Opinion ID: 2647072
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Codified Examples

Text: Our conclusion finds further support in the Department of Justice’s most recent codification of rules regarding SORNA’s retroactive applicability. See 28 C.F.R. § 72.3 (2011). The retroactivity regulation begins with the familiar refrain that “[t]he requirements of [SORNA] apply to all sex offenders,” including pre-Act offenders. Id. But the regulation goes on to provide two illustrations, both of which suggest that an offender’s pre-SORNA registration obligation is an “initial registration”: Example 1. A sex offender is federally convicted of aggravated sexual abuse under 18 U.S.C. 2241 in 1990 and is released 8 SORNA did not absolve pre-Act offenders of their existing registration obligations. See United States v. Kebodeaux, 133 S. Ct. 2496, 2502 (2013) (sex offender convicted of failure to register under SORNA was subject, at the time of his sex offense conviction, to registration obligations under the federal Wetterling Act); Carr v. United States, 560 U.S. 438, 130 S. Ct. 2229, 2238–39 (2010) (noting that “federal sexoffender registration laws have, from their inception, expressly relied on state-level enforcement” and that SORNA serves to “strengthen state enforcement of registration requirements”). 9 That DeJarnette failed to register under California law, despite an obligation to do so, has no bearing on the issue before us. Our task is simply to determine whether SORNA imposed upon DeJarnette an obligation to register in the jurisdiction of his conviction, which was indisputably different from his jurisdiction of residence at all relevant times. We conclude, based on the language of the statute and implementing guidelines, that it does not. UNITED STATES V. DEJARNETTE 17 following imprisonment in 2007. The sex offender is subject to the requirements of [SORNA] and could be held criminally liable under 18 U.S.C. 2250 for failing to register or keep the registration current in any jurisdiction in which the sex offender resides, is an employee, or is a student. Id. Example 1 applies the ongoing registration requirement described in § 16913(a) – registration in the jurisdictions of residence, employment, and education – while notably omitting any mention of registration in the jurisdiction of conviction. Expressio unius est exclusio alterius and, accordingly, we again question whether the Attorney General has applied the requirement of registration in the jurisdiction of conviction to any pre-Act offenders. But, as we have said, the case before us concerns only one subcategory of pre-Act offenders – offenders who were already subject to registration obligations when SORNA took effect – and we decide only the case before us. The second example addresses such offenders: Example 2. A sex offender is convicted by a state jurisdiction in 1997 for molesting a child and is released following imprisonment in 2000. The sex offender initially registers as required but relocates to another state in 2009 and fails to register in the new state of residence. The sex offender has violated the requirement under [SORNA] to register in any jurisdiction in which he resides, and could be held criminally liable under 18 U.S.C. 2250 18 UNITED STATES V. DEJARNETTE for the violation because he traveled in interstate commerce. 28 C.F.R. § 72.3 (emphasis added). Like the SMART guidelines, Example 2 of the codified regulations specifically addresses pre-Act offenders who were subject to existing reporting obligations, and it expressly refers to a pre-SORNA registration as an “initial” registration. Example 2 then applies to such pre-Act offenders the ongoing registration requirements of § 16913(a) & (c) – that is, registration in the jurisdictions of residence, employment, or education, and the requirement to keep the registration current following a change of jurisdiction – rather than § 16913(a)’s “initial registration” requirement of registration in the jurisdiction of conviction.