BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE GOVERNANCE & FINANCE COMMITTEE
Senator Lois Wolk, Chair
BILL NO: SB 16 HEARING: 5/15/13
AUTHOR: Gaines FISCAL: Yes
VERSION: 4/30/13 TAX LEVY: No
CONSULTANT: Weinberger
NONHOMICIDE CRIMINAL TRIAL REIMBURSEMENTS (URGENCY)
Allows a county to receive State General Fund reimbursement
for costs related to an indigent defendant's case in a
nonhomicide criminal trial.
Background and Existing Law
To promote the uniform administration of justice, avoid
delays in prosecuting and conducting homicide trials, and
prevent counties' finances from being impaired by homicide
trial costs, counties may apply to the State Controller for
reimbursement of homicide trial and hearing costs that
exceed a specified percentage of assessed property value in
the county (AB 1329, Davis, 1961). Counties may apply to
the State Controller's Office (SCO) for reimbursement of
homicide investigation and trial costs that exceed the
amount of money that would be derived by a tax of 0.0125 of
1% of the full value of assessed property in the county (AB
2866, Migden, 2000). Over the last three fiscal years,
five counties have qualified for reimbursement of costs
related to 10 trials, costing the State General Fund
slightly more than $1 million.
The U.S. Supreme Court's opinion in Gideon v. Wainwright
(1963) held that the United States Constitution's 6th
Amendment guarantee of counsel is a fundamental right which
applies to all state criminal prosecutions. California law
requires that counsel must be provided, at public expense,
to an indigent defendant charged with any felony or
misdemeanor.
In Nevada County, on September 20, 2012, four suspects were
arrested and charged with securities fraud, conspiracy, and
elder abuse for operating a Ponzi scheme that allegedly
bilked dozens of investors of over $2.3 million. The
arrests were the result of an investigation conducted by
SB 16 -- 4/30/13 -- Page 2
the State Department of Justice's Special Crimes Unit
(SCU), which coordinates the investigation and prosecution
of crimes involving large-scale, investment and financial
frauds, public corruption cases, and high-tech crimes where
the scope and complexity of offenses exceed the
investigative and prosecutorial resources of local law
enforcement and other state agencies. The criminal case is
being prosecuted by the Attorney General's Mortgage Fraud
Strike Force.
Nevada County officials worry that the county's finances
will suffer from the high costs of providing criminal
defense services to multiple defendants in complex
litigation being prosecuted by the State Attorney General's
Office. They want the Legislature to replicate the state
laws providing reimbursement for counties' homicide trial
costs to allow reimbursements for counties' defense costs
in nonhomicide criminal trials prosecuted by the State
Attorney General.
Proposed Law
Senate Bill 16 allows a county that is responsible for the
defense costs of a trial or hearing of a person charged
with a nonhomicide crime to apply to the State Controller
for reimbursement of the costs incurred by the county in
excess of the amount of money derived by the county from a
tax of 0.0125 of 1% of the full value of property assessed
for purposes of taxation within the county. This
authority applies only to trials beginning on or after
January 1, 2012 for which the Attorney General is handling
the prosecution of a nonhomicide crime.
SB 16 defines "costs incurred by the county" as all costs,
except normal salaries and expenses, incurred by the county
in defending at trial, including the trial of, a person for
the offense of a nonhomicide crime. Trial defense costs
include:
Costs, except normal salaries and expenses,
incurred by the public defender in investigation and
defense.
All pretrials, hearings, and postconviction
proceedings.
With specified exceptions, SB 16 prohibits reimbursements
SB 16 -- 4/30/13 -- Page 3
for:
Costs that exceed the California Victim
Compensation and Government Claims Board's standards
for travel and per diem expenses.
Travel in excess of 1,000 miles on any single round
trip.
SB 16 requires that, subject to appropriation by the
Legislature, reimbursement funds must be available for
three fiscal years from the date of the appropriation.
After three years unused funds revert back to the State
General Fund.
SB 16 requires the State Controller, subject to
appropriation by the Legislature, to provide reimbursement
for specified defense costs of attorneys or investigators
if the venue for trial of a nonhomicide criminal case is
changed from a county that is eligible for reimbursement to
another county.
If a county that is eligible for reimbursement applies to
the State Controller, and the Controller determines that
the reimbursement meets the provisions of state law, SB 16
requires the Controller to request that the Director of
Finance include any amounts necessary in a request for a
deficiency appropriation in augmentation of the emergency
fund.
SB 16 authorizes the State Controller to adopt rules and
regulations to carry out the bill's purposes.
