California Megan’s Law: Tiers, Registration, and Restrictions

California’s Megan’s Law requires people convicted of specified sex offenses to register with local law enforcement and publishes most of their information on a public state website at meganslaw.ca.gov. How long someone has to register — 10 years, 20 years, or life — depends on the tier assigned to their conviction under a system that took effect in 2021. What the public can see about a given registrant also depends on that tier.

What You Can See on the Public Website

The California Department of Justice runs the Megan’s Law website, where anyone can search for registered sex offenders by name, address, or zip code, or around a specific school or park.¹ Not every registrant appears the same way. The law sets different disclosure levels based on the offense and tier.

Full Address

Registrants convicted of the most serious offenses, and all Tier 3 offenders, appear with their full home address, name, aliases, photograph, physical description, date of birth, and criminal history.²

Community and Zip Code Only

Tier 2 offenders and people convicted of annoying or molesting a child under Penal Code section 647.6 appear with their community of residence and zip code but not their street address. Their name, photo, physical description, and criminal history are still visible.²

Excluded From the Website

Some registrants can apply to be left off the website entirely. Exclusion is available in narrow situations, primarily where the qualifying offense was intrafamily (the offender was the victim’s parent, stepparent, sibling, or grandparent), did not involve certain penetrative acts, and the offender successfully completed probation.² Juvenile adjudications are also excluded. Website exclusion does not end the registration duty itself; the person still has to register with law enforcement.

National Registry

The Dru Sjodin National Sex Offender Public Website at nsopw.gov searches across all 50 states, the District of Columbia, U.S. territories, and tribal jurisdictions from a single query.

Who Has to Register

Registration is triggered by a conviction for any offense listed in Penal Code section 290(c), which runs from rape and lewd acts with a child to felony sexual battery and kidnapping committed with sexual intent.³ For the listed offenses, registration is mandatory; the sentencing judge cannot waive it.

Some misdemeanors also trigger registration, including misdemeanor sexual battery and indecent exposure. Beyond the statutory list, a judge can order registration for any crime if the court finds it was committed out of sexual compulsion or for sexual gratification.

Where the conviction happened does not matter. A person convicted in federal court, military court, or another state who then moves to California must register here too.³

The Three Tiers and How Long Registration Lasts

Before 2021, nearly all registrants had to register for life. Senate Bill 384 replaced that with a three-tier system that ties registration length to offense severity.⁴ The Department of Justice assigns each registrant’s tier based on the qualifying conviction and criminal history.

Tier 1: Ten Years Minimum

Tier 1 covers people required to register for a misdemeanor or for a felony that does not qualify as a serious or violent felony under California law. The minimum period is 10 years.³

Tier 2: Twenty Years Minimum

Tier 2 applies to offenses that qualify as serious or violent felonies, along with specific offenses like incest or a second conviction for annoying or molesting a child. The minimum period is 20 years.³

Tier 3: Lifetime

Tier 3 requires lifetime registration. It applies to the most serious offenses, including murder committed during a sexual assault, kidnapping with sexual intent, aggravated sexual assault of a child, and continuous sexual abuse of a child. It also covers anyone previously found to be a sexually violent predator and anyone who commits a subsequent violent sex offense after an earlier registerable conviction.³ A person placed in Tier 3 solely because their risk assessment score is in the highest range may eventually petition for removal after 20 years.⁴

Getting Off the Registry

Tier 1 and Tier 2 registrants can petition the superior court in the county where they are registered to end their registration once the minimum period has elapsed. The petition can be filed on or after the registrant’s next birthday after the minimum period expires.⁵

If no one objects, the court grants the petition as long as the registrant is currently registered, has no pending charges that could change their tier, and is not in custody, on parole, on probation, or on supervised release. If the district attorney or a law enforcement agency requests a hearing, the court weighs the facts of the offense, the registrant’s conduct since conviction, whether they completed a certified treatment program, and their assessed risk of reoffense before deciding.⁵

A narrower early-termination path exists for certain Tier 2 registrants. They can petition after just 10 years from release if the offense involved only one victim between 14 and 17, the offender was under 21 at the time, and the offense was not a violent felony or a human trafficking offense.⁵ Tier 3 registrants cannot petition for removal, except for the risk-score subset noted above.

How Registration Works Day to Day

A person required to register must do so in person at the local police department or sheriff’s office within five working days of being released from custody, being convicted, or moving into a new city or county.³ Living on a University of California, California State University, or community college campus adds a duty to register with campus police as well.

