CANON CITY, Colo. -- The first wave of sex offenders have been released from Colorado prisons, following a state Supreme Court ruling that their sentences have been served.

The 43 convicts, including child molesters and rapists, were given $100 and their own clothes on Tuesday.

The state Supreme Court ruled last year that some sex offenders were wrongly sentenced to lengthy parole terms by the wrong statute. On Monday the court voted 4-3 not to rehear arguments on two cases affected by the ruling. The decision affects more than 1,500 sex offenders.

Parole officers across Colorado on Tuesday notified 155 sex offenders that they no longer are on parole. Department of Corrections officials also began releasing 116 sex offenders who violated parole that they not have served.

Thirteen prisons from Sterling to Canon City freed sex offenders, according to DOC records.

Colorado Supreme Court justices ruled last year that for sex offenders convicted from 1993 to mid-1996, a parole term could not exceed the unserved part of the maximum sentence imposed, or five years.

A second ruling applied to offenders convicted from mid-1996 to late 1998. That ruling said a parole term could be no longer than the remainder of the maximum prison sentence imposed.

Newly released convicts have 72 hours to register as sex offenders.

The mass release angered some rape victims, said Kathie Kramer, spokeswoman for the Rape Assistance and Awareness Program.

"We always are going to put the community at risk when we release convicted sex offenders," she said.

Convicted child molester Kenneth Hoover was among those released, eight months past when he should have been freed, he said.

He hated prison and will never re-offend, he said.

"I went to the sheriff's office today and registered," Hoover said. "I'm just going to try to hide out in my own little world."