United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT

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No. 10-2131

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United States of America, * 

*

Appellee, *

* Appeal from the United States

v. * District Court for the

* Western District of Arkansas.

William Earl Mefford, *

* [UNPUBLISHED]

Appellant. *

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Submitted: March 28, 2012

Filed: March 30, 2012

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Before WOLLMAN, MURPHY, and GRUENDER, Circuit Judges.

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PER CURIAM.

Our previous opinion in this case, see United States v. Mefford, 417 F. App’x

586 (8th Cir. 2011) (unpublished per curiam), was vacated by the Supreme Court and

remanded to us for reconsideration in light of Reynolds v. United States, 565 U.S. ---,

132 S. Ct. 975 (2012). For the reasons discussed below, we remand to the district

court for further proceedings.

William Earl Mefford was convicted in Oklahoma in 1994 of sexual abuse of

a minor. On November 4, 2009, he was indicted and charged under the Sex Offender

Registration and Notification Act (“SORNA”), 42 U.S.C. §§ 16901-16991, with
failing to register as a sex offender after having traveled in interstate commerce, in

violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2250. Mefford moved to dismiss the indictment on multiple

grounds, one of which was that SORNA violates the nondelegation doctrine, see

A.L.A. Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States, 295 U.S. 495, 529 (1935), because

it authorizes the Attorney General of the United States to determine the applicability

of SORNA’s registration requirements to persons convicted of a predicate sexual

offense prior to SORNA’s enactment. After the district court denied his motion to

dismiss, Mefford entered a guilty plea conditioned on his right to appeal the denial,

and we affirmed. Applying our then-current precedent, we held that Mefford lacked

standing for a nondelegation challenge because SORNA applied to pre-enactment

offenders who already had been required to register under state law, regardless of any

rule-making by the Attorney General. See Mefford, 417 F. App’x at 586-87.

In Reynolds, the Supreme Court held that SORNA did not become effective as

to pre-enactment offenders until the Attorney General exercised “the authority to

specify the applicability of the [registration] requirements . . . to sex offenders

convicted before the enactment of this chapter . . . .” 132 S. Ct. at 978 (quoting 42

U.S.C. § 16913(d)) (alterations and emphasis added in Reynolds). The Court

remanded to the Third Circuit for consideration of the merits of the petitioner’s

challenge to SORNA on nondelegation grounds. Id. at 980, 984. Under Reynolds,

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Mefford also is entitled to have his nondelegation challenge addressed on the merits. 

See United States v. Fernandez, --- F.3d ---, 2012 WL 612457, *1 (8th Cir. Feb. 28,

The petitioner in Reynolds also challenged on Administrative Procedure Act 1

notice-and-comment grounds the validity of the Attorney General’s interim rule of

February 28, 2007, in effect when the petitioner’s alleged SORNAviolation occurred. 

See Reynolds, 132 S. Ct. at 979-80. Here, it is undisputed that Mefford failed to

register in 2009, after the Attorney General had issued a final rule exercising the

authority to apply SORNA’s requirements to pre-SORNA offenders. See 73 Fed.

Reg. 38030, 38046 (2008). Therefore, unlike the petitioner in Reynolds, Mefford

could not (and did not) assert any challenge to the interim rule.

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2012) (per curiam). Reynolds does not affect Mefford’s Commerce Clause and Due

Process claims, see Fernandez, 2012 WL 612457 at *2, and we reinstate our previous

opinion as to those two claims.

Accordingly, we remand to the district court for consideration of the

nondelegation claim on the merits in the first instance, see id. at *1, and for other

proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion. 

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