NARSOL Affiliates Join in Amicus Brief in Willman v. U.S. Attorney General

Several NARSOL Affiliates, including: FAIR (Families Advocating Intelligent Registries), FAC (Florida Action Committee), Illinois Voices, Oklahoma Voices and PARSOL (Pennsylvania Association for Rational Sexual Offense Laws), have joined with W.A.R. (Women Against the Registry) and ACSOL (Alliance for Constitutional Sex Offender Laws) in an amicus brief to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in the case of Willman v. United State Attorney General (E.D. Mich 2019). NARSOL’s Texas affiliate, Texas Voices, has submitted a separate, independent brief.

The case challenges the federal SORNA law that requires individuals who had been released from their registering duties in one state to resume registering upon relocating to another state. Currently, in cases where an individual has completed his/her registering period or where the courts have ruled that state’s registry law to be unconstitutional, the individual can be placed back on the sex offender registry in a different state after moving or visiting and could face severe retributions if they fail to report the change.

On October 1st, 2019, United States District Judge Gershwin A. Drain granted the U.S. Attorney General’s motion to dismiss the case, citing the plaintiff’s failure to identify the specific statutory language he is challenging and several arguments that were undercut in previous court rulings. An appeal was promptly filed to the 6th Circuit Court in November 2019.

This story is a reprint from the NARSOL website