The Alliance for Constitutional Sex Offense Laws (ACSOL) is dedicated to protecting the Constitution by restoring the civil rights of registrants and their families. In order to achieve that objective, ACSOL will educate and litigate as well as support or oppose legislation. The ACSOL website and recordings are provided as a service to registrants, registrants’ families, and others for general information only. The information on the website and in the recordings are not designed to provide legal or other advice or to create an attorney-client relationship. You should not take, or refrain from taking, action based on their content. Prior results and case studies do not guarantee a similar outcome in future representations. ACSOL accepts no responsibility for any loss or damages that may result from accessing or reliance on content on the ACSOL website and recordings and disclaim, to the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, any and all liability with respect to acts or omissions made by registrants, registrants’ families and others on the basis of content on the ACSOL website.
Important News / Announcements
General News Feed
OH: Parent’s petition to “Stop Child Sex Offenders and Child Abusers From Having All Rights To Children”
[change.org - 11/30/18] "Im writing this petition because of the number of children that are hurt daily due to a failed judicial system and relaxed punishments for offenders. Plus I myself are going threw an custody battle for my daughter to try to keep her away from her father that has been convicted of abuse and sex crimes against his other children" Read the...
PA: Superior Court removes Allegheny County judge from sex offender’s resentencing
The state Superior Court, in a rare move Wednesday, ordered Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Donna Jo McDaniel to be removed from a case, finding that there was “substantial evidence” that she “demonstrated bias and personal animus” against both the defendant and the public defender’s office representing him. Full Article Follow-Up: Allegheny County judge ordered removed by Superior Court from sex offender case recuses
VA: Father of 5 says life on sex offender registry has forced him and his family into homelessness
Many people may be unconcerned with what someone on the registry goes through, but William Walker said he hopes by sharing details of his arrest and the collateral damage it’s causing his kids, someone will rent him a place to live. Full Article
ACSOL Meeting in San Diego on Sat, December 8
ACSOL’s upcoming meeting in San Diego is as follows Saturday, December 8 10 am 350 Cedar Street Lecture Hall #2 San Diego, CA 92101 Registrants, friends and family and interested service providers are invited to attend these free meetings. There will be no law enforcement or media present in order to protect everyone’s privacy. The meetings start at 10 am and last about 2-3...
CA: Abused then arrested: inside California’s crackdown on sex work
[theguardian.com - 11/28/18\ Willia will never forget the feeling of police officers’ hands on her body. The 37-year-old Sacramento woman says she can’t escape memories of policemen following her down the street or questioning her choice of clothing, scolding her for being outside, threatening her, grabbing her, forcing her into their car, and searching her. Willia is a survivor of abuse and sexual exploitation....
CA: Changing Minds: Master student’s thesis challenges views on sex offender laws
A California law that will go into effect in 2021 is set to bring about the most sweeping changes ever to sex offender laws in the state. SB384 will allow most sex offenders to petition to be removed from the public registries in 10 to 20 years after they are released from prison, as long as they have not committed another serious or violent...
TX: Police, not judges, will decide if sex offender gets exemption
El Paso City Council Tuesday voted to amend the ordinance regarding exemptions issued to sex offenders. Currently, judges provide some sex offenders with an exemption to an ordinance which regulates where they can live. Now, El Paso Police will be responsible for issuing the exemptions. Full Article
Cotton wields sex offender report to tank prisons bill
GOP Sen. Tom Cotton is locked in an awkward fight with fellow Republicans over their push to change federal prison sentencing guidelines. And now he has a new attack line intended to make his rivals squirm: warnings that sex offenders could get off easy. Full Article
IN: Sex offender questions meaning of ‘obscene’
[tribstar.com - 11/25/18] When community corrections officers went to check on Nathaniel Bennett, who was serving an in-home sentence for sexual misconduct with a minor, they found a cellphone with videos of a couple having sex. The phone also had what was described as “selfies” of Bennett and about 10 pictures of a nude woman. The contents of the phone violated a court order...
