Zeno challenged the registration based on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s Ruling in In Re J.B.,107 A.3d 1 (Pa. 2014) that “SORNA’s registration requirements improperly brand all juvenile offender’s reputations with an indelible mark of a dangerous recidivist even though the irrebuttable presumption linking adjudication of specified offenses with a high likelihood of recidivating is not ‘universally true.’ . . . The application of SORNA’s current lifetime registration requirements upon adjudication of specified offenses violates juvenile offenders’ due process rights by utilizing an irrebuttable presumption.”
The Commonwealth, however, argued that since Zeno was tried in criminal court rather than Juvenile Court, he was eligible for registration as a sex offender.
A panel of Superior Court justices disagreed with the Commonwealth and ruled that because Zeno was a juvenile when he committed the crimes, he does not have to register as a sex offender. In Re J.B. applies to him. See the decision here.
