The Alabama Law Enforcement Agency's Sex Offender Registry page counts more than 16,000 sex offenders in its registry, not all of them available to the public because of juvenile, youthful offender or out of state status, and describes the division of labor: local law enforcement registers the offenders and forwards the information to the agency's Sex Offender Registry Unit for entry into the state repository, the offender is responsible for telling local law enforcement of any change in residence or employment, and each year, during the offender's birth month and every three months thereafter, the offender reports in person to local law enforcement, which sends the completed registration to the agency for verification with a current photograph and fingerprints. The search runs through the agency's Community Information Center, an information portal that also carries Amber, emergency missing child, missing and endangered person and Blue alerts, fugitive searches, sex offender forms, legal information and a FAQ, and that was established, the agency says, under the requirements of the Sex Offender Registration and Community Notification Act, not to replace community notification but to let the criminal justice community promote public awareness of the threat sex offenders and fugitives pose.
The website is updated daily in real time from what local law enforcement provides, so an old address on the site may mean a non compliant offender, since keeping the information current is the offender's sole responsibility, and a report that someone lives too close to a school or day care or is not at the listed address goes to the local agency, which verifies addresses and passes changes to the state. An offender appears on the website only after conviction and release through probation or the end of the sentence, and only for the offenses in section 15-20A-5 of the Code of Alabama; a first conviction for indecent exposure or sexual misconduct does not appear, a juvenile appears only when assessed as high risk, a youthful offender only when over 18 at the time of the offense, and an adult convicted in another state, in federal or military court or on an Indian reservation only after a due process hearing in some cases, which is also why a neighbor may never have been notified, along with the plain fact that an offender already living there when a family moves in brings no new notice. The Criminal Justice Information Services division answers at 334-676-7898 and sexoffenderunit@alea.gov, and the sheriff or police chief who registers offenders in each county is on the Alabama county pages.
- Search: the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency Community Information Center, updated in real time from the local registrations, with the registry forms, legal information and a FAQ beside the search.
- Duration: every adult sex offender is subject to the act for life under section 15-20A-3, whenever the crime was committed; a juvenile adjudicated before July 1, 2011 registers for ten years from release and a later one as section 15-20A-28 provides.
- Visits: registration immediately on release or conviction, in person, with local law enforcement in each county of residence, work, volunteering or school, then in person in the birth month and every three months after for life, at $10 a visit per agency.
- Distance rules: no residence within 2,000 feet of a school, child care facility or resident camp or of the former victim, no living or overnight stays with a minor outside the family exceptions, and no loitering within 500 feet of places for children for offenders whose victim was under 12.
Written by SearchSystems.net from Alabama's own systems: the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency sex offender registry page, the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency Community Information Center, Code of Alabama section 15-20A-3 on applicability and the lifetime duty, Code of Alabama section 15-20A-5 on sex offenses, Code of Alabama section 15-20A-7 on registration information, Code of Alabama section 15-20A-10 on registration with local law enforcement, Code of Alabama section 15-20A-11 on prohibited residence locations, Code of Alabama section 15-20A-14 on entering the state, Code of Alabama section 15-20A-21 on community notification, Code of Alabama section 15-20A-22 on the registration fee, Code of Alabama section 15-20A-23 on relief from the residency restriction, Code of Alabama section 15-20A-24 on relief from registration and notification, each read on October 14, 2026 by the SearchSystems editorial team.
Lifetime registration, and the offenses behind it
Section 15-20A-3 applies the act to every adult convicted of a sex offense whenever the crime was committed or the duty arose, and subjects every adult sex offender to the act for life; a juvenile adjudicated delinquent of a sex offense on or after July 1, 2011 is covered as section 15-20A-28 provides, one adjudicated earlier registers and verifies for ten years from the last release with notification only if the court ordered it, and a youthful offender adjudicated on or after July 1, 2011 is treated as section 15-20A-35 provides, an earlier one as a juvenile unless a prior sex offense makes the person an adult offender.
