BILL ANALYSIS                                                                                                                                                                                                    Ó



                                                                            



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                                    THIRD READING


          Bill No:  SB 114
          Author:   Pavley (D)
          Amended:  4/10/13
          Vote:     21

           
           SENATE PUBLIC SAFETY COMMITTEE  :  7-0, 4/2/13
          AYES:  Hancock, Anderson, Block, De León, Knight, Liu, Steinberg


           SUBJECT  :    Commercially sexually exploited minors

           SOURCE  :     Childrens Advocacy Institute


           DIGEST  :    This bill extends the sunset date to January 1, 2017,  
          for the discretionary pilot project in Los Angeles County  
          regarding the development of a comprehensive, multidisciplinary  
          model reflecting the best practices for the response of law  
          enforcement and the criminal and juvenile justice systems to  
          identify, assess and address the needs of commercially sexually  
          exploited children who have been arrested or detained by local  
          law enforcement for prostitution crimes, and extends the sunset  
          date for the District Attorney of Los Angeles to submit a report  
          to the Legislature to April 1, 2016.

           ANALYSIS  :    

          Existing law:

          1. Statutorily authorizes the County of Los Angeles, contingent  
             upon local funding, to establish a pilot project to develop a  
             comprehensive, replicative, multidisciplinary model to  
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             address the needs and effective treatment of commercially  
             sexually exploited minors who have been arrested or detained  
             by local law enforcement, as specified.  

          2. Sunsets these provisions on January 1, 2014.  

          This bill:

          1. Extends this sunset date three years to January 1, 2017, for  
             the discretionary pilot project in Los Angeles County. 

          2.  Extends the sunset date three years to April 1, 2016 for the  
             District Attorney for the County of Los Angeles to submit a  
             report to the Legislature summarizing activities of the pilot  
             project, as specified.

           Background
           
          In 2008, the Legislature passed AB 499 (Swanson, Chapter 359,  
          Statutes of 2008) to authorize a pilot project in Alameda County  
          intended "to encourage the development of a comprehensive,  
          multidisciplinary model reflecting the best practices for the  
          response of law enforcement and the criminal and juvenile  
          justice systems to identify and assess commercially sexually  
          exploited children who have been arrested or detained by local  
          law enforcement."  In 2010, the Legislature passed a virtually  
          identical bill to pilot the same kind of project in Los Angeles.  
           This bill extends the sunset on the Los Angeles project from  
          January 1, 2014, to January 1, 2017.  This sunset mirrors the  
          sunset date for the Alameda County project.

           Sexually exploited minors and the criminal justice system  .   
          According to the author's office, news articles over the last  
          few years have highlighted the problem of child and teen  
          prostitutes.  For example, the Contra Costa Times in 2008  
          reported, "last year, of the 443 females arrested for  
          prostitution in Oakland, 29 were juvenile cases. ?  Meanwhile,  
          police have only just started to quantify the problem and have  
          been working to nail down firm numbers. ?  Technology, the  
          Internet, and cell phones have all changed the game.  Pimps now  
          use technology to sell girls as young as 11 or 12 on the  
          street."   Similarly, an Oakland Tribune article from earlier  
          this year described efforts to address child prostitutes as  
          victims rather than criminal offenders:

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             The majority of youngsters involved in the sex trade have  
             been abused or neglected.  Almost all the youngsters on the  
             streets have run away from a home situation they find  
             untenable. 

             "A lot of these young girls are foster care youth and kids  
             not connected to any family system," said Brian Bob, outreach  
             coordinator for Covenant House, a nonprofit homeless shelter  
             for youth that drives a van around Oakland five nights a week  
             to provide food and, if they'll accept it, shelter to  
             homeless youngsters. The vast majority of homeless girls  
             Covenant House finds are prostitutes, he said. 

             . . .   

             Alameda County Deputy District Attorney Sharmin Eshraghi  
             Bock, who prosecutes human exploitation and trafficking  
             cases, said many young girls who fall into prostitution have  
             never known a loving family, so they mistake a pimp's  
             affection and promises of material things for love. 

             . . .   

             Sexually Abused and Commercially Exploited Youth, an  
             Oakland-based counseling program, last year surveyed 100  
             children ages 11 to 17 who had been peddled on the streets  
             and referred for counseling. 

             They found that 75 percent of the children had been raped at  
             some time in their lives, 48 percent had been physically or  
             sexually abused, and 70 percent had been assaulted while  
             working the streets.

             Most respondents were runaways: Eighty-eight percent said  
             they had run away from their family home or a foster care  
             home.  . . .
             Nola Brantley, coordinator of the SACEY counseling program,  
             said the child prostitution epidemic in Oakland can be  
             partially blamed on an overtaxed police system. 

             "There are cases of severe child abuse in Oakland that will  
             go uninvestigated and not prosecuted because of lack of  
             manpower," Brantley said.  "Some of these same children who  

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             were abused and nobody intervened will go on to become  
             sexually exploited minors."

           FISCAL EFFECT  :    Appropriation:  No   Fiscal Com.:  No   Local:  
           No

           SUPPORT  :   (Verified  4/10/13)

          Children's Advocacy Institute (source)
          American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists
          California Narcotic Officers' Association
          California Police Chiefs Association, Inc.
          California Public Defenders Association
          California State Sheriffs' Association



          JG:k  4/10/13   Senate Floor Analyses 

                           SUPPORT/OPPOSITION:  SEE ABOVE

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