State Revenue Impact
No estimate.
Comments
1. Purpose of the bill . County governments throughout
California are confronting significant fiscal challenges.
The extraordinary costs of a trial involving multiple
defendants who face numerous criminal charges resulting
from a complex investigation can throw a budget out of
balance, particularly in a small, rural county. Nevada
County's costs associated with the pending real estate
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fraud trial totaled $62,000 through March 2013. The County
anticipates that its quarterly costs will escalate as the
trial date approaches and increase further after the trial
begins. Based on the County's 2012 net assessment roll
value of $14.8 billion, the county's defense costs would
have to exceed $1.9 million before it could qualify for
reimbursement from the state. SB 16 will provide Nevada
County, and other counties that are in similar
circumstances, with much-needed relief from extraordinary
criminal trial costs. Just as federal and state laws
recognize that a person's right to a fair trial should not
depend on the nature of the charges against him or her,
state law should acknowledge that a county's ability to
conduct criminal trials fairly, without suffering fiscal
harm, shouldn't be limited to homicide cases.
2. Slippery slope . For more than four decades, the
state's responsibility to reimburse counties' extraordinary
trial costs has been limited to costs associated with
homicide trials. This policy reflects the uniquely serious
nature of murder charges, which require that the state make
every effort to ensure that fiscal constraints impair
neither the prosecution nor the defense. By making a
county's defense costs reimbursable regardless of the type
of criminal charges involved, SB 16 departs from
long-standing policy and invites other proposals to expand
the state's responsibilities for reimbursing trial costs.
For example, why shouldn't counties seek state
reimbursement for their extraordinary nonhomicide trial
costs regardless of whether the Attorney General's office
is involved? The Committee may wish to consider whether SB
16 establishes a precedent for further expansions of the
state's trial cost reimbursement obligations.
3. Too broad ? SB 16's provisions apply to any trial in
which the Attorney General's office is conducting the
prosecution of a nonhomicide crime. The AG is prosecuting
the Nevada County real estate fraud case because of the
scope and complexity of the investigation that led to the
criminal charges. However, Department of Justice staff
note that the AG's office routinely prosecutes criminal
cases in which the District Attorney's office has been
recused due to a conflict, which can occur if a DA's family
member or employee is a victim, witness, or defendant in a
criminal case. The AG's office also has occasionally had
to stand-in for a DA on all matters for some period of
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time. Given the number of nonhomicide criminal cases that
the AG handles, the amount of state reimbursement that
counties may be entitled to under SB 16's provisions may be
larger than anticipated. Similarly, the possibility of
receiving state reimbursement may provide an incentive for
counties to seek the AG's involvement in prosecuting
potentially costly cases. To avoid these unintended
consequences, the Committee may wish to consider amending
SB 16 to limit state reimbursements only to trials in which
the AG is conducting the prosecution because of the scope
and complexity of the case.
4. Realignment, not reimbursement . Rather than providing
a patchwork of state reimbursements for some counties'
extraordinary criminal trial costs, the state may benefit
from more systematic changes to the funding and conduct of
criminal trials. To seek a long-term solution to the
chronic fiscal problems that have confronted state and
county budgets in recent years, Governor Brown and the
Legislature have begun to restructure the state's
programmatic and fiscal relationship with its counties.
These "realignment" efforts shifted the responsibility for
funding and administering some criminal justice, health,
and social services from the state to the counties to save
costs and improve service delivery by allowing greater
local discretion and innovation. As a part of this ongoing
process, legislators may wish to consider whether
realigning responsibilities for funding and conducting
criminal trials will help prevent counties' disparate
fiscal and human resources from impairing the uniform
administration of justice in criminal cases.
5. Urgency . Regular statutes take effect on January 1
following their enactment; bills passed in 2013 take effect
on January 1, 2014. The California Constitution allows
bills with urgency clauses to take effect immediately if
they're needed for the public peace, health, and safety.
SB 16 contains an urgency clause declaring that it is
necessary for its provisions to go into effect immediately
to expedite the reimbursement of counties' defense costs
for specified criminal trials.
6. Double-referral . The Senate Rules Committee has ordered
a double-referral of SB 16, first to the Senate Governance
& Finance Committee, which has policy jurisdiction over the
statutes governing local governments' finances, and then to
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the Senate Public Safety Committee, which hears bills
relating to criminal trials.
Support and Opposition (5/9/13)
Support : Nevada County; California Public Defenders
Association; California State Association of Counties;
Rural County Representatives of California.
Opposition : Unknown.