UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 11-5098
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
JOE BOB CLARK, JR.,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of Virginia, at Norfolk. Robert G. Doumar, Senior
District Judge. (2:10-cr-00182-RGD-TEM-1)
Submitted: June 1, 2012 Decided: June 12, 2012
Before WILKINSON and THACKER, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON,
Senior Circuit Judge.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
Michael S. Nachmanoff, Federal Public Defender, Walter B.
Dalton, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Norfolk, Virginia,
for Appellant. Neil H. MacBride, United States Attorney,
Elizabeth M. Yusi, Assistant United States Attorney, Norfolk,
Virginia, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Joe Bob Clark, Jr., appeals his conviction and thirty-
month sentence following his guilty plea to one count of
traveling in interstate commerce and failing to register or
update a registration, as required by the Sex Offender
Registration and Notification Act (“SORNA” or “the Act”), in
violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2250(a) (2006). Clark argues that, in
enacting SORNA, Congress (1) violated the non-delegation
doctrine by impermissibly delegating legislative functions to
the Attorney General, namely, the discretion to determine
whether SORNA’s registration requirements should apply to sex
offenders like Clark, who were convicted prior to the Act’s
enactment; and (2) exceeded its authority under the Commerce
Clause. Clark further argues that the retroactive application
of SORNA to a pre-enactment offender violates the Ex Post Facto
Clause. For the reasons that follow, we reject these arguments
and affirm.
Prior to entering a conditional guilty plea, Clark
moved to dismiss the indictment against him, raising the same
constitutional claims pressed on appeal. The district court
denied the motion. We review de novo the district court’s
denial of a motion to dismiss an indictment. United States v.
Hatcher, 560 F.3d 222, 224 (4th Cir. 2009).
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“The non-delegation doctrine is based on the principle
of preserving the separation of powers between the coordinate
branches of government.” United States v. Ambert, 561 F.3d
1202, 1212 (11th Cir. 2009). Congress’ delegation of authority
to another branch of government does not offend the non-
delegation doctrine as long as Congress has delineated an
“intelligible principle” guiding the exercise of that authority.
J.W. Hampton, Jr., & Co. v. United States, 276 U.S. 394, 409
(1928). Even a general legislative directive is a
constitutionally sufficient intelligible principle if Congress
“clearly delineates the general policy, the public agency [that]
is to apply it, and the boundaries of th[e] delegated
authority.” Mistretta v. United States, 488 U.S. 361, 372–73
(1989) (internal quotation marks omitted).
Clark contends that there is no intelligible principle
guiding the Attorney General’s exercise of his discretion.
Although this court has yet to resolve this issue in a published
decision, this court has rejected this argument in three
unpublished, non-binding decisions. See United States v.
Rogers, No. 10-5099, 2012 WL 698890 (4th Cir. Mar. 6, 2012)
(unpublished after argument), petition for cert. filed, __
U.S.L.W. __ (U.S. May 16, 2012) (No. 11-10450); United States v.
Stewart, Nos. 11-4420/4471, 2012 WL 130746 (4th Cir. Jan. 18,
2012), cert. denied, __ S. Ct. __, 2012 WL 1390242 (U.S. May 21,
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2012); United States v. Burns, 418 F. App’x 209 (4th Cir. 2011)
(unpublished after argument). As was the court in Rogers, we
are “satisfied that the persuasive reasoning of the panels in
Burns and Stewart . . . fully disposes of the claim here.” 2012
WL 698890, at *2. This disposition is also in accord with the
published opinions from several of our sister circuits, which
have squarely rejected the non-delegation argument. See, e.g.,
United States v. Guzman, 591 F.3d 83, 93 (2d Cir. 2010)
(concluding that the Attorney General’s delegated authority is
“highly circumscribed” because SORNA “includes specific
provisions delineating what crimes require registration; where,
when, and how an offender must register; what information is
required of registrants; and the elements and penalties for the
federal crime of failure to register” (internal citations
omitted)), cert. denied, 130 S. Ct. 3487 (2010); United States
v. Whaley, 577 F.3d 254, 264 (5th Cir. 2009) (holding that
SORNA’s statement of purpose is a guiding intelligible
principle); Ambert, 561 F.3d at 1213-14 (describing SORNA’s
broad policy goals as intelligible principles). Based on these
persuasive authorities, we too reject Clark’s non-delegation
argument.
Turning to Clark’s Commerce Clause and ex post facto
claims, Clark aptly concedes that these issues are foreclosed by
this court’s decision in United States v. Gould, 568 F.3d 459
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(4th Cir. 2009), cert. denied, 130 S. Ct. 1686 (2010). A panel
of this court cannot “overrule or reconsider a precedent set by
another panel.” United States v. Najjar, 300 F.3d 466, 486 n.8
(4th Cir. 2002). We thus hold that Clark’s ex post facto and
Commerce Clause challenges to SORNA fail.
For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the district
court’s judgment. We dispense with oral argument because the
facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the
materials before the court and argument would not aid the
decisional process.
AFFIRMED
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