BILL ANALYSIS Ó SB 57 Page 1 Date of Hearing: August 17, 2011 ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS Felipe Fuentes, Chair SB 57 (Runner) - As Amended: April 12, 2011 Policy Committee: Public SafetyVote: 4-1 Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program: Yes Reimbursable: No SUMMARY This bill requires registered sex offenders to provide law enforcement all of their online names and addresses, e-mail addresses, and instant messaging user names for all social networking Web site accounts at the time of original registration, and within 30 days of creating a new account, name or address. Failure to so comply would be a misdemeanor. FISCAL EFFECT 1)Potentially state-reimbursable local law enforcement costs, likely in the low hundreds of thousands of dollars, for increased duties related to sex offender registration - collecting and updating the online, e-mail, and instant messaging addresses of about 100,000 registered sex offenders. Though this cost has not been keyed as a reimbursable state mandate by Legislative Counsel, the sheer number of offenders and information may cause a local law enforcement agency to file a test claim with the Commission on State Mandates. 2)Unknown, likely minor annual non-state reimbursable local law enforcement and incarceration costs as a result of expanding sex offender registration requirements, violation of which is a misdemeanor, punishable by up to six months in county jail. These costs would be offset to a degree by increased fine revenue. 3)Unknown, potentially moderate costs in excess of $150,000, to the extent three or four registered felony sex offenders who SB 57 Page 2 fail to report online addresses and names are charged with felony failure to comply with sex offender registration requirements, pursuant to Penal Code 290.018. While this bill "notwithstands" 290.018, it is not clear that these offenders could not also be charged with a felony. Moreover, by adding additional registration requirements, failure to comply could result in a second or third strike, potentially significantly increasing state prison costs. 4)Unknown, potentially moderate costs in excess of $150,000, to the extent three or four registered sex offenders who fail to report online addresses and names are convicted of a misdemeanor, and as a result of the probation, are sent to state prison. 5)Unknown moderate costs, potentially in the range of $150,000, to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) to the extent additional parole agent training and monitoring is required. 6)No direct costs to DOJ, as the bill only authorizes local law enforcement to share the online address information with DOJ. To the extent, however, the existence and availability of this information encourages DOJ to pursue such information sharing, DOJ would require staff and software to store and analyze the information. These costs, while unknown, would likely be in the range of several hundred thousand dollars. COMMENTS 1)Rationale . The author contends social networking sites and e-mail "create a virtual shopping mall for sex offenders on the prowl" and that requiring convicted offenders to register online addresses provides law enforcement a tool to employ against predators who attempt to misuse the Internet to find potential victims. 2)Support. A list of local law enforcement entities supports this proposal. 3)Concerns regarding efficacy and fiscal efficiency . There is nothing that prevents a registered sex offender from simply changing an e-mail address. Nor is there any reason to assume that a potential offender, intent on using an Internet site SB 57 Page 3 for conversing or meeting potential victims, would register the e-mail address used for this purpose. Assuming a registrant changes e-mail addresses occasionally, or uses different e-mail addresses for different purposes, all of the e-mail addresses, and all of the changes, must be reported to the registering law enforcement agency. Do local governments have the personnel and capacity to obtain, process, and potentially transmit all of this data? Given the ease with which a person may change an e-mail address, given that many registrants have been crime-free for years, given that the crimes of many sex offenders had nothing to do with children, given California's rare lifetime sex offender registration, and considering the oft-stated estimate that 90% of child abuse victims know the perpetrator, is this bill an efficient use of limited law enforcement resources? 4)Opposition . According to the ACLU and California Public Defenders Association, this bill is an inefficient and ineffective use of law enforcement resources. 5)In 1996, California enacted "Megan's Law," allowing the public to access an address list of registered sex offenders. Before 2003, the public could only obtain the information on the Megan's Law list by calling a 900 number or visiting designated law enforcement agencies. In 2003, DOJ put the Megan's Law list of offenders on a public access website with the offender's address, photo and list of offenses. For some offenders with less serious offenses, only the ZIP code is listed. Today anyone can peruse the website and see where registered sex offenders are living in the community. 6)Related 2011 Legislation. a) AB 755 (Galgiani) requires every registered sex offender to inform the law enforcement agency with which he or she last registered of all Internet identifiers or service providers. AB 755 failed passage in Assembly Public Safety. b) AB 543 (Torres) makes it a misdemeanor for a registered sex offender to use any Internet social networking Web site, as specified. AB 543 was held on this committee's Suspense File. c) AB 653 (Galgiani) requires a person required to register SB 57 Page 4 as a sex offender to report his or her Internet accounts and Internet identifiers to local law enforcement. AB 653 was not heard by Assembly Public Safety. 7)Previous Legislation . a) SB 1204 (Runner), 2010, was similar to SB 57 and was held on this committee's Suspense File. b) AB 1850 (Galgiani), 2010, required a person required to register as a sex offender to register Internet accounts and identifiers. AB 1850 was held on this committee's Suspense File. c) AB 2208 (Torres), 2010, prohibited specified sex offenders from accessing an Internet social networking Web site. AB 2208 was held on this committee's Suspense File. d) AB 179 (Portantino), 2009, required registered sex offenders to report all e-mail addresses and IM identities at the time of registration. AB 179 was significantly narrowed in this committee and ultimately amended into a tax bill. e) AB 841 (Portantino), 2007-08, required registered sex offenders to provide all e-mail addresses and IM addresses to local law enforcement. AB 841 was significantly narrowed in this committee and ultimately amended into a health care bill. Analysis Prepared by : Geoff Long / APPR. / (916) 319-2081