Opinion ID: 2056690
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Evaluation of Mendoza-Martinez Factors

Text: [¶ 56] It is not our role to ask whether the Legislature could achieve its goals through alternative means. Indeed, we properly exercise restraint in our review of a legislative effort to apply retroactively a civil regulatory scheme intended to address a complex public safety issue. We proceed with care so as not to interfere with innovative legislative efforts intended to advance the public interest, unless required otherwise by constitutional mandates. [15] [¶ 57] Although the ex post facto evaluation in this case raises numerous questions, many of which do not lend themselves to precise answers, ultimately we must determine only whether the punitive effects of SORNA of 1999 negate its civil intent by the clearest proof. Although we have considered all of the Mendoza-Martinez factors and related information in this analysis, the first and second factors, considered together, stand out as being most probative on the question of punitive effects. [¶ 58] As to the first factor, it belies common sense to suggest that a newly imposed lifetime obligation to report to a police station every ninety days to verify one's identification, residence, and school, and to submit to fingerprinting and provide a current photograph, is not a substantial disability or restraint on the free exercise of individual liberty. As to the second factor, the duty to register imposed 41 by SORA of 1991 and SORNA of 1995 was an integral part of the criminal sentencing process and the resulting sentence. The retroactive application of SORNA of 1999 thus imposes a substantial disability or restraint and, in so doing, makes more burdensome the registration requirements that resulted from an offender's original sentence. [¶ 59] Regarding the second Mendoza-Martinez factorwhether the effects of SORNA of 1999 can be historically regarded as punishmentthe State properly notes that in Haskell, we determined that the retroactive application of SORNA of 1999 to a crime that was committed on August 8, 1999, did not violate the ex post facto prohibition. 2001 ME 154, ¶¶ 6, 22, 784 A.2d at 8, 16. Haskell is, however, distinguishable from this case in one important respect. [¶ 60] SORNA of 1999 became effective only six weeks after Haskell had committed his crime, but well before his sentencing. Id. ¶¶ 2, 6, 784 A.2d at 6, 8. Accordingly, we did not have reason in Haskell to consider the question we face today: Whether it is an ex post facto violation to apply retroactively the enhanced requirements of SORNA of 1999 when, by so doing, the application revises and enhances sex offender registration requirements that were a part of the offender's original sentence. This question was also not addressed in Smith; the retroactive application of the Alaska statute at issue did not revise and enhance registration requirements that were part of the offenders' actual underlying criminal sentences. [16] See 538 U.S. at 91, 123 S.Ct. 1140. [¶ 61] We recognized the significance of the inclusion of compliance with SORNA of 1999 as part of an offender's criminal sentence in Johnson. We held that if SORNA of 1999 registration was made a part of a criminal sentence, the exclusive means by which the State could seek to modify the offender's sex offender classification under SORNA of 1999 was through Rule 35 of the Maine Rules of Criminal Procedure. Johnson, 2006 ME 35, ¶¶ 13-14, 894 A.2d at 492-93. We also indicated that the same was not true, however, for offenders sentenced on or after July 30, 2004, whose sex offender registration requirement was separately ordered and not part of the underlying sentence, in accordance with the 2003 amendment of SORNA of 1999. Id. ¶ 14, 894 A.2d at 492-93; see also P.L. 2003, ch. 711, § B-13 (effective July 30, 2004). It follows from Johnson that when sex offender registration is made a part of an offender's criminal sentence, it necessarily constitutes a part of the punishment administered by the State in response to that offender's criminal conviction. There is an unmistakable nexus between the retroactive application of SORNA of 1999, on the one hand, and the punishment of those for whom registration as a sex offender under SORA of 1991 and SORNA of 1995 was a part of their original criminal sentences. We thus distinguish our analysis in this case from that in Haskell because the purpose of the ex post facto prohibition is rightfully considered to be at its apex when a law's retroactive application is more punitive than the punishment that was actually imposed against an offender as part of a sentence. [¶ 62] Having considered all of the Mendoza-Martinez factors, we are convinced that an ex post facto violation has been shown by the clearest proof. Specifically, we hold that the retroactive application of the lifetime registration requirement and quarterly in-person verification procedures of SORNA of 1999 to offenders originally sentenced subject to SORA of 1991 and SORNA of 1995, without, at a minimum, affording those offenders any opportunity to ever be relieved of the duty as was permitted under those laws, is punitive. As to these offenders, the retroactive application of SORNA of 1999 is an unconstitutional ex post facto law because it makes more burdensome the punishment for a crime after its commission. [17] Collins, 497 U.S. at 42, 110 S.Ct. 2715 (quotation marks omitted); see also Chapman, 685 A.2d at 424; Joubert, 603 A.2d at 869.