Jessica's Law is the informal name given to a 2005

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

law, as well as laws in several other states, designed to protect potential victims and reduce a sexual offender's ability to re-offend. A version of Jessica's Law, known as the Jessica Lunsford Act, was introduced at the federal level in 2005 but was never enacted into law by Congress. The name is also used by the media to designate all legislation and potential legislation in other states modeled after the

Florida law The law of Florida consists of several levels, including constitutional, statutory, and regulatory law, as well as case law and local law. The ''Florida Statutes'' form the general statutory law of Florida. Sources The Constitution of Florida ...

. Forty-two states have introduced such legislation since Florida's law was passed. The law is named after

Jessica Lunsford Jessica Marie Lunsford (October 6, 1995 – February 24, 2005) was an American nine-year-old girl from Homosassa, Florida, who was murdered in February 2005. Lunsford was abducted from her home in the early morning of February 24, 2005, by John ...

, a young Florida girl who was kidnapped, raped, and murdered in February 2005 by John Couey, a previously convicted

sex offender A sex offender (sexual offender, sex abuser, or sexual abuser) is a person who has committed a sex crime. What constitutes a sex crime differs by culture and legal jurisdiction. The majority of convicted sex offenders have convictions for crime ...

. Public outrage over this case spurred Florida officials to introduce this legislation. Among the key provisions of the law was classifying lewd or lascivious molestation on a person under the age of 12 as a life felony, and a

mandatory minimum sentence Mandatory sentencing requires that offenders serve a predefined term for certain crimes, commonly serious and violent offenses. Judges are bound by law; these sentences are produced through the legislature, not the judicial system. They are inst ...

of 25 years in prison and lifetime electronic monitoring of persons 18 and older convicted of lewd or lascivious molestation against a victim less than 12 years old. Lewd or lascivious molestation is defined as "A person who intentionally touches in a lewd or lascivious manner the breasts, genitals, genital area, or buttocks, or the clothing covering them,... or forces or entices a person to so touch the perpetrator." The statute also requires that if an offender is sentenced to a term of years, he or she must be given lifetime probation following the imprisonment. In Florida, another charge, capital sexual battery is defined as: ''A person 18 years of age or older who commits sexual battery upon, or in an attempt to commit sexual battery injures the sexual organs of, a person less than 12 years of age commits a capital felony.'' Sexual battery is defined as ''oral, anal, or vaginal penetration by, or union with, the sexual organ of another or the anal or vaginal penetration of another by any other object'', except for bona fide medical purposes. The charge of capital sexual battery carries a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole.

Jessica Lunsford Act

The Jessica Lunsford Act ( of the

109th Congress The 109th United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, composed of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives, from January 3, 2005 to January 3, 2007, dur ...

), was a proposed

federal law Federal law is the body of law created by the federal government of a country. A federal government is formed when a group of political units, such as states or provinces join in a federation, delegating their individual sovereignty and many po ...

in the United States — modeled after the Florida state law — which, if adopted, would have mandated more stringent tracking of released

Bill objectives

The bill, if passed, would have greatly reduced federal grant money under the

Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, commonly referred to as the 1994 Crime Bill, the Clinton Crime Bill, or the Biden Crime Law, is an Act of Congress dealing with crime and law enforcement; it became law in 1994. It is t ...

of 1994 () and

Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act The Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 (, codified at ''et seq.'') was legislation passed by the Congress of the United States and signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson that established the Law Enforcement Assistance Admin ...

of 1968 () to any

U.S. State In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sover ...

that failed to conform its sex offender registration laws to the following: *Sex offenders would have been required to wear

Global Positioning System The Global Positioning System (GPS), originally Navstar GPS, is a satellite-based radionavigation system owned by the United States government and operated by the United States Space Force. It is one of the global navigation satellite sy ...

devices on their ankles for five years following their release from prison, or for life for those deemed

sexual predator A sexual predator is a person seen as obtaining or trying to obtain sexual contact with another person in a metaphorically "predatory" or abusive manner. Analogous to how a predator hunts down its prey, so the sexual predator is thought to "hunt" ...

s, to better enable law enforcement personnel to track their whereabouts. The costs of tracking and monitoring offenders would have been absorbed by each State. *States would have been required to mail sex offender registration forms at least twice per year, at random times, to verify registrants' addresses. Any registrants who did not respond within 10 days would have to be considered non-compliant. The bill was introduced by U.S.

