NV - Officials push to amend Nevada’s controversial sex offender law

Original Article

05/01/2014

By YESENIA AMARO

Nevada Assemblywoman Michele Fiore on Thursday said she would use one of her bill drafts in the next legislative session to rework the state’s controversial sex offender law that was adopted to comply with a federal act.

In 2006, Congress approved the Adam Walsh Act as a guideline for state laws on sex crimes. The act was intended to toughen punishment for sex offenders and make their photos, names and addresses available to the general public.
- Once again we have someone admitting the laws are all about punishment, therefore they are unconstitutional!

Nevada lawmakers in 2007 adopted most provisions of the federal law. The state law, proposed in Assembly Bill 579, was set to go into effect Feb. 1, but the Nevada Supreme Court put a temporary stop to it following a lawsuit filed on behalf of 24 unnamed clients.

It was not the first legal challenge the law had faced since 2007.

“I just don’t think that AB579 is fitting nor (is) appropriate for the state of Nevada,” Fiore, R-Las Vegas, said during a meeting of the Advisory Committee to Study Laws Concerning Sex Offender Registration. “I really, truly believe that we have very intelligent legislators and judges, that could bring forth this next legislative session much more comprehensive guidelines than what’s implemented in this” legislation.

The state law applies to anyone convicted of a felony sex crime involving children and is retroactive to 1956. There are about 3,000 registered sex offenders in Nevada, and that number is expected to dramatically increase under the law.

Susan Roske, an attorney with Clark County’s juvenile public defender’s office, said if the committee doesn’t make a recommendation to the Legislature to repeal the law entirely, an alternative could be to amend parts of the law that address juveniles.

In response to various states concerned about the federal act’s impact on juvenile offenders, the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering and Tracking has said juvenile courts can have discretion in keeping juvenile offenders off the public website that would display their personal information, Roske said.

The committee could ask the state Legislature to acknowledge those changes and grant juvenile court judges that discretion, she said. The change wouldn’t apply to juveniles being charged as adults.

“I would strongly urge that this change be made,” she said Thursday.

Tod Story, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada, said he would recommend the state suspend the implementation of the law and examine why lawmakers rushed to adopt it in 2007.

Thus far, only 17 states have passed laws which “substantially implement” the federal act, Story said. The remaining 33 states are either unable or unwilling to comply with the requirements.

“It’s a bad law and it wasn’t thought through,” Roske said.

OK - Third Circuit Upholds SORNA Against Nondelegation Challenge

Original Article

04/15/2014

On April 10, the Third Circuit upheld the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA) against an interesting nondelegation challenge - in U.S. v. Cooper. SORNA applies retroactively to sex offenders convicted before the enactment of the statute (the possible ex post facto issue was not part of this new case), and delegates to the Attorney General full discretion to create registration procedures for pre-enactment offenders). The court explains:

The statute defines “sex offender” to include individuals who were convicted of sex offenses prior to the enactment of SORNA. 42 U.S.C. § 16911(1) (defining “sex offender” as “an individual who was convicted of a sex offense”); see also Reynolds, 132 S.Ct. at 978 (noting that SORNA “defines the term ‘sex offender’ as including these pre-Act offenders”). However, SORNA does not set forth the registration procedures for pre-SORNA sex offenders. Instead, in 42 U.S.C. § 16913(d), Congress delegated to the United States Attorney General the authority to determine whether SORNA's registration requirements would apply retroactively to pre-SORNA sex offenders.

Only two Circuits (Ninth and Tenth) have not yet addressed this issue, and the Third Circuit notes that there seems to be a consensus forming on the point, rather than a split, though the Supreme Court has repeatedly denied cert in this cases:

Each of our sister circuits to have considered the issue has concluded that SORNA does not violate the nondelegation doctrine. See, e.g., United States v. Goodwin, 717 F.3d 511, 516–17 (7th Cir.2013), cert. denied, ––– U.S. ––––, 134 S.Ct. 334, 187 L.Ed.2d 234 (2013); United States v. Kuehl, 706 F.3d 917, 919–20 (8th Cir.2013); United States v. Parks, 698 F.3d 1, 7–8 (1st Cir.2012), cert. denied, ––– U.S. ––––, 133 S.Ct. 2021, 185 L.Ed.2d 889 (2013); United States v. Rogers, 468 F. App'x 359, 362 (4th Cir.2012) (not precedential), cert. denied, ––– U.S. ––––, 133 S.Ct. 157, 184 L.Ed.2d 78 (2012); United States v. Felts, 674 F.3d 599, 606 (6th Cir.2012); United States v. Guzman, 591 F.3d 83, 92–93 (2d Cir.2010), cert. denied, 130 S.Ct. 3487 (2010); United States v. Whaley, 577 F.3d 254, 263–64 (5th Cir.2009); United States v. Ambert, 561 F.3d 1202, 1213–14 (11th Cir.2009).

PA - Overloaded, underfunded

Original Article

02/25/2014

In 1994, _____ strangled, sexually assaulted and repeatedly slammed a Montgomery County woman's head into a wall. He served 30 months in jail for his violent crime and was classified as a high-risk sex offender. As such, _____ was required, once released from prison, to regularly report his whereabouts to the state's sex offender registry, a requirement of Megan's Law.

It's good to know that between 96 and 97 percent of Megan's Law offenders comply with its requirements, as reported in our Sunday story. The flip side is that about 3.5 percent don't. That means of the current 15,802 offenders who are entered in the registry, 556 have fallen off the radar screen. In other words, nobody knows where they are. At least nobody in law enforcement.

This list includes _____.

What's worrisome is that more than a year lapsed before state officials asked local police in Tinicum, where _____ last reported residing, to verify that the violent ex-offender still lived there.

This gap between disappearance and detection speaks to flaws in a system that nonetheless is pretty effective. A 97 percent success rate is an A-plus by most anybody's measurement. Still, the system will have failed — utterly and tragically — anybody who might become a victim of one of those fugitive 556.

If you take time to dissect our comprehensive report, one thing is clear: The system is overloaded and undermanned. Indeed, a recent federal study suggests the expansion of offenses requiring registration under the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA) has grown the list of offenders beyond current capacity to track all who require tracking.

We're not legal experts, but we question why people convicted of "interfering with custody of a child" or "invasion of privacy" or several other offenses falling under the Tier 1 category of the law would require tracking as sex offenders. It's why Montgomery County state Sen. Stewart Greenleaf, R-12, who introduced the Megan's Law legislation in the Senate, voted against the SORNA expansion.

"Part of the problem is continuing to add people to the list. As a result," Greenleaf said, "we have created a bureaucracy that is not sustainable, and we're not supplying enough money."

Bucks County state Sen. Tommy Tomlinson, R-6, who introduced Megan's Law legislation in the state House when he was a member there, is less sure about causality but is certain lawmakers need to figure out how to fix the flaws, whatever they are. And he said he plans to start by requesting a report from state police on how the registry is working and how to improve it.

"These people need to be monitored all the time," he said. No argument there. Doubtless, getting the system to function at a 100 percent success rate is a very tough challenge. Failing to do so, however, merely invites tragedy.
- A vast majority of those on the registry DO NOT need 24/7 monitoring as you suggest!