UT: Most sex offenders will be released from prison – What Utah corrections is doing to keep you safe
The sex offender population at the Utah State Prison continues to grow at a staggering pace. In 1996, there were 248 sex offenders incarcerated by the Utah Department of Corrections. Today, there are 10 times that number, in the neighborhood of 2,500 at both the Point of the Mountain and the prison in Gunnison, making it by far the fastest-growing population at the prison....
Kat’s Blog: Lessons Learned
Our family member has been on the registry for a year. I know that in the grand scheme of things, that time is merely a drop in the bucket. We had no idea what we were in for. We educated and prepared ourselves as much anyone can before we started this seemingly endless road thru hell. Read what we could, talked to those willingly...
Belize Sex Offender Registry Launched
[sanpedrosun.com - 11/22/18] Belizeans authorized by the Ministry of National Security will soon be able to access the ministry’s new National Sex Offenders Registry. The Belize Crime Observatory introduced the new online portal to social workers, educators, law enforcement officials, civil rights groups, non-governmental agencies and other interested parties at a sensitization session at the Radisson Fort George Hotel Belize City on Tuesday morning,...
TX: Inmate claims God, dead mom, gave him ‘go ahead’ to beat sex-offender cellmate to death: report
[foxnews.com - 11/17/18] An inmate who allegedly beat to death his cellmate, an accused child molester, earlier this month in a Texas jail said “God and his mother” told him to do it because the man was “Bin Laden,” authorities said. David Faustino Flores, 42, was charged earlier this month with the murder of 76-year-old kiddie-train operator Clinton Don Simpson. Flores allegedly bashed Simpson’s...
NC: Process for adding out of state convictions to state registry is unconstitutional
[floridaactioncommittee.org - 11/23/18] In an opinion entered earlier this month. A North Carolina District Court Judge found the state’s process for adding people to their sex offender registry who had been convicted out of state, was unconstitutional. In this case, the plaintiff’s case was out of Washington State. He moved to North Carolina, where he was originally told he did not have to register,...
One Criminal-Defense Attorney’s Lament: Scott Greenfield argues that innocents are being sacrificed in the name of utopian causes
[theatlantic.com - 11/21/18] For more than a decade, the criminal-defense attorney Scott H. Greenfield has been writing about American law and culture at Simple Justice. Among the site’s readers are lawyers, law professors, judges, civil libertarians, and advocates of criminal-justice reform. What keeps me coming back is his zealous advocacy for a consistent set of principles no matter how unpopular their application might be...
OK: Some law enforcement worry new, stricter law will discourage sex offenders from registering
A new law that further tightens restrictions on where sex offenders can live has some law enforcement agencies concerned it will discourage people from registering as offenders. The law, which went into effect on Nov. 1, added home daycares to the list of locations sex offenders cannot live near. Prior to that, state law already prohibited offenders from living near child-friendly areas, ordering them...
When stealing LEGOs adds to a lifetime of consequences
A petition argues that people seeking to escape the sex offender registry, including those put on it as children, deserve more than a single shot. Full Article
CO: Judge Matsch On SORA: Cut The Crap, It’s Unconstitutional [UPDATED]
UPDATE: Oral Argument - Thursday, November 15, 2018 - Courtroom III https://www.ca10.uscourts.gov/clerk/oral-argument-recordings 9/2/2017: In Millard v. Rankin, an as-applied challenge, Colorado Senior District Judge Richard Matsch rejected the pretty ribbons the legislature wrapped around the Sex Offender Registry Act. Applying the “intents-effects” test to the law, the court held that it was unconstitutional under the Eighth Amendment. Full Article
RI: Judge dismisses charge against sex offender
Recent misdemeanor charges against ____ ____, a registered sex offender who caused a stir among neighbors when he moved to Providence last month, were dismissed Monday in District Court. Full Article Related Statement by RI ACLU
Are Sex Offenders Categorically Unworthy Of Rights?
It’s bad enough, both for substantive as well as factual reasons, that the Supreme Court in Smith v. Doe held that sex offender registration was not punitive, but civil, and therefore beyond the reach of the Ex Post Facto Clause. Not only was it grounded in utterly baseless statistics of recidivism, but it indulged in the fantasy that rhetoric was an adequate substitute for...