united-states public-domain sexual-offences
Is all sex offender registry information public domain in the USA?
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<p>In 1994, Congress mandated that all states develop sex offender registries. Two years later, Megan's Law provided that sex offender information must be made public. <a href="https://nij.ojp.gov/topics/articles/tracking-sex-offenders-federal-law-resources-have-led-marked-improvement-state" rel="nofollow noreferrer">National Institute of Justice, &quot;Tracking Sex Offenders&quot; November 13, 2020, nij.ojp.gov</a></p>
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<p>Every state in the US has a public registry of sex offenders and limited details as to their identity, home address, work address, etc.</p>
<p>Is this information in the public domain? Or does it vary state to state?</p>

<p>&quot;Public domain&quot; refers informally to copyright status, usually works whose protected status has expired. A list of names, addresses and criminal offenses is &quot;factual&quot;, not a creative expression, and is not subject to copyright protection. You may be thinking of &quot;public record&quot;, which is closer to an relevant expression. Typically, as instantiated in Washington state under <a href="https://app.leg.wa.gov/rcw/default.aspx?cite=9a.44.130" rel="nofollow noreferrer">RCW 9a.44.130 ff</a>, a person convicted of certain offenses is required to register with the county sheriff, and that registration is thus a &quot;public record&quot;. Under a separate law, <a href="https://apps.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=4.24.550" rel="nofollow noreferrer">RCW 4.24.550</a> disclosure is allowed &quot;when the agency determines that disclosure of the information is relevant and necessary to protect the public and counteract the danger created by the particular offender&quot; – in other jurisdictions disclosure may be mandatory. The specific information to be disclosed is &quot;name, relevant criminal convictions, address by hundred block, physical description, and photograph. The website shall provide mapping capabilities that display the sex offender's address by hundred block on a map&quot;. The <a href="https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=42.56&amp;full=true" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Public Records Act</a> does not exclude disclosure and copying of that information, so it is a public record in the sense that it must be disclosed on request.</p>
<p>Every state has its own laws implementing this desideratum: all states have such laws, they vary somewhat in details.</p>
