Plaintiff-Appellees David Millard, Eugene Knight, and Arturo Vega challenge the constitutionality of Colorado’s Sex Offender Registration Act (CSORA).
The district court held CSORA was unconstitutional as applied to the Appellees because the statute inflicted cruel and unusual punishment and violated substantive due process guarantees.
Additionally, the district court held that the state courts’ application of CSORA’s deregistration procedures to Vega violated his procedural due process rights.
Defendant-Appellant, the State, appeals from the entirety of the district court’s decision. Because the district court’s ruling contravenes binding Supreme Court and Tenth Circuit precedent, we reverse. Decision
Millard v Rankin decided today in the 10th circuit. Not a favorable decision. Hopefully can be appealed to the Supreme Court.
I read the decision.
Basically, the court is saying the registry is legit, and what the plaintiff is going through is no worse than what is happening elsewhere and has already been adjudicated as permissible.
Finally, it holds the state isn’t the one doing bad things, it is simply making information available, and it is the public who is doing what they do.
What the court ignores is that the harm is real. The suffering is real. The struggle is real. What is needed then is some kind of law that protects RSOs from added discrimination. While RSOs are not a protected class, the public perception that they always reoffend and the unique regard for SOs in society (unlike robbers or murderers) means they should be held in a class of their own. Added protections against discrimination in employment and housing would have the net benefit of facilitating rehabilitation and reintegration. Not to mention, the secondary benefits for family members.
I get the idea that a person who is convicted of an offense with a child should never be permitted to work with children in any capacity. It might be reasonable to restrict their interaction at a school. But unless a job specifically entails that kind of interaction, then a background check should come come back green, not red.
Employers and renters should be limited in how they perform background checks, so they only query a central database with limited information. Barring a sex offender from a job at a school or church sounds reasonable. Being passed over for a job at Home Depot sounds ridiculous.
There’s no reason why each offense cannot also carry some kind of tailored sanction. Not all RSOs are pedophiles or rapists. Some could be flashers, nudists, people who view pornography, or attempted to break the law in some foolish or loathsome way. But that should not result in facilitating additional public discrimination based on mythology or erroneous reasoning.
The harms are real, so something must be done. If striking down registration requirements isn’t a possibility, then the state should consider measures to protect those who are attempting to reenter society as better citizens.
Same song and dance Smith is the law of the land it’s civil not punishment. I hate this country with a passion and even if I wasn’t a registrant I would feel this way. Since I’m a monster in this country allow me to move and give up my citizenship; which I’m more than happy to do. Screw the United States and every institution of this evil corrupt country!!
Smith v Doe needs to be overturned. A bad decision influenced by poor statistics and worse judgement.
If the feds get their way, the punishment will be more onerous than simply mailing a form, like what was described in that case. Dual citizenship will need to be reported, we will have to report everywhere we go, and we will never be free from the long arm of the government.
What has to happen for this to be ruled punishment? Do the stocks need to come back? Do we need to be paraded through the streets? I am at a loss as to how this can continue.
If that’s how it has to be, we will continue the fight.
I contacted Ty Gee to see if they plan to appeal.
My fees challenge was stayed pending this decision. I might have to consider dismissing my case if they don’t appeal.
Of course, the registry cannot possibly be punitive because the (insert your state here) legislature says it isn’t meant to be punitive.
This decision seems to be the difference between judges who consider the law to be so many words on paper and a judge who takes into account the real world effects of those laws.
The purveyors of database will use every excuse to maintain their ungodly authority upon the government ” of the people . ” Ubiquitous nature or not the system is corrupted by profiteers.
The people know it and they will continue to protests and if necessary burn it to the ground.
@Tim in WI. May I ask you how did you come up with this data base theory. When I was in my criminal Justice Classes back in college still wondering about the vocation that many want to persue. Did we ever study to get caught up in this registry. One wonders fi many thought about actions.
Justice is as easy as one saying guilty or not guilty or do we all hide with second thought theories. I had an comment about this Mcenery, this presidents press secretary that I was ready to bring to ASCOL but I decided that that would not be wise to present on ACSOL and disrespectful in the issue we are all concerned about.
