Did you know? – Changing Drivers Licenses for TEMPORARY Address
Florida Sex Offender Laws
By now we all know (hopefully) that when visiting Florida, or staying at a temporary location for five (5) or more days, a sex offender is required to register where they are staying as a “temporary address”. But did you know that in addition to going to the local sheriff and registering, you are also required to go to the DMV and get a new driver’s license/ID?
Who would have thought, right?
It was just brought to our attention that even registering a temporary address triggers the requirement that you go down to the DMV drivers license office also.
Florida Statutes 943.0435 states:
(4)(a) Each time a sexual offender’s driver’s license or identification card is subject to renewal, and, without regard to the status of the offender’s driver’s license or identification card, within 48 hours after any change in the offender’s permanent, temporary, or transient residence or change in the offender’s name by reason of marriage or other legal process, the offender shall report in person to a driver’s license office, and shall be subject to the requirements specified in subsection (3).
So say you live in another state and plan to take a family trip to Florida for winter break, plan to spend half a day at the sheriff’s office to register and another half day at the driver’s license office getting your license or ID card. Say you live in North Florida and plan on visiting your parents in Boca Raton for 5 days, you’ll need to BOTH go to the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office to register your temporary location AND go to the DHSMV to change your driver’s license, even though you have a Florida license with the designation on it!
Whatever you do stay away from bay county. Landed a job with the shipbuilding company there. 2nd day on the job a detective showed up to tell me I had to leave town because of municipality laws prohibiting me from being in the surround areas. Or I could move to the woods. Those were my choices I had just paid 36 dollars for a new ID. Sold all my belongings and I do mean all except close bought a bicycle to get to work and just paid 600 dollars for a hotel for two weeks that I had to borrow half of, I explained there were 3 other RSOs in the same hotel…needless to say he said I had till the end of the week to “figure it out” because their cases were over 10yrs old. I called a number he gave me to check addresses that I found available one after another was turned down. There was a play ground or church on every corner. I told him that in the city I was living at I didn’t have those restrictions. Why would I have them now? I’m not a predator just an offender. Needless to say I moved across the city because he said that part was not his jurisdiction and I would have to talk to them. So I did. I was there for three days paid 150 more on top of a 36 dollar charge for a new license…again that I had to borrow cause I didn’t recieve my first pay for 2 weeks. 3 days there a sheriff pulls up as I’m getting on my bike to go to work and stops me. He stopped his car never getting out and asked my name and asked if I knew there was a bus stop at the end of the street I told him no cause I checked for parks churches and everything else. Didn’t think about school bus stops. He said I had till Monday (it was Thursday) to move again. At this point I was in tears and frantic I went 3 years without a job and now that I finally had one…uuugh. Anyways I brought a relative into the situation she called the detective from the first hotel,not sure what she said to him something about you’re supposed to enforce the law not make it, but he called me back the next day and said “I don’t usually call FDLE twice for someone but I did and they agreeded you do not have those restrictions have a good day” I ended up having to move several different times while there when I could finally afford it. In the end I got run out of town after 10 months of work. I attempted to move back to my home town. I left on Friday and the county I was moving to only does so registration on Tues and Thurs. But I had not stayed in my home town the whole time. I went back to bay county to stay the night at a friend’s house back in bay county when Thursday came around I went to my hometown to register and I had a warrant out for my arrest. When I finished registering she said I can’t believe I’m about to say this but you have a warrant, I said for what!!! She said failure to register. She said I have never in my life heard of someone coming in to register and getting arrested for not registering. I’m still fighting the battle it’s been since February as of right now it looks like I may win this one. I am unemployed so I have a public defender and I was worried at first but she finally gave me hope last court date. A failure to register is automatic 26 months prison time no matter the case. They have been giving me plea deals for 36 months prison at first I turned it down and said no I was completely in my rights, they investigated and offered Xmonths probation yes X no number they were pushing for 5years I laughed said no I’m jobless it’ll set me up for failure. Then they came back with 24months probation I said no. They tried to reoffer after taking the other offers the table with 36 months prob. My PD chuckled when she brought me the news cause she knew what my answer was. That was a couple weeks ago I have another court date coming up in a couple weeks that is another pretrial hearing. As I was leaving she said it looks hopeful I couldn’t get so much as a sigh of relief from her before so I’m standing my ground. I don’t need another charge I already spent 18 months in prison for a judge whom on record that told me he believed every word I said and that the techs admitted the videos were never opened but because they were in my position even unknowningly he had to make an example out of me. Bam life ruined at the age of 20. Never downloaded music illegally again.
