Utah calls its registry the Sex and Kidnap Offender Registry, and the Department of Public Safety's Bureau of Criminal Identification lists it on its offender registries page beside the child abuse offender registry, with a single link to the combined Sex, Kidnap and Child Abuse Offender Registry search. The fullest official description of the system is the overview the Utah Legislature's Office of Legislative Research and General Counsel wrote for lawmakers on June 14, 2023, The Sex and Kidnap Offender Registry, which opens with the scale and the structure: approximately 7,000 offenders were listed under the requirements of Title 77, chapter 41 of the Utah Code, the Utah Department of Corrections managed the registry at the time, but House Bill 156 of the 2023 session moved management to the Department of Public Safety starting in 2024, and the local law enforcement agencies and the Board of Pardons and Parole are responsible for registering offenders and monitoring them. The briefing describes every state registry as having four components, the list of qualifying offenses, the required length of registration, the registration process and the registration based restrictions, and places Utah's in the code: the qualifying offenses sit in the definition of sex offender in section 77-41-102, the offenses that require lifetime registration in section 77-41-106, every other registrable offense carries ten years, and the location restrictions are limited to offenders who committed registrable offenses against a minor and include no housing restrictions.
The briefing predates the 2024 transfer, so the agency names in it are those of 2023, while the duties it describes come from the code sections it cites; the registry search itself, the local police and sheriff's offices that take the registrations and the Board of Pardons and Parole are the places that apply them today. The police department or sheriff for any Utah address is on the Utah county pages.
- Search: the Sex, Kidnap and Child Abuse Offender Registry linked from the Bureau of Criminal Identification offender registries page, run since 2024 by the Department of Public Safety.
- Registration: twice a year, once in the birth month and once six months later, plus a visit within three business days of any change of primary or secondary residence, employment, vehicle or education, and within ten days of entering Utah from another state even for a short stay.
- Duration: ten years after the sentence ends or release from custody for most offenses, and life for the offenses listed in section 77-41-106, from rape and sodomy on a child to child kidnapping and human trafficking for sexual exploitation.
- Removal: a petition after five years for certain offenses, ten years for ten year registrants and twenty years for lifetime registrants, with no new class A misdemeanor or felony, completed treatment, paid restitution and, for lifetime registrants, a recent evidence based risk assessment.
Written by SearchSystems.net from Utah's own systems: the Utah Department of Public Safety Bureau of Criminal Identification offender registries page, the Utah Legislature Office of Legislative Research and General Counsel overview of the Sex and Kidnap Offender Registry, June 14, 2023, each read on October 14, 2026 by the SearchSystems editorial team.
The two tiers: ten years or life
Registration length in Utah is set by a two tiered system, the briefing explains, so not every registrable offense carries the same term: offenders register for ten years or for life depending on the seriousness of the offense, and those required to register for ten years do so for the duration of the sentence and for ten years after the termination of the sentence or release from state custody. The briefing's appendix pairs each offense with its term.
Lifetime registration follows rape, rape of a child, object rape, object rape of a child, forcible sodomy, sodomy on a child, sexual abuse of a child, aggravated sexual abuse of a child, aggravated sexual assault, sexual exploitation of a minor, aggravated sexual exploitation of a minor, which Senate Bill 167 of 2022 added, aggravated sexual extortion, aggravated exploitation of prostitution, child kidnapping, felony enticing a minor, aggravated kidnapping, human trafficking of a child for sexual exploitation, human trafficking for sexual exploitation, aggravated human trafficking for sexual exploitation and human trafficking of a vulnerable adult for sexual exploitation.
Ten years follows human trafficking for labor, human smuggling and human smuggling of a child, human trafficking of a child for labor, aggravated human trafficking and smuggling, human trafficking of a vulnerable adult for labor, sexual exploitation of a vulnerable adult, sexual extortion, forcible sexual abuse, custodial sexual relations with a person in custody under 18, lewdness or sexual battery on a fourth or later conviction or any combination of the two totaling four, incest, lewdness involving a child, felony or class A misdemeanor voyeurism, unlawful sexual activity with a minor, which does not require registration when the defendant was less than four years older than the minor or under 21, sexual abuse of a minor, which spares a first offender under 21, unlawful sexual conduct with a 16 or 17 year old, kidnapping and misdemeanor enticing a minor.
The briefing notes that other states use one, two or three tiers, some mirroring Utah's two and others ranging across 10, 15, 20 and 25 years and life.
Registering twice a year, and the three business day rule
Section 77-41-105 sets the offender's responsibilities as the briefing summarizes them: offenders register twice per year, once during the birth month and once six months from the birth month; they also register within three business days of changing a primary residence, a secondary residence, a place of employment, vehicle information or educational information; and offenders from other states register within ten days of entering Utah even when they are not staying for an extended period.
