Eight years after Congressman Chris Smith (Hamilton, NJ) first introduced a bill to protect children in the U.S. and around the world from convicted pedophiles who travel in secret to or from the United States—currently below the radar of law enforcement officials—it is now on the verge of becoming law.

 Smith (NJ-04), author of International Megan’s Law to Prevent Demand for Child Sex Trafficking, H.R. 515, announced that the House unanimously approved HR 515 today. “It will now be sent on to the White House to provide children at home and abroad with new protections against predators,” Smith said.

 The legislation is named for Megan Kanka, a seven-year-old from Hamilton, N.J. in Smith’s district who was sexually assaulted and killed in 1994. Megan’s assailant was a convicted, repeat sex offender living across the street, unbeknownst to residents in the neighborhood. Due to public outcry in response to the tragedy and to hard work by Megan’s loving parents, Richard and Maureen Kanka, the New Jersey State Legislature passed the original Megan’s Law (NJSA 2C: 7-1 through 7-II) in 1994 to require public notification of convicted sex offenders living in the community. Today all 50 states and all the territories have a Megan's Law, an important tool in preventing more children from becoming victims.

“While they still carry deep emotional and psychological scars, Maureen and Richard’s selflessness, love of others, and vision have protected countless children from harm,” Smith said. “Enactment of International Megan’s Law will expand meaningful child protection at home and around the world.” Click here to read Smith's floor remarks.

 Passed by the House for the third time in early 2015, H.R. 515 establishes new tools and a framework for the U.S. to send and receive notifications on traveling sex offenders who have previously been convicted of serious sexual crimes against children. Additions to the bill in the Senate required the House to pass it one last time.

 “It is imperative—and long overdue—that the United States take the child protection lessons it has learned domestically with the successful notification systems first created by Megan’s Laws and expand them globally to prevent convicted U.S. sex offenders from harming children abroad,” said Smith, a senior member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee who first introduced the bill in 2008. “It is the same horror story over and over. Child predators thrive on secrecy that allows them to commit—with impunity—heinous crimes against children. International Megan’s Law will ensure that potential predators are on the radar of U.S. and foreign  law enforcement.

 “It has taken many years to get the bill passed,” Smith said. “We received input from the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Justice, the State Department, and colleagues in the Senate and House, painstakingly producing a carefully-crafted and well-designed law.”

 “The Angel Watch Center will be authorized to send actionable information about child-sex offender travel to destination countries in time for those countries to assess the potential dangers—and respond appropriately, whether that is to deny entry or visa, monitor travel, or limit travel.  Information is power, and in this case, a new level of protection,” said Smith.

 Smith first introduced the International Megan’s Law bill alongside the Kankas in 2008, and has worked for passage ever since. The bill passed the House in 2010 and 2014, but was stalled in the Senate both times. The version that moved out of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in October was done in close partnership with Senator Richard Shelby (AL), Foreign Affairs Committee  Chairman Bob Corker (TN) and Ranking Member Ben Cardin (MD), and; Sen. Barbara Mikulski (MD). Smith also acknowledged the strong support of Majority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy (CA), who helped advance the final bill in the House, and House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce and Ranking Member Eliot Engel.

 Specifically, Smith’s legislation will:

• Authorize and expand the Angel Watch Center, an office within the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and authorize it to notify destination countries of intended travel by registered sex offenders;

• Coordinate the work of the Angel Watch Center with the Sex Offender Targeting Center of the US Marshals Service so that the best information is getting to the right people in the shortest amount of time;

• Make it a crime, for the first time, for a sex offender to travel abroad without giving 21 days advance notice so that law enforcement has adequate time to vet the traveler and warn the destination country, if needed;

• Mandate that the State Department, in consultation with the Departments of Homeland Security and Justice, establish, within 90 days, a program for issuing a passport provision on a traveling sex offender with an offense against a child and current duty to register, thereby preventing circumvention of the notification system by travelers who misreport which countries they will visit;

• Collect notification response data to understand which countries are working with the U.S. on preventing re-offense by child predators;

• Provide the authority for both the Angel Watch Center and the US Marshals Service to receive information from other countries about pedophiles intending to travel to the U.S.;

• Clarify the receipt and sharing within U.S. law enforcement of incoming notifications on known sex offenders traveling to the U.S.; and

• Direct the Secretary of State, in coordination with the Attorney General and Secretary of Homeland Security, to seek agreements and use technical assistance with other countries so that the United States is notified in advance of incoming foreign sex offenders. 

  Smith said, “International Megan’s law facilitates information sharing so that other countries notify American law enforcement officials of foreign predators coming into the United States. The goal is reciprocal notification to protect children at home and abroad from known sex offenders.”

 The new International Megan’s Law will work in conjunction with America’s landmark anti-human trafficking law, the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 authored by Smith, and the two other trafficking laws he wrote in wrote in 2003 and 2005.
 
  According to a 2010 report by the Government Accountability Office entitled “Current Situation Results in Thousands of Passports Issued to Registered Sex Offenders,” at least 4,500 U.S. passports were issued to registered sex offenders in fiscal year 2008. Typically a U.S. passport is valid for 10 years. The GAO emphasized that its numbers were probably understated due to the limitations of the data that it was able to access and analyze.

  Estimates from the International Labor Organization indicate that 1.8 million children are victims of commercial sexual exploitation around the world every year.

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