Judge: Sex offender GPS monitoring lawsuit can proceed
A judge has refused to dismiss a Chancery Court lawsuit challenging a state law that requires certain sex offenders on probation to wear an ankle GPS monitor.
The suit, filed in May by the American Civil Liberties Union, claims that the GPS monitoring law, enacted in 2007, is unconstitutional because it is being applied to those convicted of crimes that happened before 2007.
The law requires certain high-risk sex offenders, categorized as Tier III, wear and pay for GPS monitors.
Vice Chancellor Donald F. Parsons, Jr. ruled Tuesday that the suit against Department of Correction Commissioner Robert Coupe can proceed.
The judge rejected the Department of Correction’s argument that the case belonged in Superior Court, rather than Chancery Court.
He also rejected the argument that the suit could usurp the Superior Court’s authority to enforce Delaware’s laws or open a floodgate for other criminal defendants to seek relief from the Department of Correction.
“This case does not threaten to disrupt that balance,” Parsons wrote. “It is not a criminal action.”
The suit is being brought on behalf of three sex offenders who were convicted of crimes before 2007.
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I am curious about this case – didn’t the Supreme Court of the US just rule that GPS monitoring does indeed constitute illegal search and seizure? If so, then once a registered citizen completes the adjudicated sentence everything after is civil is it not? Then forcing a registered citizen to wear GPS as a factor of the registry would be illegal search and seizure? Anyone here know anything else about that?
The Supreme Court agreed that GPS monitoring is a search, even if it is not a criminal search (The state argued that it was a civil search in nature) But the court said it must be determined whether such a search is reasonable, which affects its constitutionality. They punted that question back to the state supreme court. See Grady v. North Carolina 14-593