Court rejects part  of sex offender law

Ohio Supreme Court change will affect the status for 26,000 in the state.

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By Laura A. Bischoff, Columbus Bureau Updated 6:34 AM Friday, June 4, 2010

COLUMBUS — Sex offenders in Ohio who were reclassified under the federal Adam Walsh Act will have their status returned to what judges had originally imposed.

The Ohio Supreme Court on Thursday, June 3, struck down parts of a new, more restrictive sex offender registration law, saying pieces of the Adam Walsh Act violate the separation-of-powers doctrine in the Ohio Constitution.

In 2007, lawmakers repealed “Megan’s Law” and replaced it with the Adam Walsh Act which imposed more restrictive registration and community notification requirements for sex offenders. The Adam Walsh law required the state attorney general to reclassify all sex offenders who had been previously classified under Megan’s Law.

Three offenders received notice from the attorney general’s office in November 2007 announcing that they would face stricter registration and notification rules than what they were given by judges under Megan’s Law. They challenged the new law.

In a 5-1 opinion, the Supreme Court said that the Adam Walsh Act’s provisions that tell the executive branch to re-do sex offender classifications was unconstitutional.

“The reclassification scheme vests the executive branch with authority to review judicial decisions, and it interferes with the judicial power by requiring the reopening of final judgments. It is well settled that a legislature cannot enact laws that revisit a final judgment,” wrote Justice Maureen O’Connor in the majority opinion.

Attorney General Richard Cordray’s office said it would begin notifying the 26,000 sex offenders who had been reclassified. There are 30,750 sex offenders in total in Ohio.

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