At registration, law enforcement collects the current home address, employment details, and the name of any school the registrant attends, along with physical descriptors, photographs, fingerprints, and vehicle information. Any change of address, name, or job must be updated within five working days.

Every registrant renews annually, within five working days of their birthday, whether anything has changed or not. A person without a fixed address is classified as a transient and has to re-register at least once every 30 days with the agency covering the area where they are physically present. Moving into a residence starts a five-working-day clock to register at that address.

Penalties for Failing to Register

Missing a registration deadline is a separate criminal offense. Willful violation is a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in county jail for misdemeanor registrants, and a felony carrying 16 months, two years, or three years in state prison for felony registrants. The felony level also applies to anyone with a prior failure-to-register conviction, regardless of whether the original offense was a misdemeanor or felony.⁶

A transient who misses the 30-day window faces a misdemeanor with a minimum of 30 days and a maximum of six months in county jail; a third or later violation becomes a felony. Even when a court grants probation for a failure-to-register conviction, the defendant must serve at least 90 days in county jail as a condition of probation.⁶

Restrictions That Come With Registration

Working With Children

Any registrant who applies for or accepts a job or volunteer position that involves working directly and in an unaccompanied setting with minors on more than an occasional basis must disclose their registration status to the employer or organization. The same disclosure requirement applies to accompanied positions where the work involves regularly touching children. Registrants whose victim was a child under 16 are banned outright from working in an unaccompanied setting with minors or holding supervisory authority over children, whether as employee, contractor, or volunteer. Violation is a misdemeanor punishable by up to six months in county jail, a fine up to $1,000, or both.⁷

Where You Can Live

Proposition 83 (Jessica’s Law), passed in 2006, added Penal Code section 3003.5(b), barring registered sex offenders on parole from living within 2,000 feet of any school or park. California courts struck down blanket enforcement as unconstitutional. Distance-based residency limits can still appear as case-by-case parole or probation conditions, and some local ordinances impose their own rules. Anyone subject to registration should check their specific supervision conditions and local ordinances.

International Travel and Passports

Under the federal Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA), registrants must notify their registering agency at least 21 days before any planned international travel.⁸ The information is forwarded to the U.S. Marshals Service’s National Sex Offender Targeting Center.

Under 22 U.S.C. § 212b, the State Department will not issue a passport to a covered sex offender unless it carries a unique identifier printed inside the book: “The bearer was convicted of a sex offense against a minor, and is a covered sex offender pursuant to 22 USC 212b(c)(1).”⁹ The State Department can revoke a previously issued passport that lacks the identifier. A “covered sex offender” is anyone currently required to register under any jurisdiction’s program, and the identifier can only be removed once the person is no longer required to register.¹⁰

Federal Housing

Public Housing Agencies are required by federal regulation to deny admission to any applicant subject to a lifetime sex offender registration requirement under state law. This covers both public housing and Housing Choice Voucher (Section 8) programs. For California, that means Tier 3 registrants are categorically ineligible for federally assisted housing. Tier 1 and Tier 2 registrants cannot be denied on that basis alone, since those tiers are time-limited. Sex offender status is not a protected class under the Fair Housing Act.¹¹

GPS Monitoring on Parole

Sex offenders released on parole may be placed on GPS monitoring as a condition of supervision. Removing, disabling, or tampering with the device is a parole violation that can lead to reincarceration. Monitoring is imposed case by case and is separate from the registration obligation itself.

How You Can Legally Use the Information

California law limits how anyone can use information from the Megan’s Law website. It exists for protecting yourself and your family. Using it to commit a crime against a registrant, to harass someone, or to discriminate unlawfully in housing or employment can lead to criminal prosecution and civil liability. The statute authorizes both.

1
State of California – Department of Justice – Office of the Attorney General. Megan’s Law
2
California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 290.46
3
California Legislative Information. California Code PEN 290 – Sex Offender Registration Act
4
California Department of Justice. California Tiered Sex Offender Registration (Senate Bill 384) FAQs
5
California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 290.5
6
California Legislative Information. California Code PEN 290.018
7
California Legislative Information. California Penal Code 290.95
8
Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking (SMART). SORNA: Information Required for Notice of International Travel
9
U.S. Department of State. Passports and International Megan’s Law
10
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 22 USC 212b – Unique Passport Identifiers for Covered Sex Offenders
11
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). State Registered Lifetime Sex Offenders in the Housing Choice Voucher and Public Housing Programs FAQ