Municipalities — sex offender ordinances

Listen to this article

Wisconsin Court of Appeals

Civil

Municipalities — sex offender ordinances

A registered sex offender is not entitled to a hearing on dangerousness before he can be enjoined from living in his home under a municipal ordinance.

“Kester points to the Ordinance’s application to all child sex offenders regardless of their individual circumstances or dangerousness as well as the permanency of the Ordinance’s application. We state the obvious: All convicted child sex offenders have proven themselves to be dangerous. A municipality is not required to regulate its police powers based upon someone’s prognostication as to the future acts of a convicted child sex offender. Kester argues that other municipalities in Wisconsin have enacted less onerous ordinances to show that the City’s objectives can be met by less drastic means. That fact may be true but, contrary to Kester’s argument, our laws provide that the City may make ‘reasonable categorical judgments that conviction of specified crimes should entail particular regulatory consequences.’ Id. at 103. Such categorical judgments do not require individual risk assessments to survive challenges on double jeopardy or ex post facto grounds. See id. at 104. Moreover, the City did not have to enact the best measure to reach its aims, only a reasonable one. See id. at 105. While we agree that the Ordinance places burdens upon Kester and other child sex offenders who wish to live in South Milwaukee, we cannot say these restrictions are not reasonable to achieve the City’s purpose of protecting against the risk that a child sex offender may reoffend.”

Affirmed.

Recommended for publication in the official reports.

2012AP724 City of South Milwaukee v. Kester

Dist. I, Milwaukee County, White, J., Reilly, J.

Attorneys: For Appellant: Dupuis, Laurence Jacques, Milwaukee; For Respondent: Murphy, Joseph G., South Milwaukee