Crowell seeks Bill of Rights change

A provision of Missouri's Bill of Rights in effect since 1820 would be removed from the state constitution under a proposal from state Sen. Jason Crowell aimed at forcing more sex offenders to register with authorities.

Crowell, R-Cape Girardeau, filed the proposed constitutional amendment last week for consideration when state lawmakers return Jan. 3 to Jefferson City. The measure, which would require a statewide vote if approved by lawmakers, is a response to a June ruling by the Missouri Supreme Court. In the unanimous decision, the court ruled that only sex offenders convicted after Jan. 1, 1995, when Missouri first started requiring registration, had to notify authorities of their residences.

"Regardless of when sex offenders were convicted, the community should be aware of where they are," Crowell said in a prepared statement.

The provision Crowell wants to change bars the legislature from enacting any law "retrospective in its operation," which means that no law can change the legal effect of an act that occurred before the law became effective. For example, Judge Laura Denvir Stith wrote, the court has used the constitutional provision in the past to strike down legislation attempting to make it possible for a lawsuit to be filed after the statute of limitations has expired.

Crowell filed the proposed constitutional amendment at the urging of Cape Girardeau County Prosecuting Attorney Morley Swingle. In a letter to Crowell written six weeks after the Supreme Court ruling, Swingle said the Missouri protection against retrospective laws is more sweeping than the federal constitution's ban on ex post facto laws, which protects against measures that make past actions a criminal offense.

"Missouri is one of five states that have that goofy language in there," Swingle said Wednesday. "I just think that people are engaging in silly speculation that anybody's rights would be taken away. This has been as useless as an appendix to the Missouri Constitution."

Amending the Missouri Constitution, especially the Bill of Rights, has traditionally been difficult, Swingle noted. The only two recent additions to the state Bill of Rights are provisions passed in 1992 that give crime victims the right to be heard prior to sentencing or a grant of parole and a 2004 measure that defines marriage as the union of a man and a woman.

"This is a simple way to correct this situation," Swingle said. "When you look at the constitution, the court had to reach the result they reached. This is a simple way to correct the problem."

If the law isn't changed, Swingle said, the ruling "created a risk that Missouri would become a haven for elderly child molesters" who committed their crimes before Jan. 1, 1995.

Under the sex offender registration law, known as "Megan's Law," anyone convicted of a specific set of sex crimes must register with the county sheriff, giving their address. The registrations must be renewed regularly or the offenders face criminal penalties.

The impact of Crowell's proposal could be more sweeping than intended if the point is to force sex offenders convicted before 1995 to register, said Carl Esbeck, a professor of law at the University of Missouri-Columbia.

"He could be more surgical," Esbeck said. "He could propose a constitutional amendment that very selectively and narrowly works in this single case the Supreme Court struck down."

The Missouri Legislature has passed numerous laws over the years imposing civil obligations or duties, Esbeck said. Those measures have all been aimed at controlling future conduct, not to create liability for past conduct, because of the provision Crowell wants to change.

"I suspect he is going to get some counsel to get a more narrow or surgical focus," Esbeck said. "Something that achieves his purpose without doing too much collateral damage."

rkeller@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 126