House Bill 122 of 2023 added a detail to the vehicle rule by specifying the number of days an offender may drive a particular car before its information must be reported, and House Bill 298 of 2019 made a registrant ordered to register by a court of another jurisdiction register in Utah, let a registrant change a name on 30 days' notice when the change is not contrary to the public interest, and required the registry to publish both the new and the previous name.
The same 2023 bill required the Department of Corrections to maintain, but not publish, the information on offenders who were under 18 when they committed a qualifying offense unless the offense requires lifetime registration, and confirmed that juveniles who commit qualifying offenses must still comply with the registry.
Removal: five, ten or twenty years
Section 77-41-112 lets qualifying offenders petition to be removed. Some may petition five years after the sentence ended, depending on the offense, and must show that the offense is the only one for which they were required to register, that they have not been convicted of another offense other than a traffic offense, that they completed all required treatment and that they paid all restitution; the appendix lists the five year offenses as kidnapping, misdemeanor enticing a minor, class A misdemeanor voyeurism, and unlawful sexual activity with a minor, sexual abuse of a minor and unlawful sexual conduct with a 16 or 17 year old where the offender was not more than ten, ten or fifteen years older than the victim respectively, with ten years to petition when the age gap was wider.
Ten year registrants may petition once ten years have passed from the latest of the day they were placed on probation, released from incarceration, had the sentence terminated or entered a community based program, or ten years after the division's custody ended for an offender convicted as a minor, showing no later class A misdemeanor, felony or capital felony conviction, completed treatment and paid restitution. Certain lifetime registrants may petition after twenty years from the same starting points, with no class A misdemeanor, felony or capital felony in the most recent twenty years, treatment completed, restitution paid and an evidence based risk assessment, completed within the six months before filing and meeting the standards the court or the Board of Pardons and Parole set, describing the current level of risk to the public; in weighing a lifetime registrant's risk the court may consider the nature and degree of violence in the offense, the age and number of victims, the offender's age at the time, performance under supervision, stability in employment and housing, the community and support system, the assessment results and other relevant factors, and must tell the victim and the registry office its decision within three days.
Senate Bill 215 of 2021 opened the twenty year petition for lifetime registrants and required removal of a pardoned conviction, Senate Bill 165 of the same year made the registry remove offenders whose offenses are listed in section 77-41-113 automatically rather than on request, Senate Bill 50 let a person who was a minor at the offense request removal, and Senate Bill 34 of 2020 required removal of anyone registered for an offense no longer registrable.
Restrictions: pools, parks and coaching, but no housing rule
Utah's location restrictions are limited to offenders who committed registrable offenses against a minor and do not include housing restrictions, the briefing states twice, so the state has no rule on how close to a school a registrant may live. The recent sessions added conduct rules instead: House Bill 146 of 2023 bars an offender on the registry from entering a homeowners' association, condominium project or apartment complex swimming pool, park or playground, House Bill 99 of the same session raised the penalty for repeat violations of the sex offender restrictions, House Bill 344 of 2020 prohibited an offender from serving as a coach, manager or trainer of a minor, and House Bill 40 of 2019 cut the minimum jail term for failing to register from 90 days to 30.
House Bill 268 of 2023 created the Sex Offense Management Board and clarified how the Department of Corrections sets standards for sex offender treatment, and House Bill 75 of 2019 reduced the offense level for a person under 21 who commits unlawful sexual activity with a minor and removed the registration requirement for that person.
The federal standard
The briefing measures Utah against the federal Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act, created by the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006 to set minimum registry requirements and track each state's implementation: as of 2022, 18 states and four territories had implemented every standard, and Utah had met most but not all, because the federal act requires a three tier system where Utah has two, and because Utah does not meet the standards on required juvenile offenses or on posting all required information on the public registry website.
Human trafficking offenses were added to the registrable list by House Bill 291 of 2020, and House Bill 139 of 2023 amended the requirements for an offender who commits certain offenses in another state.
Reading a Utah result
A listing on the Sex, Kidnap and Child Abuse Offender Registry means an offender who registers in the birth month and six months later, for ten years after the sentence or for life as the offense in the appendix dictates; an offender who was under 18 at the offense is kept by the department but not published unless the offense carries life, and a person removed by petition, pardon or a change in the law is gone. The local police or sheriff take the twice yearly registration and the three business day changes, the Board of Pardons and Parole monitors and sets risk assessment standards, the Department of Public Safety has run the registry since 2024, and the district court hears the removal petition and informs the victim and the registry office within three days.
Questions about the Utah sex offender registry
Related Utah records
Utah's other public records guides on this site are the Utah arrest records guide for what a booking makes public, the Utah inmate search guide for the Department of Corrections offender search and the county jails, the Utah background check guide for the Bureau of Criminal Identification records, and the Utah county pages for every sheriff and police department.