Opinion ID: 1841416
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: Registration Provisions

Text: The State argues that Worm's constitutional challenges are not properly before this court because the Act's requirements are collateral to the criminal conviction. The State relies on two cases in which we held that the registration provisions were collateral to the defendant's conviction. See State v. Torres, 254 Neb. 91, 574 N.W.2d 153 (1998), and State v. Schneider, 263 Neb. 318, 640 N.W.2d 8 (2002). Worm, however, contends that his constitutional challenges to the Act are properly before this court, because after the Act was amended, the sentencing court had an affirmative duty to determine whether an aggravated offense had occurred, thus triggering a lifetime registration requirement. In Torres, we held that a defendant who was subject to the registration requirements lacked standing to challenge the Act in a direct appeal from the underlying conviction because the Act's registration requirements were separate and collateral to the sexual offense that had triggered the requirements. We held that the district court's order did not address the [Act's] requirements; rather, the [Act's] registration requirements arose solely and independently by the terms of the [A]ct itself only after Torres' conviction. (Emphasis in original). 254 Neb. at 95, 574 N.W.2d at 155. Torres is distinguishable in two respects. First, the defendant in Torres argued that the Act constituted an ex post facto law because it potentially increased his sentence by imposing an additional penalty if he failed to register. He did not argue that the registration requirements themselves violated the ex post facto clause as retroactive punishment. Second, unlike the 10-year registration requirement for the registrable offense in Torres, the lifetime registration requirement for an aggravated offense does not arise solely and independently from the defendant's conviction. Rather, the amendments require the court, as part of the sentence, to determine if the defendant committed an aggravated offense. See § 29-4005(2). As such, the court's finding that Worm committed an aggravated offense was part of the court's judgment. See People v. Hernandez, 93 N.Y.2d 261, 711 N.E.2d 972, 689 N.Y.S.2d 695 (1999). Neither is Schneider controlling. In Schneider, this court determined that a guilty plea was not involuntary or unintelligent because the trial court failed to inform the defendant of the Act's requirements before accepting his plea. We relied on Torres in concluding that the requirements were a collateral consequence of the defendant's plea and that it had no direct effect on the range of the defendant's possible sentences or incarceration periods. Schneider, supra . Ripeness, however, was not an issue in that case. We specifically declined to use the intent-effects test for analyzing the penal nature of the statutory scheme because the defendant had not raised a double jeopardy or ex post facto challenge. Id. Thus, we determine that the registration requirement for an offender convicted of an aggravated offense under the Act's amended provisions is part of the sentencing court's judgment for purposes of filing an appeal. Worm's constitutional challenges to the Act's registration provisions are properly before this court.