[Federal Register: May 14, 2010 (Volume 75, Number 93)]
[Notices]
[Page 27362-27366]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr14my10-108]

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DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

Office of the Attorney General

[Docket No. OAG 134; AG Order No. 3150-2010]
RIN 1105-AB36


Supplemental Guidelines for Sex Offender Registration and
Notification

AGENCY: Department of Justice.

ACTION: Notice; Proposed guidelines.

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SUMMARY: The Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA)
establishes minimum national standards for sex offender registration
and notification. The Attorney General issued the National Guidelines
for Sex Offender Registration and Notification (``SORNA Guidelines'' or
``Guidelines'') on July 2, 2008, to provide guidance and assistance to
jurisdictions in implementing the SORNA standards in their sex offender
registration and notification programs. These supplemental guidelines
augment or modify certain features of the SORNA Guidelines in order to
make a change required by the KIDS Act and to address other issues
arising in jurisdictions' implementation of the SORNA requirements. The
matters addressed include certain aspects of public Web site posting of
sex offender information, interjurisdictional tracking and information
sharing regarding sex offenders, the review process concerning
jurisdictions' SORNA implementation, the classes of sex offenders to be
registered by jurisdictions retroactively, and the treatment of Indian
tribes newly recognized by the Federal Government subsequent to the
enactment of SORNA.

DATES: Written comments must be postmarked and electronic comments must
be submitted on or before July 13, 2010. Commenters should be aware
that the electronic Federal Docket Management System will not accept
comments after Midnight Eastern Time on the last day of the comment
period.

ADDRESSES: Comments may be mailed to Linda M. Baldwin, Director, SMART
Office, Office of Justice Programs, United States Department of
Justice, 810 7th Street, NW., Washington, DC 20531. To ensure proper
handling, please reference OAG Docket No. 134 on your correspondence.
You may submit comments electronically or view an electronic version of
these proposed guidelines at http://www.regulations.gov.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Linda M. Baldwin, Director, Office of
Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and
Tracking; Office of Justice Programs, United States Department of
Justice, Washington, DC, 202-305-2463.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

Posting of Public Comments

    Please note that all comments received are considered part of the
public record and made available for public inspection online at http:/
/www.regulations.gov. Such information includes personal identifying
information (such as your name, address, etc.) voluntarily submitted by
the commenter.
    If you want to submit personal identifying information (such as
your name, address, etc.) as part of your comment, but do not want it
to be posted online, you must include the phrase ``PERSONAL IDENTIFYING
INFORMATION'' in the first paragraph of your comment. You also must
locate all the personal identifying information you do not want posted
online in the first paragraph of your comment and identify what
information you want redacted.
    If you want to submit confidential business information as part of
your comment but do not want it to be posted online, you must include
the phrase ``CONFIDENTIAL BUSINESS INFORMATION'' in the first paragraph
of your comment. You also must prominently identify confidential
business information to be redacted within the comment. If a comment
has so much confidential business information that it cannot be
effectively

[[Page 27363]]

redacted, all or part of that comment may not be posted on http://
www.regulations.gov.
    Personal identifying information and confidential business
information identified and located as set forth above will be placed in
the agency's public docket file, but not posted online. If you wish to
inspect the agency's public docket file in person by appointment,
please see the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT paragraph.
    The reason the Department is requesting electronic comments before
Midnight Eastern Time on the day the comment period closes is that the
inter-agency Regulations.gov/Federal Docket Management System (FDMS),
which receives electronic comments, terminates the public's ability to
submit comments at Midnight on the day the comment period closes.
Commenters in time zones other than Eastern may want to take this fact
into account so that their electronic comments can be received. The
constraints imposed by the Regulations.gov/FDMS system do not apply to
U.S. postal comments, which will be considered as timely filed if they
are postmarked before Midnight on the day the comment period closes.