Even the sex offender registry can effect other aspects of life, government, political views, and is not just a one sided affair. Sure people will run the gamet with and say well we are doing these operations to protect. One can even wonder why some letters or e-mails if thats the case never get noticed and are brused under the rug so to speak.
One wonders if those without sin cast the first stone was a database theory or a dose of truth? Now isn’t government about truth and true justice or should we all stand up for life, whether its black lifes matter, killing babies as some view, abuse of power in many governmental forms or just be silent and be of good cheer. We all try in doing the best for our fellow man and we can all have mis-guided views at times and yes even government can cover up in many ordeals.
Many can case shadow’s and many can cast justice so who is mixed in this view or does “We the people” have any say today when government goes in a kayos. Should we call in agent 99.
They don’t consider residency restrictions as restraint.
That state doesn’t have the brightest people huh? I mean how dumb of a human being do you have to be to think that residency restrictions for people isn’t a restraint on their freedoms.
They need to get this case in front of people with some practicality in their brains.
I believe in other more civilized countries, this type of ridiculous reasoning wouldn’t work.
@Brandon, I’m not sure half the legislators that have voted for strict registry laws even agree with them. They just don’t disagree enough to put their job on the line. When I had to go through a treatment program years ago, I had to attend a quarterly workshop which normally involved a guest speaker. One time they brought a state legislator who had actually worked on the judiciary committee and talked at length about them. During Q&A he basically admitted that they weren’t useful but that if he took that stance he wouldn’t even get past the primaries. So while he wasn’t adamantly opposed to them he still thought they were useless but had to vote for them so he could continue his political career.
@ MC. You make a good point about these classes one has to go thru. I have even mentioned about my classes in this tug of war game of freedom and human justice. The overdog fights the underdog in this political pawn game. So were does that leave the sex offender, stripped of rights, freedom, having to ask premission to wear a mask before walking out his or her front door. One wonders how many sleeping pills one has to tell their PO they take.
Sure we all can talk about civil rights, BLM, Cherokee tribes, go back to the Rifleman days or Don King days of boxing promotions or live with a internet bible thumper type of knowledge. So where does one look for the brightest star in todays undercover-up ‘s.
The sex offender is a good issue starter or someone is not eating his spinish. I’m sure many don’t understand the values of life today or are many things played out in court procedures today.
Seems guessing games are for light weights or where is the heavypwweights today. Stand up is everyone’s right. One wonders today who studies to shw thyself apporved today in many matters. Wether its buying boot-leg wiskey from those moonshiners in WV,KY or carring it to the men in the California Gold rush days.
Seems people are so fixed and fascinated on this internet that that is the common defeensse today and the voice of reasoning has lost its power. In the end who brings back liberty and justice for all. Believe it or not this virus is hear for a reason that mankind has no control over.
When government usurps their authority in any matter some crazy and bias things can happen. United we stand or divided we fall its up to every one no matter what situation one is in to bring to the table justice for all.
Now we have to federal circuits (this one and the recent Michigan one) with two very different outcomes. NOW WHAT?????
Notice they didn’t mention Does v. Snyder even once, even though Judge Matsch referenced it several times in his reasoning.
If sexofenders really wanted to bring down the IML punishment BS all they have to do is follow the blue print Africa Americans have set.
In the very beginning of the civil rights movement people were to scared to stand up and speak out against LE and the government who oppressing them but when people started geting together organizing and protesting thats when they started getting the government’s attention and things started to change.
Sexofenders obviously have the numbers and the government knows this there literally afraid of a up rising and as the registry grows bigger the sexofender community grows bigger and Washington’s plots to contain them gets even bigger that’s why they keep adding new laws every day.
The government isn’t stupid they know this whole situation is a ticking time bomb that’s why their trying to relieve pressure by leting people off the register after years of proclaiming in the name of Public Safety life time sexofender registration is necessary.
