Nichols v. United States
The Court ruled that a federal sex-offender registration law did not require a man who moved from Kansas to the Philippines to notify Kansas authorities of his departure, because the law only covers places where an offender currently lives, works, or studies.
The decision means the federal statute's present-tense wording controls: once someone leaves a state, that state is no longer a place the law requires the person to check in with, even though other laws may still require notice on departure.
How it got here: Nichols pleaded guilty but appealed; the Tenth Circuit affirmed his conviction, and the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case to resolve a circuit split.
The Case in Depth
What happened
Lester Ray Nichols, a registered sex offender living near Kansas City, Kansas, abruptly left the country for the Philippines without telling Kansas authorities he was leaving. He was arrested in Manila, brought back to the United States, and charged with failing to update his sex-offender registration under a federal law called SORNA. He argued the law never required him to notify Kansas once he had already moved away.
The question before the Court
Did federal law require a registered sex offender who moved from Kansas to the Philippines to update his sex-offender registration in Kansas after he left?
Why it matters
Sex offenders who move out of a state and out of the country are not automatically committing a federal crime by failing to tell their old state they left, under this specific statute. States and Congress may need to rely on separate state laws or newer federal travel-notification requirements to track offenders who leave the country, rather than this registration provision alone.
What changes now
The Tenth Circuit's decision affirming Nichols's conviction is reversed, which as a practical matter undermines that conviction under this particular provision. The ruling is a final merits decision resolving a split between circuit courts. Congress has since passed a separate law criminalizing failure to report international travel plans, and state laws may independently require notice before leaving, so departing offenders are not entirely free of registration obligations going forward.
What this does not decide
The Court's holding does not mean sex offenders can freely leave the country without any registration consequences. It leaves in place separate federal travel-notification laws and state departure-notice requirements, and only addresses this specific SORNA provision's present-tense wording.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The Court focused on the statute's use of present-tense verbs: a sex offender must register in each place where he currently 'resides,' 'is an employee,' or 'is a student.' Once someone moves away, he no longer 'resides' in the old location in the present tense.
- Because the law requires appearing in a jurisdiction 'involved' under this present-tense definition, a state a person has left is no longer an 'involved' jurisdiction, so there was no ongoing duty to check in there.
- A companion provision requires the in-person update to happen within three business days 'after' a change of residence; the Court reasoned a person cannot appear in a place 'after' leaving it, reinforcing that the departure state drops out of the picture once the move happens.
- The Court rejected the government's proposed reading that a jurisdiction stays 'involved' merely because the offender's name remains on its registry, explaining that adding such language would rewrite the statute rather than interpret it — a power courts do not have.
- The Court also rejected the government's argument that leaving an old residence and arriving at a new one count as two separate 'changes' requiring two updates, saying ordinary English usage treats a single move as one change, not several artificial steps.
- Having found the statute's text clear, the Court declined to stretch its purpose of closing registration gaps to override that plain text, especially since other laws still address offenders leaving the country.