Overview

    The Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act, which is title
I of the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006, Public Law
109-248, was enacted on July 27, 2006. SORNA (46 U.S.C. 16901 et seq.)
establishes minimum national standards for sex offender registration
and notification in the jurisdictions to which it applies.
``Jurisdictions'' in the relevant sense are the 50 states, the District
of Columbia, the five principal U.S. territories, and Indian tribes
that satisfy certain criteria. 42 U.S.C. 16911(10). SORNA directs the
Attorney General to issue guidelines and regulations to interpret and
implement SORNA. See id. 16912(b).
    To this end, the Attorney General issued the National Guidelines
for Sex Offender Registration and Notification, 73 FR 38030, on July 2,
2008. The SORNA standards are administered by the Office of Sex
Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and
Tracking (``SMART Office''), which assists all jurisdictions in their
SORNA implementation efforts and determines whether jurisdictions have
successfully completed these efforts. See 42 U.S.C. 16945; 73 FR at
38044, 38047-48.
    Since the publication of the SORNA Guidelines, issues have arisen
in SORNA implementation that require that some aspects of the
Guidelines be augmented or modified. Consequently, the Department of
Justice is proposing these supplemental guidelines, which do the
following:
    (1) Allow jurisdictions, in their discretion, to exempt information
concerning sex offenders required to register on the basis of juvenile
delinquency adjudications from public Web site posting.
    (2) Require jurisdictions to exempt sex offenders' e-mail addresses
and other Internet identifiers from public Web site posting, pursuant
to the KIDS Act, 42 U.S.C. 16915a.
    (3) Require jurisdictions to have sex offenders report
international travel 21 days in advance of such travel and to submit
information concerning such travel to the appropriate Federal agencies
and databases.
    (4) Clarify the means to be utilized to ensure consistent
interjurisdictional information sharing and tracking of sex offenders.
    (5) Expand required registration information to include the forms
signed by sex offenders acknowledging that they were advised of their
registration obligations.
    (6) Provide additional information concerning the review process
for determining that jurisdictions have substantially implemented the
SORNA requirements in their programs and continue to comply with these
requirements.
    (7) Afford jurisdictions greater latitude regarding the
registration of sex offenders who have fully exited the justice system
but later reenter through a new (non-sex-offense) criminal conviction
by providing that jurisdictions may limit such registration to cases in
which the new conviction is for a felony.
    (8) Provide, for Indian tribes that are newly recognized by the
Federal government following the enactment of SORNA, authorization and
time frames for such tribes to elect whether to become SORNA
registration jurisdictions and to implement SORNA.

Proposed Supplemental Guidelines for Sex Offender Registration and
Notification

Contents

I. Public Notification
    A. Juvenile Delinquents
    B. Internet Identifiers
II. Interjurisdictional Tracking and Information Sharing
    A. International Travel
    B. Domestic Interjurisdictional Tracking
    C. Acknowledgment Forms
III. Ongoing Implementation Assurance
IV. Retroactive Classes
V. Newly Recognized Tribes

I. Public Notification

A. Juvenile Delinquents

    SORNA includes as covered ``sex offender[s]'' juveniles at least 14
years old who are adjudicated delinquent for particularly serious sex
offenses. See 42 U.S.C. 16911(1), (8). While the SORNA Guidelines
endeavored to facilitate jurisdictions' compliance with this aspect of
SORNA, see 73 FR at 38030, 38040-41, 38050, resistance by some
jurisdictions to public disclosure of information about sex offenders
in this class has continued to be one of the largest impediments to
SORNA implementation.
    Hence, the Attorney General is exercising his authority under 42
U.S.C. 16918(c)(4) to create additional discretionary exemptions from
public Web site disclosure to allow jurisdictions to exempt from public
Web site disclosure information concerning sex offenders required to
register on the basis of juvenile delinquency adjudications. This
change creates a new discretionary, not mandatory, exemption from
public Web site disclosure. It does not limit the discretion of
jurisdictions to include information concerning sex offenders required
to register on the basis of juvenile delinquency adjudications on their
public Web sites if they so wish.
    The change regarding public Web site disclosure does not authorize
treating sex offenders required to register on the basis of juvenile
delinquency adjudications differently from sex offenders with adult
convictions in other respects. Whether a case involves a juvenile
delinquency adjudication in the category covered by SORNA or an adult
conviction, SORNA's registration requirements remain applicable, see 42
U.S.C. 16913-16, as do the requirements to transmit or make available
registration information to the national (non-public) databases of sex
offender information, to law enforcement and supervision agencies, and
to registration authorities in other jurisdictions, see 73 FR at 38060.
    Jurisdictions are not required to provide registration information
concerning sex offenders required to register on the basis of juvenile
delinquency adjudications to the entities described in the SORNA
Guidelines at 73 FR 38061, i.e., certain school, public housing, social
service, and volunteer entities, and other organizations, companies, or
individuals who request notification. This reflects an exercise of the
Attorney General's authority to create exceptions to required
information disclosure under 42 U.S.C. 16921(b). Accordingly,

[[Page 27364]]

if a jurisdiction decides not to include information on a juvenile
delinquent sex offender on its public Web site, as is allowed by these
supplemental guidelines, information on the sex offender does not have
to be disclosed to these entities.

