Montana v. Mehan, 440 P.3d 25

In 2016 Douglas Alan Mehan pleaded guilty to Sexual Intercourse Without Consent for raping an unconscious adult woman recorded on bar surveillance.
The Cascade County District Court accepted a plea, designated Mehan a Tier I sex offender, and sentenced him to 50 years with 25 years suspended.
A Presentence Investigation Report recommended numerous conditions; the court adopted nearly all, including multiple conditions restricting Mehan’s contact with minors.
Mehan objected at sentencing and on appeal, arguing those minor-contact restrictions lacked a nexus to his offense (victim was an adult) or to his personal history.
Psychosexual evaluations rated Mehan low-moderate risk, found no persistent deviant sexual interest or predatory characteristics, and recommended community treatment as appropriate.
The District Court sustained the conditions based in part on testimony that Mehan’s judgment was distorted by pornography; the Supreme Court reversed and remanded to strike the minor-contact conditions and to resolve an oral/written sentence conflict.

Issue	Mehan's Argument	State's Argument	Held
Whether conditions restricting contact with minors have a sufficient nexus to the offense or offender	Conditions lack nexus because victim was an adult and Mehan has no history of offenses involving minors; psychosexual evaluations show low-moderate risk	Minors are uniquely vulnerable and, like an unconscious adult, cannot consent; standard sex-offender treatment conditions justify restrictions	Court held conditions lacked sufficient nexus to Mehan or the offense and were an abuse of discretion; reversed and remanded to strike them
Whether the written judgment conflicts with the oral pronouncement (condition 22)	Oral pronouncement controls; written judgment improperly adds conditions	State conceded the conflict	Court confirmed oral pronouncement governs and ordered revision of written judgment on remand

State v. Leyva, 280 P.3d 252 (2012) (upheld minor-contact restrictions where offender had prior sexual offenses and higher assessed risk)
State v. Bullplume, 305 P.3d 753 (2013) (upheld restrictions given offender’s higher risk and nonconforming behavior)
State v. Malloy, 103 P.3d 1064 (2004) (upheld conditions where offender had prior sex offenses and treatment noncompliance)
State v. Zimmerman, 228 P.3d 1109 (2010) (conditions must relate to rehabilitation or protection within context of offender’s crime or unique characteristics)
State v. Ashby, 179 P.3d 1164 (2008) (condition valid if nexus to offense or to offender’s recent, significant, or chronic conduct)
State v. Ommundson, 974 P.2d 620 (1999) (condition must correlate to the crime of conviction)
State v. Melton, 276 P.3d 900 (2012) (reversal where nexus is absent or exceedingly tenuous)
State v. Simpson, 203 P.3d 791 (2009) (probation conditions should be individualized; oral pronouncement controls over conflicting written judgment)