If you don’t think the FBI is watching ACSOL Janice Bellucci and her team you are highly mistaken just look at all the hard work this organization has done for registrant’s in the state of California that scares the crap out of them their biggest fear is ACSOL.
They’re afraid of 100.000 sexofenders showing up at the state capitol demanding there civil rights they know that would change the public’s perspective on the whole situation and that would differently destroy lML.
The government uses fear to keep sexofender in line and their #1 fear tactic is incarceration everybody knows how prison gangs feel about sexofenders and there’s a 50% chance they could be raped and killed while in prison because every person forced to register in California knows the sheriff’s department turns a blind eye to sexofenders be attacked while in custody.
Good luck
“Today’s ruling is a major victory for public safety advocates,” Attorney General Hunter said. “Sex offenders are violent, and are statistically speaking, some of the most likely to reoffend. Online sex offender registries allow the public to know who among them is a child predator or has been convicted of rape. To hide this information in order to make individuals convicted of these crimes feel more comfortable is utterly irresponsible. Anyone advocating for this position should talk to victims and survivors of these types of crimes, who will forever remain scarred by these horrific acts, to find out why the registry systems are important.”
Wow! Ok… still using the old line, hook, and sinker
https://www.einnews.com/pr_news/524456255/attorney-general-hunter-comments-on-10th-circuit-ruling-colorado-sex-offender-registry-must-remain-available-to-public
Here are my thoughts after 24 hrs of digesting the bad news on a road trip to relax the mind and body from the world of today…
1) What are @AJ’s thoughts on this?
2) Based upon my discussions with some legal folks familiar with the 10th Justices, one of the Justices was already against this appeal from the beginning and a “reverse” vote. We don’t see what the vote count actually was in the end or a published dissent (obviously or if any), so the 10th is hiding behind this basic opinion piece regurgitating cases to fit a popular narrative.
3) The opinion author cannot get it right when the registry concept started in CA (1947) as mentioned here recently, not the 1990’s. (A ticky tacky point but if you are going to discuss the idea, discuss the true genesis of it and it’s growth since)
4) When will the courts mature into cogent thinking entities of today with today’s matters at stake with today’s realities when it comes to understanding not all intents are described accurately using ordinary English but do provide real punishments anyway and the public acts as they do?
5) Would like to know why the court did not address any of the Amici briefs detailing facts of today and other court opinions, e.g. 6th CCoA, etc, as @JDUtah noted, when writing their opinion here? They just fell into the shadow of other established cases giving them, in my opinion (and maybe their minds), solid ground to opine from. That begs, in my mind, “Why take nearly two years to reach this point and only provide this doc?” Seems any fresh law school grad new to clerkship could’ve done this in 90 days after oral arguments. Something is missing here. Judge Matsch is probably shaking his head in disappointment at his fellow jurists. Critical thinking appears to be MIA.
I won’t miss the daily checking of the 10th CCoA appeals opinions published page for the opinion, but it was part of a long established 18 mo daily routine. Glad I check here first for the scoop after seeing the opinion had been published so I knew what I was going to see (and easier to read on a phone outside of a gas station restroom when I checked).
Side note – Can anyone get this doc (I cannot) from Harvard Law Review: Prevention versus Punishment: Toward a Principled Distinction in the Restraint of Released Sex Offenders (https://www.jstor.org/stable/1342027?seq=1) An interesting first page clip to read if you are interested and should lead to more thinking on this topic.
The lower courts have to abide by Smith v. Doe, 538 U.S. 84 and have no choice until it is revisited or overturned by SCOTUS, which isn’t likely to happen to a satisfactory degree (even if it does get chipped away a bit without states patching the “loophole”).
The best bet would be a whole new attack by families of RCs who have well documented facts that prove the public registry is an excessive burden on spouses, children and possibly other friends and family. Then the government would have to limit the registry to a non-internet one that required “concerned citizens” to visit police stations, show IDs, state a risk reason, and then they could view the state or national registry, which is how it began in the ’90s.