B. Internet Identifiers

    The KIDS Act, which was enacted in 2008, directed the Attorney
General to utilize pre-existing legal authorities under SORNA to adopt
certain measures relating to sex offenders' ``Internet identifiers,''
defined to mean e-mail addresses and other designations used for self-
identification or routing in Internet communication or posting. The
KIDS Act requires the Attorney General to (i) include appropriate
Internet identifier information in the registration information sex
offenders are required to provide, (ii) specify the time and manner for
keeping that information current, (iii) exempt such information from
public Web site posting, and (iv) ensure that procedures are in place
to notify sex offenders of resulting obligations. See 42 U.S.C. 16915a.
    The SORNA Guidelines incorporate requirements (i)-(ii) and (iv), as
described above. See 73 FR at 38055 (Internet identifiers to be
included in registration information), 38066 (reporting of changes in
Internet identifiers), 38063-65 (notifying sex offenders of SORNA
requirements). However, while the Guidelines discouraged the inclusion
of sex offenders' Internet identifiers on the public Web sites, they
did not adopt a mandatory exclusion of this information from public Web
site posting, which the KIDS Act now requires. See 42 U.S.C. 16915a(c);
73 FR at 38059-60.
    The authority under 42 U.S.C. 16918(b)(4) to create additional
mandatory exemptions from public Web site disclosure is accordingly
exercised to exempt sex offenders' Internet identifiers from public Web
site posting. This means that jurisdictions cannot, consistent with
SORNA, include sex offenders' Internet identifiers (such as e-mail
addresses) in the sex offenders' public Web site postings or otherwise
list or post sex offenders' Internet identifiers on the public sex
offender Web sites.
    This change does not limit jurisdictions' retention and use of sex
offenders' Internet identifier information for purposes other than
public disclosure, including submission of the information to the
national (non-public) databases of sex offender information, sharing of
the information with law enforcement and supervision agencies, and
sharing of the information with registration authorities in other
jurisdictions. See 73 FR at 38060. The change also does not limit the
discretion of jurisdictions to include on their public Web sites
functions by which members of the public can ascertain whether a
specified e-mail address or other Internet identifier is reported as
that of a registered sex offender, see id. at 38059-60, or to disclose
Internet identifier information to any one by means other than public
Web site posting.
    The exemption of sex offenders' Internet identifiers from public
Web site disclosure does not override or limit the requirement that sex
offenders' names, including any aliases, be included in their public
Web site postings. See 73 FR at 38059. A sex offender's use of his name
or an alias to identify himself or for other purposes in Internet
communications or postings does not exempt the name or alias from
public Web site disclosure.

