and a metal box dug into the side of a hill . `` He looked at me , and he said , ' I 've got bad news for you . You 've just been kidnapped . ' `` What followed was days of brutal rapes and beatings . Ausley eventually left , and Andrews would certainly have died if some rabbit hunters had not stumbled upon him after hearing his screams . Andrews believes that civil commitment is not the best tool , but for the most dangerous predators , `` it is the only tool we have that is 100 percent effective , because they are removed from society . They are removed from their triggers . '' The case before the Supreme Court on Tuesday deals with a federal law that has kept as many as 77 inmates held in federal prison in North Carolina under indefinite commitment . The justices will decide whether the program enacted under the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006 is constitutional by infringing on a traditional state function . The law was named after the son of `` America 's Most Wanted '' host John Walsh . The justices said in 2007 that a Kansas law was neither double jeopardy ( second criminal punishment for the same crime ) nor `` ex post facto '' ( new punishment for a previous crime ) . `` We have never held that the Constitution prevents a state from civilly detaining those for whom no treatment is available but who nevertheless pose a danger to others , '' Justice Clarence Thomas said . Courts have since been at odds with what kind of treatment must be provided and to what extent , to pass constitutional muster . Janus worries about the slippery slope if such laws -- federal or state -- are allowed to continue without strong judicial checks . `` The main danger of civil commitment of sex offenders is that it provides a precedent for doing an end run around those governmental protections , and we all may be comfortable right now because we say , 'Well , this is those people . It 's not us . It 's not our rights that are at stake , ' `` he said . `` I think we all ought to be cognizant of the fact that these laws set a precedent that greatly expands the power of government to take away our liberty , not for something we 've done in the past , not after we 've been convicted and punished , but out of fear that we might commit a crime in the future , and this is a very very powerful and dangerous idea , '' Janus said . The white-haired man sitting with his lawyer outside Richmond says he is no longer a danger to society . He served nearly eight years in prison for molesting three girls and nearly five years in forced civil commitment . Despite that state confinement , including being the first of only about four men to be released from it , he says post-prison treatment helped him . `` I think that civil commitment is unfair , '' he said . `` I 'm not against treatment . I have done everything in my power to help myself '' understand the effects of sexual abuse . He said that being told just days before his scheduled 2003 release that he was being civilly committed left him feeling `` hopeless . '' Shortly afterward , the man castrated himself with a razor in his jail cell . After the transfer and years in the rehabilitation unit , he was freed and lives a quiet life -- albeit under constant electronic surveillance -- with no further reported incidents , says his attorney . Lawyer David Hargett convinced the Virginia Supreme Court that his client had a constitutional right to contest his civil commitment . `` I have found talking with people they are shocked to hear somebody can be sentenced by a judge , serve out that entire sentence and then say , 'Wait a minute , we 're not going to let you go , ' `` Hargett said , calling it a legal `` black hole . '' `` This treatment facility ... is a prison , let 's be honest . It has barbed wire and locked doors . '' He said most in the Virginia facility realistically will never get out . The high court case is U.S. v. Comstock ( 08-1224 ) .
Case on civil commitment often come before U.S. Supreme Court . Laws allows sex offenders to be held even after they finish criminal sentences . Law says civil commitment not best tool but effective for now . Critics of such programs oppose treatment programs similar to prison .