Case ID: f-appx_557/html/0579-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Craig C. HOWELL, Defendant-Appellant.
    No. 14-1367.
    United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.
    Submitted June 5, 2014.
    Decided June 5, 2014.
    Gregory Harris, Office of the United States Attorney, Springfield, IL, D. Gregory Weddle, Attorney, Office of the United States Attorney, Rock Island, IL, for Plaintiff-Appellee.
    Peter W. Henderson, Attorney, Office of the Federal Public Defender, Urbana, IL, for Defendant-Appellant.
    Before DIANE P. WOOD, Chief Judge, FRANK H. EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge and MICHAEL S. KANNE, Circuit Judge.
   Order

Craig Howell has been convicted of failing to register as a sex offender after moving from one state to another. His appeal presents two arguments.

First, he contends that 18 U.S.C. § 2250 (SORNA), which establishes the registration requirement, exceeds the national government’s power under the Commerce Clause. This court has held otherwise. United States v. Vasquez, 611 F.3d 325, 330-31 (7th Cir.2010); United States v. Sanders, 622 F.3d 779 (7th Cir.2010); United States v. Kendrick, 647 F.3d 732, 734 (7th Cir.2011). Howell contends that National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, — U.S.-, 132 S.Ct. 2566, 183 L.Ed.2d 450 (2012), calls these decisions into question. Not so. National Federation concluded that the Commerce Clause does not afford much scope for the regulation of inactivity. Id. at 2587. Howell, by contrast, moved from one state to another without fulfilling the conditions the statute set for that activity; regulation of the circumstances under which interstate travel occurs lies at the core of the national power under the Commerce Clause. See, e.g., United States v. E.C. Knight Co., 156 U.S. 1, 15 S.Ct. 249, 39 L.Ed. 325 (1895). Two other circuits have sustained the validity of § 2250 in the wake of National Federation. See United States v. Robbins, 729 F.3d 131 (2d Cir. 2013); United States v. Cabrerar-Gutier-rez, -F.3d-, 2014 WL 998173, 2014 U.S.App. LEXIS 5203 (9th Cir. Mar. 17, 2014). No court of appeals has held otherwise.

Second, Howell maintains that 42 U.S.C. § 16913(d), which permits the Attorney General to decide the extent to which SORNA applies to persons whose predicate convictions predate its enactment, delegates impermissible power to the Executive Branch. That argument, too, has been considered and rejected by this court. United States v. Goodwin, 717 F.3d 511 (7th Cir.2013). No other circuit has disagreed; we do not see any reason to revisit the subject.

Affirmed