II. Interjurisdictional Tracking and Information Sharing

A. International Travel

    Certain features of SORNA and the SORNA Guidelines require the
Department of Justice, in conjunction with other Federal agencies, to
develop reliable means for identifying and tracking sex offenders who
enter or leave the United States. See 42 U.S.C. 16928; 73 FR at 38066-
67. To that end, the Guidelines provide that sex offenders must be
required to inform their residence jurisdictions if they intend to
commence residence, employment, or school attendance outside of the
United States, and that jurisdictions that are so informed must notify
the U.S. Marshals Service and update the sex offender's registration
information in the national databases. See 73 FR at 38067. (Regarding
the general requirement to provide registration information for
inclusion in the National Sex Offender Registry and other appropriate
databases at the national level, see 42 U.S.C. 16921(b)(1); 73 FR at
38060.) In addition, the Guidelines provide that sex offenders must be
required to inform their residence jurisdictions about lodging at
places away from their residences for seven days or more, regardless of
whether that results from domestic or international travel. See 73 FR
at 38056, 38066.
    Since the issuance of the Guidelines, the SMART Office has
continued to work with other agencies of the Department of Justice, the
Department of Homeland Security, the Department of State, and the
Department of Defense on the development of a system for consistently
identifying and tracking sex offenders who engage in international
travel. Although, as noted, the current Guidelines require reporting of
international travel information in certain circumstances, the existing
requirements are not sufficient to provide the information needed for
tracking such travel consistently.
    The authority under 42 U.S.C. 16914(a)(7) to expand the range of
required registration information is accordingly exercised to provide
that registrants must be required to inform their residence
jurisdictions of intended travel outside of the United States at least
21 days in advance of such travel. Pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 16921(b),
jurisdictions so informed must provide the international travel
information to the U.S. Marshals Service, and must transmit or make
available that information to national databases, law enforcement and
supervision agencies, and other jurisdictions as provided in the
Guidelines. See 73 FR at 38060. Jurisdictions need not disclose
international travel information to the entities described in the SORNA
Guidelines at 73 FR 38061[boxh]i.e., certain school, public housing,
social service, and volunteer entities, and other organizations,
companies, or individuals who request notification. See 42 U.S.C.
16921(b). As the international tracking system continues to develop,
the SMART Office may issue additional directions to jurisdictions to
provide notification concerning international travel by sex offenders,
such as notice to Interpol, or notice to Department of Defense agencies
concerning sex offenders who may live on U.S. military bases abroad.
    While notice of international travel will generally be required as
described above, it is recognized that requiring 21 days advance notice
may occasionally be unnecessary or inappropriate. For example, a sex
offender may need to travel abroad unexpectedly because of a family or
work emergency. Or separate advance notice of intended international
trips may be unworkable and pointlessly burdensome for a sex offender
who lives in a northern border state and commutes to Canada for work on
a daily basis. Jurisdictions that wish to accommodate such situations
should include information about their policies or practices in this
area in their submissions to the SMART Office and the SMART Office will
determine whether they adequately serve SORNA's international tracking
objectives.

[[Page 27365]]

B. Domestic Interjurisdictional Tracking

    SORNA and the SORNA Guidelines require interjurisdictional sharing
of registration information in various contexts and SORNA directs the
Attorney General, in consultation with the jurisdictions, to develop
and support software facilitating the immediate exchange of information
among jurisdictions. See 42 U.S.C. 16913(c), 16919(b), 16921(b)(3),
16923; 73 FR at 38047, 38062-68. The SMART Office accordingly has
created and maintains the SORNA Exchange Portal, which enables the
immediate exchange of information about registered sex offenders among
the jurisdictions.
    Regular use of this tool is essential to ensuring that information
is reliably shared among jurisdictions and that interjurisdictional
tracking of sex offenders occurs consistently and effectively as SORNA
contemplates. For example, if a jurisdiction sends notice that a sex
offender has reported an intention to change his residence to another
jurisdiction, but the destination jurisdiction fails to access the
notice promptly, the sex offender's failure to appear or register in
the destination jurisdiction may go unnoticed or detection of the
violation may be delayed. Accordingly, to be approved as having
substantially implemented SORNA, jurisdictions must, at a minimum, have
a policy of regularly accessing the SORNA Exchange Portal to receive
messages from other jurisdictions.
    Technological improvements may facilitate the creation of new tools
that may eventually replace the existing SORNA Exchange Portal. If that
occurs, the SMART Office may issue directions to jurisdictions
concerning the use of these new tools that jurisdictions will need to
follow to be approved as substantially implementing SORNA.

C. Acknowledgment Forms

    SORNA provides that sex offenders are to be informed of their
registration obligations and required to sign acknowledgments that this
information has been provided upon their initial registration. See 42
U.S.C. 16917. Even before the enactment of SORNA, similar requirements
were included in the predecessor national standards for sex offender
registration and notification of the Jacob Wetterling Crimes Against
Children and Sexually Violent Offender Registration Act (42 U.S.C.
14071(b)(1)(A), prior to its repeal by SORNA).
    SORNA requires jurisdictions to provide criminal penalties for sex
offenders who fail to comply with SORNA's requirements, see 42 U.S.C.
16913(e), and Federal criminal liability is authorized for sex
offenders who knowingly fail to register or update a registration as
required by SORNA under circumstances supporting Federal jurisdiction,
see 18 U.S.C. 2250. Successful prosecution of sex offenders for
registration violations under these provisions may require proof that
they were aware of a requirement to register.
    The acknowledgment forms signed by sex offenders regarding their
registration obligations are likely to be the most consistently
available and definitive proof of such knowledge. Including these forms
in registration information will make them readily available in the
jurisdictions in which sex offenders are initially registered, and will
make them available to other jurisdictions pursuant to the provisions
of SORNA and the Guidelines for transmission of registration
information to other jurisdictions. See 42 U.S.C. 16921(b)(3); 73 FR at
38060.
    The authority under 42 U.S.C. 16914(b)(8) to expand the range of
required registration information is accordingly exercised to require
that sex offenders' signed acknowledgment forms be included in their
registration information. The existing Guidelines already provide that
acknowledgment forms covering the SORNA requirements are to be obtained
from registrants as part of the SORNA implementation process and
thereafter. See 73 FR at 38063-65. As with other forms of documentary
registration information, the inclusion of these forms in registration
information can be effected by scanning the forms and including the
resulting electronic documents in the registry databases or by
including links or information that provides access to other databases
in which the signed acknowledgments are available in electronic form.
See 73 FR at 38055.