Section 15-20A-5 lists the sex offenses: rape and sodomy in both degrees, sexual misconduct and indecent exposure, which on a first conviction bring registration and verification only and the full act on a second, sexual torture, sexual abuse in both degrees, enticing a child, sexual abuse of a child under 12, promoting prostitution in both degrees, the child pornography act, unlawful imprisonment of a minor with intent to abuse the minor sexually, kidnapping to abuse sexually and kidnapping of a minor by anyone but a parent or guardian, incest, transmitting obscene material to a child by computer, sex acts by a school employee with a student or a foster parent with a foster child, facilitating solicitation of a child, electronic solicitation, facilitating online solicitation, traveling or facilitating travel to meet a child for sex, human trafficking involving sexual servitude, custodial sexual misconduct, sexual extortion, directing a child to engage in a sex act, first degree voyeurism, the equivalent offenses under former law, any solicitation, attempt or conspiracy, any crime elsewhere that would be one of these here, any offense the federal act specifies, any crime that requires registration where it was committed, any offender another jurisdiction has determined to be a sex offender, any crime anywhere known as rape, carnal knowledge, sodomy, sexual assault or battery, criminal sexual conduct or contact, sexual abuse, child pornography, lewd and lascivious conduct, indecent liberties, molestation, video voyeurism or the like, and any other offense with a finding of sexual motivation; a juvenile adjudicated for second degree rape or sodomy, sexual misconduct, indecent exposure or child pornography is presumed exempt after counseling unless the court decides otherwise.
Registering with local law enforcement: immediately, in every county
Under section 15-20A-10 an adult sex offender appears in person immediately on release from incarceration, or immediately on conviction when not incarcerated, and registers with local law enforcement in each county where the offender lives or intends to live, accepts or intends to accept employment or a volunteer position, and begins or intends to begin school, with seven days from release to comply with the residence restrictions; every new residence, job, volunteer position or school, every transfer or termination of one, every name change and every change in the registration information is reported immediately in person in each such county, except that telephone numbers, email addresses, instant message addresses, other online identifiers and internet providers may be reported electronically or by telephone where the agency allows, and an offender who vacates a residence or spends three or more consecutive days away from it without prior notice or a travel document has transferred the residence.
The offender then appears in person during the birth month and every three months thereafter, whatever the month of conviction, for life, with local law enforcement in each county of residence, and signs a form explaining every duty and restriction; an offender registered before July 1, 2011 moved to quarterly reporting after the next biannual date. Section 15-20A-14 makes an adult entering Alabama to live, work, volunteer or study register immediately in person in that county and supply a certified copy of the conviction within 30 days unless the record no longer exists.
Section 15-20A-7 lists what is registered: every name, alias, nickname and ethnic or tribal name, the date of birth and Social Security number, each residence, each school and employer including transient and day labor work, the plate, registration, description and storage place of every land vehicle, aircraft and watercraft used for work or personal purposes, every telephone number, every email address, instant message address and internet moniker other than those used purely for lawful commerce, a current photograph, a physical description with scars and tattoos, fingerprints and palm prints, a DNA sample unless one already exists, a photocopy of the driver license or identification card and of every passport and immigration document, professional licenses, a full criminal history with supervision and warrant status, every internet service provider, and anything else the agency's secretary requires; the photograph, prints, DNA and document copies need not be retaken at each verification when nothing has changed.
Knowingly failing to provide the information, giving false information or breaking the registration section is a Class C felony.
The 2,000 foot rules and the household rule
Section 15-20A-11 bars an adult sex offender from establishing or keeping a residence after release or conviction within 2,000 feet of the property of any school, child care facility or resident camp, meaning a camp with permanent or semi permanent sleeping facilities run by a business, church or nonprofit mainly for minors and known to the local police, and within 2,000 feet of the property where the former victim or an immediate family member of the victim lives, the distance measured in a straight line from property line to property line; a school or facility that arrives after the offender moved in creates no violation unless a new release or conviction follows, a residence approved in writing by local law enforcement in advance is safe, since each agency must publish a policy for obtaining such preapproval, and time in a licensed health care facility, jail, prison or mental health facility is exempt.
No adult sex offender may live or stay overnight with a minor, except a parent, grandparent, stepparent, sibling or stepsibling of the minor, and even that family exception falls away when parental rights have been or are being terminated, when any child, grandchild, stepchild, sibling or stepsibling of the offender was a victim, when a minor victim lived with the offender at the time of the offense, when any sex offense involved a child, or when the offense involved forcible compulsion against a minor, a rule the agency summarizes on its page along with the further rule that an offender whose victim was under 12 may not live with a minor at all nor loiter where children congregate.