“We are dealing here with legislation which involves one of the basic civil rights of man. Marriage and procreation are fundamental to the very existence and survival of the race. The power to sterilize, if exercised, may have subtle, farreaching and devastating effects. In evil or reckless hands it can cause races or types which are inimical to the dominant group to wither and disappear. There is no redemption for the individual whom the law touches. Any experiment which the State conducts is to his irreparable injury. He is forever deprived of a basic liberty. We mention these matters not to reexamine the scope of the police power of the States. We advert to them merely in emphasis of our view that strict scrutiny of the classification which a State makes in a sterilization law is essential, lest unwittingly or otherwise invidious discriminations are made against groups or types of individuals in violation of the constitutional guaranty of just and equal laws. The guaranty of ‘equal protection of the laws is a pledge of the protection of equal laws.’ …. When the law lays an unequal hand on those who have committed intrinsically the same quality of offense and sterilizes one and not the other, it has made as an invidious a discrimination as if it had selected a particular race or nationality for oppressive treatment.”
SKINNER v. STATE OF OKLAHOMA ex rel. WILLIAMSON, Atty. Gen. of Oklahoma, Decided June 1, 1942
https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/316/535
The key here is that the family is de facto listed on the registry as being at the same location under color of the same regulation, and has committed NO OFFENSE AT ALL. How that equal protection?
@ Austin. I feel sorry for the way military treated you and the reprocussions and what you had to endure. Banning someone out of the service is bad enough but government seems to want to make an example out of many of these ordeals. While these ordeal can effect anyone no matter what race or religous afficlation they are in. And yes even discrimination and homelife is bad enough it is a bit too much. The United States Government should be ashamed of itself. Much of this is ensnarement.
Sure A.D.A.T. and many of you all talk about this hyprocricy and it is that. Thats why speaking out is so important, Writing letters, etc. All I had was a potty tongue , their was no children involved. So who can tame the tongue. Even the bible can tell one that. So were does the sword of true Justice Come in.
Even many police will cover up their actions. And now we all look for positive answers to reason this out. I have no ill grudges against anyone but being taken advantaged of – is what it is untill it is – what it ain’t.
What Americans need to understand is these laws deal with regrants now, but will creep on your doorstep before you know it and then you can look as dumb as you do now. Wake the fuck up!!!
I’ve tried to stay out of this case issue that people are talking about with this CO: decision. I myself can’t even understand this myself. Excuse me if I’m not that bright at law cases. See I never looked at this with case reviews. The bible’s case reviews and examples are good enough for me. Even the bible says the wisdom of this world is foolishness to man.
While the bible says beware of the scribes and Pharisees. Seems like we are all smack dab in all this mess one way or another. So who’s playing with who’s conscious to put this mark on you. As Will Allen said its too late to think. Its never to late to use truth and understanding. Hey I wanted to go to court but one had to reason this all out. One wonders if more people are standing uo in court today than taking a plea deal from say 8 or 8 yrs ago. The courts know how to railroad people and I suspect many were railroad in this mess. True understanding will come out in the wash.
Yes we all try to find the answer, even the answer to make peace with each fellow person but remember Jesus came with a sword. So who’s playing the prostitute in this registry game while we all look to find a reason to understand to find the truth of this American Justice. Even Brandon says to wake up in all this craziness.
@Gralphr, the media wouldn’t even pick the story up unless there was no way they could avoid it. If they did pick it up they would spin the story as a bunch of pedophiles demanding they be allowed to hide so they can get at children undetected.
I guess more civil non punishment restrictions will be flying across governor’s desk across the country. Don’t really except freedom from a country that considers Saudi Arabia a friend. Buckle up folks it’s going to get bumpy as we continue whack a mole with the government and whack a troll online!!
The national office pub’d a good write up on this case which provides perspective on it if you are interested in some leisurely reading: https://narsol.org/2020/08/registration-not-cruel-and-unusual-punishment-says-tenth-circuit/
Contacted that ACLU of CO attorneys of the case on Thursday, still no feedback.
Just received word from CO ACLU, no en banc, no appeal to SCOTUS.