Just found this, rather interesting, regarding registration relief in each state:
http://ccresourcecenter.org/state-restoration-profiles/50-state-comparison-relief-from-sex-offender-registration-obligations/
If you come from another state for 5 days or more you also must surrender your out of state license to get a Florida license. You are also put on the Florida website for LIFE.
You can also get a Florida ID card without surrendering your home-state’s DL
If you register in FL you are on FOR LIFE even if you’re here only 5 days.
And this is the reason any sane person would NEVER enter one foot into the state without the law being changed or repealed.
All it takes is a vehicle breakdown, missing a bus, having a medical emergency or some other situation to cause a delay in getting back out of the state in time.
Think about this: If you enter the state for 1 day, get identified by law enforcement for ANY REASON, then leave the same day.. then a week later or even a month later you re-enter the state only to have law enforcement pull you over, or simply run a plate or identify you for any reason, you will now have to find a way to defend yourself and prove your innocence as they will almost certainly say you’ve been in the state long enough to trigger registration but failed to do so. And the punishment for that, well is not a slap on the wrist.
If I ever were to visit Florida, it would would be with the understanding I would be forever tied to the state and listed on the registry for life and locked into a hellish landmine of registration gotcha. Needless to say I don’t step foot in Florida and it absolutely pisses me off to see people on the registry visit florida. Your “vacation” is not worth it. If you have family there, well, if they want to see you, they should visit YOU in your state. It’s not worth your entire life possibly thrown away.
Additionally, FL has some of the most corrupt cops anywhere in the country. It’s simply not worth it. If you are off paper, get out, stay out!
Why would any RC want to come to Florida in the first place? My advice is don’t come to Florida. If you have family here, have them come to you.
so, if i come for vacation to florida and only spend 2 days here and then go to the keys for 3 days, and drive back home, do i need to register anywhere. staying at hotels only. is it 5 days in one location or 5 days in florida no matter where you go
“Temporary residence” means a place where the person abides, lodges, or resides, including, but not limited to, vacation, business, or personal travel destinations in or out of this state, for a period of 5 or more days in the aggregate during any calendar year and which is not the person’s permanent address or, for a person whose permanent residence is not in this state, a place where the person is employed, practices a vocation, or is enrolled as a student for any period of time in this state.
The version of my papers (2018) refers to 3 days or more for a temporary or transient address… What is the correct number?
Its unreal, stupidity at the highest level here. There really does need to be some sort of revolt. Imagine yourself doing one of these jobs at the Sheriffs office or DMV, I’d have to quit, and that would have been before I knew what I know now about this debacle.
We should all legally change our names to the same thing. A popular name that is indexed very well in google.
Example:
Ron Book Males
Lauren Book Females
or Representative Christopher Smith who authored IML
This would completley render the registry useless as all names would be the same.
Also, what would happen, if we all just started registering temporary addresses. Like a ton of them, starting with Ron Books address or neighbor to Lauren Book?
Headlines: 60,000 SO’s in State of Florida in Bed with Ron Book and Daughter Lauren.
LMAO
now that’s FUNNY !!!! thank you i really needed a laugh !
NEWS FLASH !! A SEX OFFENDER OR PREDATOR CANNOT CHANGE THEIR NAME !!!. That law passed many years ago !!!.
1st Sarcasm…. and your fact statement is not very accurate. Do not pass go and no monoply for you unless you lighten up.
Move to another state. Wait the minimum time period to change name. Then do it.
ROFL! LOVE IT!!!!!!
Sadly we can’t even get every registrant to to give $1 towards each legal campaign in progress to take down the registry one piece at a time. If every registrant gave for example $1 per month each year we probably be done with the whole registry Thing by now. The number of lawsuits we could deal with would be enough to make a serious dent in the registry and could have expedited getting the registry taken down much sooner. I do like this mindset of everybody got together to make the registry completely irrelevant through still legal methods.
CORRECTION!
As long as you do not move you can also have a temp address without changing your drivers lic. I have paperwork on that from state attorney buried somewhere as i was arrested for failure to register and 1 year later failure to update change lic. both times state dismissed the charges and also advised police that a person can have 2 or 3 temp address so long as they do not actually move from their perm. address
Please share that paperwork with us. An FAC member is dealing with this issue presently and both the registration office in the relevant county and the FDLE advised otherwise. If you have paperwork, it would be extremely helpful to his case and anyone else who is dealing with this.
I am in Orange County, and have listed a temporary address before. At the registration they asked me for the address, and how long I might be using it. I used 6 months at the time, but did not “move” there just said that sometimes I might be staying there. I really didn’t use it that often, but I never had a problem. I never had any problems with it, and the person that lives there never said anything about police randomly stopping by or anything of that nature.
It seems like yet ANOTHER really gray area that is purposely made ambiguous so they can shape it to their needs on a per-case basis.