Republican Republican can refer to: Political ideology * An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law. ** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...

Congresswoman

Ginny Brown-Waite Virginia Brown-Waite (born Virginia Frances Kniffen; October 5, 1943) is the former U.S. Representative for , serving from 2003 until 2011. She is a member of the Republican Party and a founder of Maggie's List. The district stretched along sev ...

from

on April 6, 2005. It had 107 cosponsors and was referred to a subcommittee of the

House Judiciary Committee The U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary, also called the House Judiciary Committee, is a standing committee of the United States House of Representatives. It is charged with overseeing the administration of justice within the federal courts, a ...

, but it was never voted upon (either by any committee or the full Congress), and it died when the 109th Congress finally adjourned.

Impact on offender's family members

Advocates for convicted sex offenders claim that the civil rights of convicted persons and their non-offending family members is forever affected, long after the punishment has ended. Internet publication of sex offenders' home addresses continues to be upheld by the court in the name of public safety, although a series of vigilante-type murders in Maine in April 2006 have brought new concerns of misuse of the registry and for the safety of non-offending family members by private parties. Missouri civil rights attorney Arthur Benson currently awaits a decision from the

Missouri Supreme Court The Supreme Court of Missouri is the highest court in the state of Missouri. It was established in 1820 and is located at 207 West High Street in Jefferson City, Missouri. Missouri voters have approved changes in the state's constitution to give ...

regarding the Sex Offenders Registration and Notification Act (SORNA) litigation, Jane Doe I, et al. v. Thomas Phillips et al.Supreme Court Home Page
/ref> which "contends the act violates substantive due process rights and equal protection rights because it infringes on fundamental liberty rights, imposes a lifetime stigma, has no express purpose and, even if it serves a compelling interest, is not narrowly tailored or rationally related to that interest. They assert that, if the act is deemed to be criminal in nature, it violates the prohibition against ex post facto laws because it imposes an additional punishment, thereby altering the consequences for a crime for which they already have been sentenced."

References

*Arthur A. Benson II. ''Jane Doe I, et al. v. Thomas Phillips et al.'' (Case No. SC86573). May 2006. *Carl Jones. "Porn Law Goes Too Far". Daily Business Review. April 10, 2006. *Internet Broadcasting Systems and Local6.com. "Groups Propose Tier System For Sex Registry". May 2006. *Rebecca Van Drunen. Confederation College. "Outcast Society: A Closer Look at North American Sexual Offenders in the Twenty-First Century". May 5, 2006. *Sharon Wilson. "Sex Offenders: The Other Side". Orlando Sentinel. 23 October 2005.

External links

*Full text of the bill
Florida House Bill 1877
The text of the enrolled version of Jessica's Law passed in Florida. *

Jessie's Dad ''Jessie's Dad'' is a 2011 documentary film by Boaz Dvir. The film tells the story of Mark Lunsford, and his transformation from an uneducated truck driver to a child activist after the murder of his daughter Jessica by a convicted sex offender. A ...

* *{{cite web , last1=Symons , first1=Michael , title=New Jersey, after 9 years, adopts Jessica Lunsford Act , url=https://www.app.com/story/news/politics/capitolquickies/2014/06/02/new-jersey-after-9-years-adopts-jessica-lunsford-act/9870921/ , website=Asbury Park Press , date=2014-06-02 United States proposed federal criminal legislation Sex laws Sex offender registration Proposed legislation of the 109th United States Congress Sex offender registries in the United States Florida law

Jessica Lunsford Act

Bill objectives

Impact on offender's family members

See also

References

External links