Retroactive enforcement of Tennessee’s sex offender registry law is being challenged in a federal court lawsuit that mimics a separate, successful appeal that led to the nullification of retroactive laws in Michigan. Full Article
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I’m not exactly clear on what the whole ex post facto challenge means, not only in Tennessee, but also Michigan. Are they saying that personal reporting, residency restrictions, etc, are illegal altogether, or illegal only when imposed after a previously imposed lesser registry requirement? Because New York imposes numerous reporting requirements, including those for internet use, so your doing multiple reporting in person. Damn, I can throw a lawsuit together in less than two weeks if the former is the case.
This is a very well worded lawsuit, and one that Mike R and others can benefit from when creating their own lawsuits.
In addition to it challenging Ex Post Facto, it also challenges Internet Identifiers, residency restrictions, travel restrictions, vagueness, and other constitutional violations.
I like how they were able to include testimony from an officer in a previous case to demonstrate how police don’t know the answers to simple questions and admit how they will just arrest sex offenders. Since it is costly to put together an investigation and gather witnesses to be part of a trial to show how vague restrictions are and how law enforcement doesn’t know what they are doing, I wonder if you can just include testimony from other cases or would that be attacked as hearsay even though it is on an official record?
Ugh…we need a single repository of the best ways to attack each constitutional violation so we don’t have to keep re-inventing the wheel when creating these lawsuits.
I just thought of something,
Even though this case challenges many things other than Ex-Post Facto, just like the 6th Circuit decision, once they rule that this individual should not have to register based on ex-post-facto, then they won’t rule on any of the other constitutional violations that would affect all of us who’s crimes were after 1994.
It’s a shame that once Ex-Post Facto is ruled apon that every other violation has to wait for another lawsuit where Ex-Post Facto is not involved.
Another federal district court lawsuit against the registry has been filed, this time in Tennessee (in the same 6th Circuit as the successful Court of Appeals case in Michigan).
The new case asks the Tennessee court to recognize what other courts across the country have increasingly found: that the nature of sex offender registration has fundamentally changed since 2003, when the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a registration scheme that imposed only “minor and indirect” restraints on registrants, and points out that numerous courts — most recently the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit — have now recognized that the retroactive application of sex offender registration schemes and their associated restrictions violate the constitutional prohibition against ex post facto laws.
Here’s a newspaper account from USA Today:
http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2016/11/09/lawsuit-challenges-tennessee-sex-offender-registry/93546842/
Here’s the full complaint
https://www.scribd.com/document/330569896/Tennessee-lawsuit-challenges-sex-offender-registry-laws#from_embed
***moved from General Comments – Moderator***
I couldn’t get past the spam to read the article! I will say, if anyone here is of the mind set to file a lawsuit personally, I’d be willing to contribute to the filing and other legal expenses. There’s just too much low-hanging fruit to go after to wait until someone can afford an attorney.
I’d just as soon do it myself with some help!
At least this suit may have a fighting chance…It is pretty well articulated and focused with enough evidence to show merit on this issues that they bring forth….Still didnt address right to reputation directly, hardly any evidence such as case law or other empirical evidence for the right to travel(understandably because I can not find any precedents or empirical evidence on this subject either), Nor did it challenge the justification of these laws that were based and justified by false statistics and myths..I dont know Im not going to criticize this any more it is by far the best suit Ive seen to date…..
Doe #2 v. Haslam is being merged with the original. That may slow the progress of the suits, but I would surmise it also adds ammunition to the argument.
https://www.pacermonitor.com/public/case/20552846/Doe_2_v_Haslam_et_al
–AJ
Hello,
I just ran across this article the other day and I really wish I had heard about this a while back. I will tell my story.
In 1991 I was convicted of 1st degree Sexual Assault in the State of Kentucky. They did not even have an SOR when I was convicted but I was 18 and stupid or I would not be on here telling this story. My sister, who bailed me out of jail when this happened, pressed charges on me for supposedly molesting my nephew. My mom was poor and could not afford an attorney so I was pressed with a public defender. My sister knew 2 weeks before I got arrested that I was going to be arrested and called me several times a day telling me that if I did not admit to this I would go to prison. I knew nothing about the law at 18. After I was arrested her and her husband were good friends with the jailer who would give them access to me 24 hours a day, whenever they wanted me so to speak. The whole time they were telling me say you did it and you will just have to see a psychiatrist and they will let you come home. So I tearfully went in and gave a confession saying exactly what they told me to “I did this im sick and I need help.” The first thing at that time i noticed that the judge told me when I first saw him I was facing up to 180 years for everything from child rape to sodomy!! The very next time I went to court I was looking at 5 years probation. My public defender advised me to take it, so I did. I then moved back to Tennessee and tried to put my life together finished my probation everything. Right before I was off probation the sex offender registry was put into place so we called the courts in Kentucky and they said I did not have to register, so I never did. I moved back to Tennessee and lived here for years. I would even go online and search my name on the registry and it would say nothing found. Years later I moved back to kentucky for a bit and checked again and still have the letter from the kentucky state police that I did not have to register there. I moved back to Tennessee again and I was not here for a year before I was arrested for not registering. I had to get an attorney and they got it knocked down to a misdemenor and I registered they classified me as a tier 3 so I can never get off this. My nephew who was the alleged victim is now in his late 30s and we are very close. My sister who I spoke of earlier was diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic before she died 4 years ago of a drug overdose so I am now seeking out a kentucky attorney to maybe help me get in front of a judge to get my conviction overturned my nephew even says he will take the stand that I never touched him. But according to tbi, until i can make something like this happen, I am on it for life this has been the only thing I have ever been charged with in my life. I was sentenced almost 25 years ago!!! Something has to be done. I wrote a reporter at a news paper my story and have been talking to him about publishing it maybe, but am afraid since any blow joe can pull up my address off the sor that I will be killed!! but we all should unite forces to get these constitutional violations to stop.
