Topeka ? A Douglas County man who has been judged to be a violent sexual predator will ask the Kansas Supreme Court on Friday to overturn that status.

Kodi A. Thomas has been confined at the Larned State Hospital since 2012 under a law that allows the state to continue holding people in custody indefinitely for treatment after they have completed their criminal sentences.

He was sent there after serving 16 years for convictions in 1996 for attempted rape and aggravated burglary. According to court records, he had two earlier convictions for sex crimes: a 1981 conviction on two counts of indecent liberties with a child for participating in a gang rape of two girls; and a 1987 conviction for indecent solicitation of a child.

During Thomas’ commitment trial in 2012, District Attorney Charles Branson presented testimony from two doctors who diagnosed Thomas with a number of mental conditions including mild mental retardation and substance abuse. Both said Thomas would be likely to engage in sexually violent acts if he were released.

On appeal, Thomas’ attorneys argue that he was denied the right to confront and cross-examine witnesses because the court allowed a state expert witness to read verbatim from the notes and reports of Larned hospital staff members, and that those notes and reports were used as substantive evidence against him.

They also argue that the instructions to the jury at the trial did not convey that the state had a burden of proof to show beyond a reasonable doubt that Thomas is a sexually violent predator.

The U.S. Supreme Court upheld Kansas’ Sexually Violent Predator Law in 1997, saying the state has a right to confine people indefinitely, even after completion of their sentences, to prevent sexual predators from committing future crimes.

But the court said that confinement has to be for purposes of treatment and that those people must be released once they are deemed to be no longer a threat.

Thomas is one of 231 people currently being held at Larned under that program, according to the Department of Aging and Disability Services. Another 25 are being held in other facilities off campus, including some in general hospitals for treatment of acute illnesses. Another four people are currently on conditional release.

Since the program began, state officials said, only three violent sexual predators have been discharged, while 27 have died of natural causes while in the treatment program.