Sex offenders registration bill passes

Thursday, June 9, 2005 | 9:33 a.m.

SUN CAPITAL BUREAU

CARSON CITY -- A bill that tightens the law on registration of sex offenders cleared the Legislature on its final day and will soon be sent to Gov. Kenny Guinn.

There was some confusion whether Senate Bill 341 made it through the legislative process during the final push towards adjournment when scores of bills were considered.

The website of the Legislature has the Senate receiving the bill on the final night and sending it to the printer. But there is no notation that it has been enrolled and transmitted to the governor.

Lorne Malkiewich, director of the Legislature Counsel Bureau, said the bill passed and it was delivered to the printer. Once the Senate bill passed the Assembly and was sent to the Senate, that constituted final approval.

Because the staffs went home and are due back today, the progress of the bill was not completed on the website information. The bill on the website is listed as the fourth reprint, but Malkiewich said there is actually a fifth reprint.

Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas, who said she is pleased with the passage of the measure, said there will be better information available to the public. Instead of only the ZIP code that is available now, an offender's address will be revealed.

"It tightens up on the registration of sex offender," Titus said.

Also, Titus said, sex offenders must renew their driver's licenses every year.

The bill calls for the state's Central Repository to have the complete addresses of any residences where the convicted sex r offender lived, and it will have the number of the street block but not the specific street number of any location where the offender works or is a student.

The bill spells out that if a District Court grants probation or a suspended sentence to a sex offender, it must impose a condition the individual must submit to a search of him, his residence or car at any time by a peace officer without a warrant.

The 40-page bill says an offender convicted of a crime against a child who commits a second or subsequent offense within seven years of the first violation shall not be entitled to probation or a suspended sentence.

Included in the definition of sexual offenses now is the voluntary sexual conduct between a prisoner and another person.

Part of the bill becomes effective in July and other parts in July 2006.