Sincerely David
This case is still ongoing. Counts 2 through 7 of the complaint have been dismissed. Portions of counts 8 and 9 due process complaints survive. Count 1 ex post facto also survives, and I think has a good chance of succeeding in light of Snyder. Michigan and Tennessee are both in the 6th circuit.
https://www.leagle.com/decision/infdco20171113e19
I have been Locked up for ten years for nothing because in 2002 I rejected a Plea bargain of “Time Served” to take my case to trial after passing a Voice Antilizer test and was told if I passed I would be released from all charges HaHa that didn’t happened I went to trial and when the ADA couldn’t win when the court went into recess and this is all on transcript he went into the jury room and presented repeated Testimony to the Jury by going into the Jury room with the Tv and Videotape statement of the alleged Victim which is in violation of Art 793 and Art. 831 . I had video tape of me and my children sitting outside the courthouse at the time in which the jury ask for the tape. If I was guilty of such a crime as this surely I would have jumped on the Plea bargain which at the time I didn’t know it would be a misdemeanor because it fell under the mandatory minimum of one year for the time I had spent of 10 /1/2 months in jail . this case was turned into a felony just because I choose to take it to trial so how can you turn a Misdemeanor into a felony just for exercising your right to a fair and just trial. now after spending 10 flat years in prison I continue to spend a living hell in public eye just because of me registering as a sex offender and I will bet you if I was to get all my rights back tomorrow I would be the best neighbor in the world so what has changed . people have a preconceived notion that when titles are placed on someone whether they did anything or not you are placed in a category of entitlement of being the worse person on earth just by words especially in small town USA where truck loads of country boys with guns try to kill you just for what they perceive or wrong information because you can say anything and people are ignorant or plain stupid to any facts about that person . rumors run ramp id
Curtis
Scott County,Tenn
I was arrested and convicted in 2002 and spent ten years fighting my case . I passed a voice antilizer test and both the Mother and daughter failed the test . I also turned down time served on a plea bargain to get two ten year sentences . the district attorney went into the jury room to get the conviction which he was losing in court because I was in another town witnessed by the states own witness because she couldn’t get her story right but she and the DA and the judge created a Miscarriage of Justice by stating to the jury at the start of court that by my mere presence I was guilty and I have that on my transcript . I was railroaded because i choose to exercise my right to trial. I went to prison for exercising my right to trial and upon being released I am still in a personal Prison in Tennessee because I can’t go no where and the town informant tried to kill me on my own property by trespassing to get to his property and when I confronted him he hit me which I have eight screws plates and rods in my neck from prison and I was remodeling my house and my dogs alerted me and when I approached him he had two pistols and when he hit me I threw the hammer down and whipped him with my fists and when his friends stepped in he finally got the gun to my head and pulled the trigger inches from my head and when the cops arrived they allowed them to get into ambulance and car and leave with weapons and arrested me for aggravated assault which in Tennessee there is a Stand your Ground law which I was in compliance so you have no rights when dealing with the public and your call for help falls on deaf ears . I did nothing wrong but defend myself and my friend which is old and the law never arrested him or charged him with anything and where I Live is 1/2 mile driveway in the Mountains and could be dead for days before anyone would know . I have never touched a child or done anything sexual to any human being but was accused by my brother-in -laws brother to extort money from me and they put his girlfriends daughter up to this because about three months prior I caught him at his house playing with the girls and before I went to trial he was convicted for carnal Knowledge of a juvenile and the DA knew this but never investigated . it took three months to get a statement which is on the transcript . where is the Justice . I need someone to direct me to the right people . I was a paralegal in prison for ten years and have went to the U.S.S.C. Pro Se Litigant under Docket No#10m20 and you know you have to go through Judicial, Legislative, and finally Executive branch which most legal attorneys don’t have that title. so if anyone has input on this issue or can guide me to freedom please contact me which you can find on the registry of Scott County Tenn Im not afraid
Tennessee man loses his argument that his registration is time barred
with this being in the 6th I was hoping that it would be a different ruling.