Opinion ID: 2095176
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Does SORA Deprive Appellants of Procedural Due Process?

Text: Appellants' second contention is that SORA deprives them of procedural due process by infringing on Constitutionally or statutorily protected liberty interestsbroadly speaking, their interests in being free from registration requirements, intrusions on their privacy, and public stigmatizationwithout first affording them a hearing on whether they are, in fact, dangerous. The Supreme Court disposed of the identical contention in Connecticut Department of Public Safety, supra . Like SORA, Connecticut's sex offender registration act requires all persons in the state who have committed designated sex offenses to register with the Department of Public Safety for ten years or life and requires the Department to publicize the information obtained from registrants on an Internet website and elsewhere. Much like the District of Columbia's website, the State of Connecticut's website explains that offenders are listed solely by virtue of their conviction record and state law and adds that the Department of Public Safety has made no determination that any individual included in the registry is currently dangerous. See Doe v. Dep't of Public Safety ex rel. Lee, 271 F.3d 38, 44, 49 (2d Cir.2001). Despite that disclaimer, the Second Circuit held that the Due Process Clause entitles offenders subject to the Connecticut law to a hearing to determine whether or not they are currently dangerous before the state implicitly labels them as dangerous by identifying them to the public in the sex offender registry. See id. at 46. The Supreme Court reversed. It held that due process does not require a state to provide a hearing on a fact, current dangerousness, that is not material to the State's statutory scheme. Conn. Dep't of Public Safety, 538 U.S. at 3, 123 S.Ct. 1160. Connecticut has decided that the registry information of all sex offenders currently dangerous or notmust be publicly disclosed. Unless ... that substantive rule of law is defective (by conflicting with a provision of the Constitution), any hearing on current dangerousness is a bootless exercise. Id. at 7, 123 S.Ct. 1160; see also id. at 8, 123 S.Ct. 1160 (Scalia, J., concurring) (Absent a claim (which respondent has not made here) that the liberty interest in question is so fundamental as to implicate so-called `substantive' due process, a properly enacted law can eliminate it.) The District of Columbia too has decided to apply its registration and notification provisions to all sex offenders, whether or not they are currently dangerous. As in Connecticut, such dangerousness is a fact of no consequence. Id. at 7, 123 S.Ct. 1160. Under Connecticut Department of Public Safety, therefore, if the District's decision does not violate any substantive constitutional requirements, appellants have no right to a hearing on their current dangerousness as a matter of procedural due process. We have already held that the District's decision does not violate the Ex Post Facto Clause, the Double Jeopardy Clause, or any substantive prohibition on the imposition of punishment to be found in the Due Process Clause. Appellants contend, however, that SORA violates principles of substantive due process in other ways. We turn now to examine that remaining issue, which is one the Supreme Court has not resolved. See Conn. Dep't of Public Safety, 538 U.S. at 8, 123 S.Ct. 1160 (Because the question is not properly before us, we express no opinion as to whether Connecticut's Megan's Law violates principles of substantive due process.); see also id. at 9, 123 S.Ct. 1160 (Souter, J., concurring) ([T]oday's holding does not foreclose a claim that Connecticut's dissemination of registry information is actionable on a substantive due process principle.).