BILL ANALYSIS SB 353 Page 1 SENATE THIRD READING SB 353 (Kuehl) As Amended June 7, 2007 Majority vote SENATE VOTE :31-7 JUDICIARY 10-0 APPROPRIATIONS 15-1 ----------------------------------------------------------------- |Ayes:|Jones, Berryhill, Duvall, |Ayes:|Leno, Walters, Caballero, | | |Evans, Berg, Keene, | |Davis, DeSaulnier, | | |Krekorian, Laird, Levine, | |Emmerson, Huffman, | | |Lieber | |Karnette, Krekorian, | | | | |Lieu, Ma, Nakanishi, | | | | |Nava, Sharon Runner, | | | | |Solorio | | | | | | |-----+--------------------------+-----+--------------------------| | | |Nays:|La Malfa | | | | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- SUMMARY : Allows a court to protect an animal in a domestic violence protective order. Specifically, this bill : 1)Finds, among other things, that there is a correlation between animal abuse and family violence and that perpetrators of abuse often abuse animals in order to intimidate their human victims. 2)Allows a court, upon a showing of good cause, to include in a domestic violence protective order a grant of exclusive care, possession, or control of any animal owned, possessed, leased, kept or held by either the petitioner, respondent, or minor child residing in the residence. 3)Allows the court to order the respondent to stay away from the animal and forbid the taking, transferring, encumbering, concealing, molesting, attacking, striking, threatening, harming or otherwise disposing of the animal. 4)Requires the Judicial Council to modify the applicable criminal and civil court forms to conform to this bill by July 1, 2009. SB 353 Page 2 EXISTING LAW : 1)Allows a court to issue a domestic violence protective order enjoining a party from molesting, attacking, striking, stalking, threatening, sexually assaulting, battering, harassing, destroying personal property, and other specified behaviors. 2)Allows protective orders to be issued ex parte, after notice and a hearing, or by a judicial officer after assertions by a law enforcement officer that the person is in immediate and present danger of domestic violence. 3)Allows a court to extend a protective order, upon a showing of good cause, to other named family or household members. 4)Permits a court to issue an ex parte order enjoining a party from specified behaviors, excluding them from the family dwelling, determining temporary custody of, and visitation with, a minor child, and temporarily determining use, possession or control of real or personal property, provided certain requirements are met. 5)Provides that a court with jurisdiction over a criminal matter may issue a criminal protective order pursuant to Family Code provisions governing domestic violence protective orders. 6)Generally prohibits cruelty to animals. FISCAL EFFECT : According to the Assembly Appropriations analysis, minor absorbable costs for the Judicial Council to modify forms. COMMENTS : Domestic violence remains a very serious problem in California and across the nation. To provide protection for victims of domestic violence, current law allows victims to seek a restraining order to prevent an abuser from continuing the abuse. That order, granted by a court, may be of varying duration depending on the circumstances. Those orders generally cover the victim, but may be extended to named family or household members, upon a showing of good cause. This bill seeks to protect domestic violence victims and animals by allowing a court to include them within a domestic violence SB 353 Page 3 protective order. The need for this bill is exemplified by the story of Susan Walsh: She said she had wanted many times to take her two children and leave her husband, ending a relationship she found frightening and controlling. But she said she was afraid he would harm the animals on their 32-acre plot called Blessed Be Farm in Ellsworth, Me. In the past, she said in a telephone interview yesterday, he had retaliated against her by running over her blind and deaf border collie named Katydid, shooting two sheep and wringing the necks of her prized turkeys. "It wasn't just the cats and the dogs I had, it was the sheep and the chickens - I was terrified for their welfare," Ms. Walsh, 50, said. "I knew if I were to leave, he wouldn't hesitate to kill them. He had done it before." (Pam Belluck, New Maine Law Shields Animals in Domestic Violence Cases , New York Times (April 1, 2006).) Recent research also provides support for this legislation, revealing that pets have been used by abusers to control their victims, such as threatening to hurt an animal if a victim were to leave an abusive situation. Studies cited by the author in support of the bill include: 1) a 1997 Human Society of the United States survey showing that 85% of women and 63% of children surveyed entering large battered women's shelters discussed incidents of pet abuse; 2) a 1998 study that reported that 71% of women seeking shelter at a particular safe house stated that their partner "threatened to hurt, or killed their companion animals"; and, 3) a 1983 survey of pet-owning families with substantiated child abuse and neglect that found that animals were abused in 88% of homes where child physical abuse was present. Recognizing this abuse, several states, including Maine and Vermont, have recently passed laws to protect pets in restraining orders. This bill allows animals to be included in the scope of a domestic violence protective order. As the term is not specifically defined in the bill, "animal" would encompass virtually any possible pet that may be threatened by an abuser. SB 353 Page 4 In defining "animal," American Jurisprudence, Second Edition, states that generally "in the language of the law, the word 'animal' is used to mean all animal life other than humans." In addition to ordering the respondent to stay away from the animal in question, this bill allows a court to include a grant of care, possession or control over the animal. Initial grants of care and orders to stay away from an animal could be placed within ex parte temporary restraining orders. With the good cause requirement, the court must still find good cause before issuing the temporary restraining order. At the subsequent noticed motion and hearing, held within 21 days, the respondent would have the opportunity to dispute the initial ex parte order for exclusive care, possession, or control of the family pet. Analysis Prepared by : Leora Gershenzon / JUD. / (916) 319-2334 FN: 0001693