Paul P. v. Farmer, 00-5244
| Decision Date | 12 July 2000 |
| Docket Number | No. 00-5244,00-5244 |
| Citation | 227 F.3d 98 |
| Parties | (3rd Cir. 2000) PAUL P., (a minor, by Laura L, his legal guardian); QUINCY Q; RONALD R; STEVEN S, (a minor, by Sally S, his legal guardian), (all fictitious names), Individually and as Representatives of a class pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P.23 (a) and 23(b) (2) v. JOHN J. FARMER, JR. <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Attorney General New Jersey; JEFFREY S. BLITZ, Atlantic County Prosecutor; WILLIAM SCHMIDT, Bergen County Prosecutor; ROBERT D. BERNARDI <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Burlington County Prosecutor; LEE A. SOLOMON, Acting Camden County Prosecutor; DAVID E. BLAKER <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Cape May County Prosecutor; ARTHUR MARCHAND, Cumberland County Prosecutor; DONALD C. CAMPOLO <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Essex County Prosecutor; ANDREW YURICK, Gloucester County Prosecutor; FRED J. THEEMLING, JR. <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Hudson County Prosecutor; STEPHEN B. RUBIN, Hunterdon County Prosecutor; DANIEL G. GIAQUINTO <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Mercer County Prosecutor; GLENN E. BERMAN <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Middlesex County Prosecutor; JOHN KAYE, Monmouth County Prosecutor; JOHN B. DANGLER, Morris County Prosecutor; E. DAVID MILLARD <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Ocean County Prosecutor; RONALD S. FAVA, Passaic County Prosecutor; JOHN E. BERGH <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Salem County Prosecutor; WAYNE W. FORREST <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Somerset County Prosecutor; DOLORES M. BLACKBURN <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Sussex County Prosecutor; THOMAS V. MANAHAN <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* , Union County Prosecutor; JOHN G. LAKY, <A HREF="#fr1-*" name="fn1-*">* Warren County Prosecutor, PAUL P. and RONALD R., Appellants Argued: |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit |
ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEW JERSEY District Judge: The Honorable Joseph E. Irenas
Attorneys for Appellants: Edward L. Barocas, Esquire (Argued) Michael Z. Buncher, Esquire Office of Public Defender Richard J. Hughes Justice Complex P.O. Box 850 Trenton, New Jersey 08625
Attorneys for Appellees: John J. Farmer, Jr., Esquire (Argued) Rhonda S. Berliner-Gold, Esquire B. Stephan Finkel, Esquire Office of Attorney General of New Jersey Richard J. Hughes Justice Complex P.O. Box 80 Trenton, New Jersey 08625, Steven S. Sand, Esquire Office of Prosecutor of Gloucester County Broad & Hunter Streets P.O. Box 623 Woodbury, NJ 08096, Maureen O'Brien, Esquire Office of Prosecutor of Union County County Administration Building Elizabeth, NJ 07207
Attorneys for United States as Amicus-Curiae Supporting Appellees: Robert J. Cleary, United States Attorney George S. Leone, Assistant United States Attorney (Argued) 970 Broad Street Room 700 Newark, New Jersey 07102, David W. Ogden, Acting Assistant Attorney General Leonard Schaitman and Lowell Sturgill, Attorneys, Appellate Staff, United States Department of Justice, Civil Division Room 9152, 601 "D" Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20530
Before: BARRY and GREENBERG, Circuit Judges, and OBERDORFER,** District Judge
For several years now, the District Court and this Court have been adjudicating appellants' various challenges to the dissemination of sex offender notices in New Jersey under what has popularly become known as "Megan's Law." As to one of those challenges, and alone among the Courts of Appeals which have considered Megan's Law cases, we found that sex offender notices implicate a nontrivial privacy interest, albeit only with respect to one piece of information -- the home address of the offender. This litigation, however, now comes to an end, for we conclude that appellees have shown, in the words of our prior order of remand, that appellants' "interest in assuring that information is disclosed only to those who have a particular need for it has been accorded adequate protection" by the Attorney General Guidelines for Law Enforcement for the Implementation of Sex Offender and Community Notification Laws (Mar. 2000) (the "New Guidelines"). Paul P. v. Verniero, 170 F.3d 396, 406 (3d Cir. 1999) ("Paul P. I"). Accordingly, we will affirm.
Megan's Law, so named for Megan Kanka, a little girl who was sexually abused and murdered by a twice-convicted sex offender, was enacted "to identify potential recidivists and alert the public when necessary for the public safety." E.B. v. Verniero, 119 F.3d 1077, 1097 (3d Cir. 1997). Given that laudatory goal, therefore, this case begins with the understanding and, indeed, the requirement that what might otherwise be private information be made public.
