New Sex Offender Law in Virgina

French-kissing someone under the age of 13 if you are an adult will land you on the sex offender registry in the state if the recently passed bill is signed into law:

State legislators passed a law Saturday that would require adults who French kiss a child younger than 13 to register as a sex offender.

Those convicted of tongue-kissing a child would be guilty of a misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year in jail and a $2,500 fine. The House of Delegates passed the legislation 96-1 and the Senate 39-0.

The bill now heads to Gov. Timothy M. Kaine, who said he supports the legislation.

Delagate Riley Ingram, R-Hopewell, introduced the bill on behalf of a woman whose 10-year-old daughter was French-kissed by the 62-year-old husband of her babysitter.

The only crime prosecutors could charge the man with was contributing to the delinquency of a minor, which did not require that he register as a sex offender.

Ingram and other members of the House fought to make the crime a felony, but in the final day of the 2008 General Assembly session gave in to senators who thought that classifying it as a felony was too harsh.

Delegate Phillip Hamilton, R-Newport News, cast the lone nay vote, refusing to back down from his belief that the crime should be a felony.

"I think that type of behavior is so egregious it warrants a felony," Hamilton said.

It's always odd when a single bizarre incident requires the legislature to jump into action.  I hope the legislators at least took steps to define tongue kissing narrowly.

Comments

[Gideon]

Do you think the legislator's comments to the passage of this bill make it prone to a Constitutional challenge? The problem with the early 2000 cases from SCOTUS was that they held these laws weren't punitive in nature.

It seems that this law is entirely punitive. Any potential there?

[Corey Rayburn Yung]

Hi Gideon,

Thanks for stopping by.

I think the problem with that argument is that the collateral sex offender restrictions (registration, notification, residency restrictions, etc.) are the laws that the courts are reviewing to determine if they are punitive. Everyone agrees that the underlying sex crime laws are punitive and they don't apply retroactively.

Even with residency restrictions, legislators often say crazy punitive things (my banishment article lists several instances where politicians support the restrictions in order to banish offenders) and the courts don't even care.