A.A. v. New Jersey
U.S. Circuit Judge Dolores K. Sloviter ruled that there is a compelling state interest in posting the address of convicted sex offenders on the Internet, overriding their privacy interest. The case, A.A. v. New Jersey, U.S. App. LEXIS 16853 (2003), considered Megan's Law, a statute that requires the address and other information about sex offenders to be released to the community in which they live. Sloviter cited an earlier case, Paul P. v. Farmer, 227 F.3d 98 (3rd. Cir. 2000), quoting, " Megan's Law's fundamental purpose . . . is public disclosure." (Emphasis in the original.)
New Jersey was the first state in the country to adopt Megan's Law, named after Megan Kanka, a 7-year-old girl who was abducted in New Jersey in 1994. She was raped, then murdered by a neighbor who was a convicted sex offender. Following the passage of Megan's Law, Congress passed the Jacob Wetterling Crimes Against Children and Sexually Violent Offender Registration Act. That act gives states federal funds on the condition that each state adopt its own law designed after New Jersey's Megan's Law.
A.A. v. New Jersey began in the U.S. District Court in New Jersey, where Judge Joseph Irenas ruled in December 2001 that Megan's Law did not constitute further punishment for sex offender crimes, and therefore did not violate their rights under the Constitution's Ex Post Facto and Double Jeopardy clauses. However, Irenas found that the convicted offenders' argument that disclosure of their home addresses violated their right to privacy had merit. (See A.A. v. New Jersey, 176 F. Supp. 2d 274 (2001)). Both sides appealed to the Third Circuit, but the case was placed on hold while another case, Smith v. Doe, was before the U.S. Supreme Court. The high court eventually ruled that posting certain information on the Internet, including certain personal information such as name, age, and personal description, did not constitute a punitive measure. (See Smith v. Doe, 123 S. Ct. 1140 (2003); see also, "Sex Offender Registration Ruled Not Punitive," in the Winter 2003 issue of the Silha Bulletin.) Sloviter cited Smith v. Doe, writing, "The purpose and principal effect of notification are to inform the public for its own safety, not to humiliate the offender."
Sloviter wrote that Megan's Law was designed to provide information about convicted sex offenders to a community. But in addition, information such as an individual's address is important to everyone in a mobile society. "The Registrants' argument ignores both the need to access information in a mobile society and the difference between the system of notification at issue here . . .." Sloviter added that unless addresses of convicted sex offenders were available on the Internet, parents might find themselves the owners of a new house just down the street from an offender. "Indeed," she wrote, "discovering this information after the fact undermines the stated goal of New Jersey, which is to enable parents to prevent or avoid placing potential victims at risk."
—Elaine Hargrove-Simon
Silha Fellow and Bulletin Editor