As we set forth in great detail in Artway v. Attorney General, 81 F.3d 1235 (3d Cir. 1996), Megan's Law "requires all persons who complete a sentence for certain designated crimes involving sexual assault after Megan's Law was enacted to register with local law enforcement." Id. at 1243; see also N.J.S.A. S 2C:7-2. "The registrant must provide the following information to the chief law enforcement officer of the municipality in which he [or she] resides: name, social security number, age, race, sex, date of birth, height, weight, hair and eye color, address of legal residence, address of any current temporary legal residence, and date and place of employment." Artway, 81 F.3d at 1243; see also N.J.S.A. S 2C:7-4b(1). Once the information is provided by the sex offender, it is forwarded "to the Division of State Police, which incorporates it into a central registry and notifies the prosecutor of the county in which the registrant plans to reside." Artway , 81 F.3d at 1243. At this stage, the information is not yet available to the public.
Once the information is received in the prosecutor's office of the county in which the registrant plans to reside, that office, in consultation with the prosecutor's office of the county in which the registrant was convicted, Id. at 1244 (citing N.J.S.A. SS 2C:7-8d(1), 2C:7-8a to b). The law mandates that
[e]very registrant at least qualif[y] for Tier 1 treatment, otherwise known as `law enforcement alert,' where notification extends only to law enforcement agencies likely to encounter the registrant. N.J.S.A. S 2C:7-8c(1).In the case of those registrants posing a moderate risk of reoffense, Tier 2 notification, or `law enforcement, school and community organization alert,' issues to registered schools, day care centers, summer camps, and other community organizations which care for children or provide support to women and where individuals are likely to encounter the sex offender. N.J.S.A. S 2C:7-8c(2). The high risk registrants merit Tier 3's `community notification,' where members of the public likely to encounter the registrant are notified. N.J.S.A. S 2C:7-8c(3).
E.B., 119 F.3d at 1083. After a classification tier is determined, the prosecutor notifies the registrant of the proposed notification and he or she can then challenge the classification through a pre-notification judicial review process in state court.
Appellants in this case "are Tier 2 and Tier 3 registrants who have been certified as a class and whose offenses were committed after the enactment of Megan's Law." Paul P. I, 170 F.3d at 399. On June 16, 1997, appellants filed a class action complaint against the Attorney General of New Jersey and all twenty-one county prosecutors (collectively, the " ") alleging that Megan's Law violated their constitutional rights of privacy and due process, and constituted cruel and unusual punishment. After the filing of the complaint, however, this Court rejected most of the same claims in E.B. v. Verniero. See 119 F.3d at 1111. Pursuant to E.B., therefore, the District Court granted summary judgment to the State defendants on October 29, 1997. See Paul P. v. Verniero, 982 F. Supp. 961, 962-963 (D.N.J. 1997). With respect to the right to privacy claim, the Court held that the information did not fall "within the `zones of privacy' protected under the Constitution." Id. at 966.
On appeal to this Court, appellants raised only one issue: whether the dissemination of notices under Megan's Law violates their constitutional right to privacy. See Paul P. I, 170 F.3d at 399. Specifically, appellants "argue[d] that the statutory requirement that the class members provide extensive information to local law enforcement personnel, including each registrant's current biographical data, physical description, home address, place of employment, schooling, and a description and license plate number of the registrant's vehicle, and the subsequent community notification is a violation of their constitutionally protected right to privacy." Id. at 398.
We rejected appellants' claim "[t]o the extent that . . . [the] alleged injury stems from the disclosure of their sex offender status, alone or in conjunction with other information." Id. at 403. We explained that "the District Court's opinion is in line with other cases in this court and elsewhere holding specifically that arrest records and related information are not protected by a right to privacy." Id. With respect to the disclosure of home addresses, however, we took a different position. As we explained:
The compilation of home addresses in widely available telephone directories might suggest a consensus that these addresses are not considered private were it not for the fact that a significant number of persons, ranging from public officials and performers to just ordinary folk, choose to list their telephones privately, because they regard their home addresses to be private information. Indeed, their view is supported by decisions holding that home addresses are entitled to privacy under FOIA, which exempts from disclosure personal files `the disclosure of which would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.'
Id. at 404 (quoting 5 U.S.C. S 552(b)(6)).
We also noted that:
Plaintiffs' primary argument receives further support from the New Jersey Supreme Court holding, relying on FOIA cases, that `[t]he fact that plaintiff's home address may be...
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