2-12-16 National:
With all of President Barack Obama’s posturing for criminal reform these past few months, to some advocacy groups, his signing the International Megan’s Law seems counter intuitive to reforming the justice system. President Obama signed the bill into law on Monday, which will require convicted and registered sex offenders who committed crimes against minors to carry a special passport when traveling abroad.
The law also requires the Department of Homeland Security to inform foreign governments when these select “covered sex offenders” are traveling into their territories. In response, several civil rights groups and commentators have come together criticizing the overreaching law for misrepresenting the statistics about sex offenders and endangering individuals on the registry.
The federal Megan’s Law, later a model for individual state laws with the same name, was signed in 1996 and is named after Megan Kanka from New Jersey, who was raped and murdered by a convicted sex offender living across the street. Her murder prompted lawmakers to pass the federal law that created the first public sex offender registry, allowing sex offenders to be monitored by members of the community.
The law is particularly relevant given that some sex offenders do travel abroad to exploit children in other countries. As indicated by the bill, child pornography and child sex tourism are international phenomena. International Megan’s Law would seem to provide another layer of provision and protection, since sex offenders will now be tracked and readily identifiable outside the country.
However, not everyone has been championing the law. Civil rights group for registered sex offenders California Reform Sex Offender Laws filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in San Francisco against Secretary of State John Kerry, Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson, and Attorney General Loretta Lynch alleging that the law violates the First Amendment, the Fifth Amendment, and the Ex Post Facto Clause. According to descriptions of the lawsuit, “A passport symbol that identifies an individual as a registered sex offender could place at significant risk that person as well as others traveling with them, including family members and business colleagues.”
Similar groups, like Reform Sex Offenders Laws and Florida Action Committee, have aligned behind the lawsuit. Citizens for Criminal Justice Reform in New Hampshire voiced its opposition to the law as it was making its way through Congress, contending that the law is “absolutely void of empirical evidence that it will promote public safety or reduce child sex trafficking.”
The concern for sex offenders’ safety may seem counterintuitive; however, it is also well founded. For example, according to the language of the bill, it doesn’t appear that there are any provisions that would monitor whether foreign governments share information about sex offenders with others outside the people who need to know. These are sex offenders who have been convicted of some of the most atrocious crimes. Could the American government control who has this kind of sensitive information? If not, does this law unduly put sex offenders at risk? Do we even care? ..Continued.. by Shafaq Hasan
February 12, 2016
Civil Rights Group Files Lawsuit Questioning Constitutionality of International Megan’s Law
August 16, 2011
D.C. Circuit Upholds Sex-Offender Registry
8-16-2011 Washington DC:
A federal appeals panel in Washington today rejected an argument that the District of Columbia's sex-offender registry is an unconstitutional example of ex post facto punishment.
The challenge to the registry was brought by Grant Anderson, who according to the panel's opinion is required to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life. A jury convicted Anderson in 1988 of attempted rape and other charges. While he was serving his sentence, the D.C. Council in 2000 passed its Sex Offender Registration Act.
Anderson brought the case pro se. U.S. District Judge Richard Roberts granted motions by the District government and the U.S. Justice Department to dismiss the case. On appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit appointed a student and professor from the University of Georgia School of Law to argue for Anderson as amicus.
The decision today from a three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit says the D.C. registry should be viewed as a civil system of regulation and not as an additional criminal penalty. The opinion notes, for example, that the registry is housed in an administrative agency, not in a court office or in an agency charged with carrying out punishment.
“We see no reason to think that the Council’s aim with [the registration act] was different from that of the many other legislatures that have passed similar laws,” Judge Thomas Griffith wrote for the unanimous panel. Judges Merrick Garland and Karen Henderson joined the opinion (PDF).
Griffith wrote that Anderson failed to support his other claims, including violations of the Fifth and Eighth amendments.
Ariel Levinson-Waldman, senior counsel to D.C. Attorney General Irvin Nathan, wrote in an e-mail today: “We are pleased that the court of appeals confirmed the constitutional validity of the Council’s regulatory law dealing with this important issue.”
A message left with Erica Hashimoto, a University of Georgia associate professor who handled amicus briefing in the case, was not immediately returned today. ..Source.. by The Blog of Legal Times