The agency adds that an offender may drop off or pick up children at a school or day care or attend games and student activities as long as the visit lasts no longer than the task requires, but that one whose victim was under 12 may not loiter on or within 500 feet of a school, child care facility, playground, park, athletic field or any business whose principal purpose is caring for, educating or entertaining minors. A violation of the residence section is a Class C felony.
Community notification by city size
Section 15-20A-21 scales the notice to the place. Immediately on an adult sex offender's release, or on notice of a planned or established fixed residence, the chief of police in Birmingham, Mobile, Huntsville and Montgomery notifies everyone with a legal residence within 1,000 feet of the offender's declared residence and every school and child care facility within three miles; in every other city of 5,000 or more people the chief of police, or the sheriff where there is none, notifies everyone within 1,500 feet and the schools and child care facilities within three miles; and in towns under 5,000 and in unincorporated areas the sheriff notifies everyone within 2,000 feet and the same three mile circle of schools and child care.
The notice is a community notification flyer carrying the public registry information, mailed or hand delivered to every legal residence in the circle, and may be supplemented by posting at the sheriff's office and the nearest police station, in a local newspaper or online; for a homeless offender without a fixed residence the notice is given by those postings, the newspaper or the internet instead. Nothing stops the agency, a sheriff or a chief from notifying people beyond the required distance or repeating the notice periodically, and the agency's Community Information Center takes subscriptions to its alert feeds by text, with ALalerts sent to 99411.
The $10 quarterly fee
Section 15-20A-22 charges an adult sex offender $10 to each registering agency in each county of residence at every quarterly registration since July 1, 2011, and another $10 to each agency where a new residence is established; an offender who cannot pay may be allowed installments over up to 90 days, a court order of indigence waives the fee subject to periodic review, and willfully failing to pay is a Class B misdemeanor, a Class A misdemeanor on a repeat.
A sheriff's fees go to the county general fund earmarked for the sheriff and a police chief's to the municipal general fund, in both cases for sex offender registration, notification, tracking and apprehension.
Relief: the medical petition and the age gap petition
Section 15-20A-23 lets a registrant who is terminally ill, permanently immobile, suffering a debilitating condition that needs substantial care or supervision, or in need of placement in a residential health care facility petition the civil division of the circuit court where relief is sought for release from the 2,000 foot residence rule, serving the prosecutors and local police of the county of conviction and of the county of relief by certified mail, with a certified copy of the conviction, a list of every place of registration, the criminal record, an affidavit of no pending charges, notarized medical documentation and a records release; the victim is notified, the court hears the petition within 30 days, and relief, indefinite or for a set time, requires clear and convincing evidence of the condition and of no substantial risk of a future sexual offense, with a $200 filing fee that hardship may defer, a 12 month wait after a denial, reinstatement on the state's request, and a Class C felony for false information.
Section 15-20A-24 opens a second door for rape in the second degree under 13A-6-62(a)(1), sodomy in the second degree under 13A-6-64(a)(1), sexual abuse in the second degree under 13A-6-67(a)(2), sexual misconduct and their equivalents and attempts: at disposition, sentencing, the end of probation or the end of a court ordered term of registration, the offender may petition for relief from some or all of the act by proving by clear and convincing evidence that the offense involved no force and was a crime only because of the victim's age, that the victim was 13 or older and that the offender was less than five years older, serving the prosecutors and local police on pain of automatic denial, with the victim heard, the probation officer's and prosecutor's recommendations, the facts, the relationship, the criminal history and the protection of society weighed, a $200 fee outside sentencing, a 12 month wait after a denial, and no relief at all for anyone with another sex offense before or after or a pending sex charge; offenders convicted before July 1, 2011 may use it too.
Reading an Alabama result
A listing on the agency's site means an adult convicted of a listed offense who has been released and is registered for life, posted in real time from the quarterly visits to local law enforcement; a missing name may be a juvenile, a youthful offender, a first indecent exposure or sexual misconduct conviction, a prisoner not yet released or an out of state offender awaiting a due process hearing. The sheriff or police chief of the county of residence holds the file, the fee record and the notification flyer, and the circuit court holds the only two petitions the act allows.
Questions about the Alabama sex offender registry
Related Alabama records
Alabama's other public records are covered on this site: the Alabama arrest records guide for what a booking makes public, the Alabama inmate search guide for the Department of Corrections and county jail lookups, the Alabama background check guide for the agency's criminal history checks, and the Alabama county pages for all 67 sheriffs.