III. Ongoing Implementation Assurance

    The SORNA Guidelines explain that the SMART Office will determine
whether jurisdictions have substantially implemented the SORNA
requirements in their programs and that jurisdictions are to provide
submissions to the SMART Office to facilitate this determination. See
42 U.S.C. 16924-25; 73 FR at 38047-48.
    SORNA itself and the Guidelines assume throughout that
jurisdictions must implement SORNA in practice, not just on paper, and
the Guidelines provide many directions and suggestions for putting the
SORNA standards into effect. See, e.g., 42 U.S.C. 16911(9), 16912(a),
16913(c), 16914(b), 16917, 16918, 16921(b), 16922; 73 FR at 38059-61,
38063-70. The Department of Justice and the SMART Office are making
available to jurisdictions a wide range of practical aids to SORNA
implementation, including software and communication systems to
facilitate the exchange of sex offender information among jurisdictions
and other technology and documentary tools. See 42 U.S.C. 16923; 73 FR
at 38031-32, 38047.
    Hence, implementation of SORNA is not just a matter of adopting
laws or rules that facially direct the performance of the measures
required by SORNA. It entails actually carrying out those measures and,
as noted, various forms of guidance and assistance have been provided
to that end. Accordingly, in reviewing jurisdictions' requests for
approval as having substantially implemented SORNA, the SMART Office
will not be limited to facial examination of registration laws and
policies, but rather will undertake such inquiry as is needed to ensure
that jurisdictions are substantially implementing SORNA's requirements
in practice. Jurisdictions can facilitate approval of their systems by
including in their submissions to the SMART Office information
concerning practical implementation measures and mechanisms, in
addition to relevant laws and rules, such as policy and procedure
manuals, description of infrastructure and technology resources, and
information about personnel and budgetary measures relating to the
operation of the jurisdiction's registration and notification system.
The SMART Office may require jurisdictions to provide additional
information, beyond that proffered in their submissions, as needed for
a determination.
    Jurisdictions that have substantially implemented SORNA have a
continuing obligation to maintain their system's consistency with
current SORNA standards. Those that are grantees under the Byrne
Justice Assistance Grant program will be required in connection with
the annual grant application process to establish that their systems
continue to meet SORNA standards. This will entail providing
information as directed by the SMART Office, in addition to the
information otherwise included in Byrne Grant applications, so that the
SMART Office can verify continuing implementation. Jurisdictions that
do not apply for Byrne Grants will also be required to demonstrate
periodically that their systems continue to meet SORNA standards as
directed by the SMART Office, and to provide such information

[[Page 27366]]

as the SMART Office may require to make this determination.
    If a jurisdiction's Byrne Justice Assistance Grant funding is
reduced because of non-implementation of SORNA, it may regain
eligibility for full funding in later program years by substantially
implementing SORNA in such later years. The SMART Office will continue
to work with all jurisdictions to ensure substantial implementation of
SORNA and verify that they continue to meet the requirements of SORNA
on an ongoing basis.

