Adkins v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

38 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 38 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “[T]he Sex Offender Registration Act is not a part of the Arkansas Criminal Code; rather, it is located in Title 12 of the Code, which deals with “Law Enforcement, Emergency Management, and Military Affairs.” Thus, under § 5-2 — 204(c)(2), a culpable mental state is not required if the offense “clearly indicates a legislative intent to dispense with any culpable mental state requirement for the offense or for any element of the offense.” [[Image here]] The Act certainly indicates a legislative intent to place the burden of knowing the gravity of the situation, as well as the mandatory nature of the registration scheme, on the sex offender.... [Although the General Assembly did not specifically spell out an intention to dispense with a scienter requirement, it is obvious that the registration requirements are mandatory, and that failure to comply with those duties is a strict liability offense. [[Image here]] Moreover, in Kellar v. Fayetteville Police Department, 339 Ark. 274 , 5 S.W.3d 402 (1999), this court stated that “no scienter is indicated in Arkansas’s Act, and we conclude the offender’s failure to register alone is sufficient to trigger the Act’s provisions.” Kellar, 339 Ark. at 285 , 5 S.W.3d at 409 . [[Image here]] Combining these statements from Kellar with an analysis of the entire statutory scheme, we conclude that it is clear that failure to register is a strict liability offense. Because the State proved that Adkins was required to register but failed to do so, ”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. Morrow v. State