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Justice Department Releases Supplemental Guidelines for Implementation of the Walsh Act
On May 14, 2010, the U.S. Department of Justice posted a notice of proposed supplemental guidelines related to state implementation of the Sex Offender Notification and Registration Act (SORNA) of the Adam Walsh Act (“the Walsh Act”). According to the notice, the proposed supplemental guidelines “augment or modify certain features of the SORNA Guidelines in order to...address other issues arising in jurisdictions’ implementation of the SORNA requirements.”
Included among the proposed supplemental guidelines is a modification that would allow jurisdictions, in their discretion, to exempt juveniles adjudicated within the juvenile court for a sex-based offense from the public registries. This modification is in keeping with CJJ’s formal position recommending that the Walsh Act be amended to remove the federal mandate that any youth adjudicated within the juvenile court for a sex-based offense be required to register as a sex offender on the national registry.
First enacted on July 27, 2006, the Walsh Act establishes federal guidelines for national, state and local efforts to track individuals convicted of a sex-based offense. Under the Walsh Act, states were originally to come into substantial compliance with the provisions of SORNA by July 27, 2009 or risk losing 10 percent of their Byrne JAG grant allocation. On May, 26, 2009, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder issued an order granting a blanket one-year extension of the deadline. As of the publishing of this column, only two states (Ohio and Delaware) and two tribes have been deemed to be in substantial compliance by the federal Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering and Tracking (“SMART Office”). To date, Attorney General Holder has declined to grant an additional blanket extension, putting the burden on the 54 remaining U.S. states and territories – and hundreds of tribes – to individually request an extension of the deadline.
Members of the public are invited to submit written comments to the proposed supplemental SORNA guidelines on or before July 13, 2010. To view the notice and the proposed supplemental guidelines in their entirety, please click here.
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