IV. Retroactive Classes

    SORNA's requirements apply to all sex offenders, regardless of when
they were convicted. See 28 CFR 72.3. However, the SORNA Guidelines
state that it will be deemed sufficient for substantial implementation
if jurisdictions register sex offenders with pre-SORNA or pre-SORNA-
implementation sex offense convictions who remain in the system as
prisoners, supervisees, or registrants, or who reenter the system
through a subsequent criminal conviction. See 73 FR at 38035-36, 38043,
38046-47, 38063-64. This feature of the Guidelines reflects an
assumption that it may not be possible for jurisdictions to identify
and register all sex offenders who fall within the SORNA registration
categories, particularly where they have left the justice system and
merged into the general population long ago, but that it will be
feasible for jurisdictions to do so in relation to sex offenders who
remain in the justice system or reenter it through a subsequent
criminal conviction. See 73 FR at 38046.
    Experience supports a qualification of this assumption in relation
to sex offenders who have fully exited the justice system but later
reenter it through a subsequent criminal conviction for a non-sex
offense that is relatively minor in character. (Where the subsequent
conviction is for a sex offense it independently requires registration
under SORNA.) In many jurisdictions the volume of misdemeanor
prosecutions is large and most such cases may need to be disposed of in
a manner that leaves little time or opportunity for examining the
defendant's criminal history and ascertaining whether it contains some
past sex offense conviction that would entail a present registration
requirement under SORNA. In contrast, where the subsequent offense is a
serious crime, ordinary practice is likely to involve closer scrutiny
of the defendant's past criminal conduct, and ascertaining whether it
includes a prior conviction requiring registration under SORNA should
not entail an onerous new burden on jurisdictions.
    These supplemental guidelines accordingly are modifying the
requirements for substantial implementation of SORNA in relation to sex
offenders who have fully exited the justice system, i.e., those who are
no longer prisoners, supervisees, or registrants. It will be sufficient
if a jurisdiction registers such offenders who reenter the system
through a subsequent criminal conviction in cases in which the
subsequent criminal conviction is for a felony, i.e., for an offense
for which the statutory maximum penalty exceeds a year of imprisonment.
This allowance is limited to cases in which the subsequent conviction
is for a non-sex offense. As noted above, a later conviction for a sex
offense independently requires registration under SORNA, regardless of
whether it is a felony or a misdemeanor.
    This allowance only establishes the minimum required for
substantial implementation of SORNA in this context. Jurisdictions
remain free to look more broadly and to establish systems to identify
and register sex offenders who reenter the justice system through
misdemeanor convictions, or even those who do not reenter the system
through later criminal convictions but fall within the registration
categories of SORNA or the jurisdiction's registration law.

V. Newly Recognized Tribes

    SORNA affords eligible federally-recognized Indian tribes a one-
year period, running from the date of SORNA's enactment on July 27,
2006, to elect whether to become SORNA registration jurisdictions or to
delegate their registration functions to the states within which they
are located. See 42 U.S.C. 16927(a)(1), (2)(B); 73 FR at 38049-50. In
principle there is no reason why an Indian tribe that initially
receives recognition by the Federal government following the enactment
of SORNA should be treated differently for SORNA purposes from other
federally recognized tribes. But if such a tribe is initially
recognized more than a year after the enactment of SORNA, then the
limitation period of Sec.  16927 will have passed before the tribe
became the kind of entity (a federally recognized tribe) that may be
eligible to become a SORNA registration jurisdiction.
    Where the normal starting point of a statutory time limit for
taking an action cannot sensibly be applied to a certain entity, the
statute may be construed to allow the entity a reasonable amount of
time to take the action. See Chicago & Alton R.R. Co. v. Tranbarger,
238 U.S. 67, 73-74 (1915); see also Taylor v. Horn, 504 F.3d 416, 426
(3d Cir. 2007) (running statutory time limit from later point where
normal starting point was already past).
    This principle will be applied to 42 U.S.C. 16927 to allow Indian
tribes that receive Federal recognition following the enactment of
SORNA a reasonable amount of time to elect whether to become SORNA
registration jurisdictions as provided in that section, and to allow
such tribes a reasonable amount of time for substantial implementation
of SORNA if they elect to be SORNA registration jurisdictions. In
assessing what constitutes a reasonable amount of time for these
purposes, the Department of Justice will look to the amount of time
SORNA generally affords for tribal elections and for jurisdictions'
implementation of the SORNA requirements. Hence, a tribe receiving
Federal recognition after SORNA's enactment that otherwise qualifies to
make the election under Sec.  16927(a) will be afforded a period of one
year to make the election, running from the date of the tribe's
recognition or the date of publication of these supplemental
guidelines, whichever is later. Likewise, such a tribe will be afforded
a period of three years for SORNA implementation, running from the same
starting point, subject to up to two possible one-year extensions. See
42 U.S.C. 16924.

    Dated: May 11, 2010.
Eric H. Holder, Jr.,
Attorney General.
[FR Doc. 2010-11665 Filed 5-12-10; 11:15 am]
BILLING CODE 4410-18-P