BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SB 651
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Date of Hearing: August 14, 2013
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Mike Gatto, Chair
SB 651 (Pavley and Leno) - As Amended: August 6, 2013
Policy Committee: HealthVote:19 - 0
Human Services 7 - 0
Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program:
No Reimbursable:
SUMMARY
This bill establishes requirements for sexual assault
examinations of residents in state hospitals and developmental
centers, and establishes a new penalty for failure of
developmental centers to report specified incidents to local law
enforcement. Specifically, this bill:
1)Makes it a class B violation for a developmental center to
fail to report to local law enforcement: a) a death; b) a
sexual assault; c) an assault with a deadly weapon by a
nonresident; d) an assault with force likely to produce great
bodily injury; e) an injury to the genitals when the cause of
the injury is undetermined; or f) a broken bone, when the
cause of the break is undetermined, if those potential
assaults take place within a specific portion of the facility.
2)Provides that if the incident occurs in the general acute care
hospital or acute psychiatric hospital portion of the
developmental center, a failure to immediately report the
incident would be subject to a civil penalty of $100 for each
day the incident is not reported.
3)Requires designated investigators of state hospitals and
developmental centers to request a sexual assault forensic
medical examination for any resident of a state hospital who
is reasonably suspected to be a victim of sexual assault.
4)Requires sexual assault forensic medical examinations to be
performed by an independent sexual assault forensic examiner
and prohibits them from being performed at the facility unless
it is deemed safer for the victim and the state hospital's
SB 651
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examination facilities are properly equipped.
FISCAL EFFECT
Costs associated with this legislation should be minor and
absorbable within existing Department of Developmental Services
(DDS) and Department of State Hospitals (DSH) resources.
COMMENTS
1)Rationale . According to the author, this bill is designed to
address the lack of forensic evidence collection for sexual
assault victims and suspected sexual assault victims in state
developmental centers and state hospitals. The author notes
that an investigation requested by DDS and undertaken by
Disability Rights California (DRC) in March 2012 identified 36
cases of alleged molestation of residents at California's
developmental centers by caretakers during the last three
years, but the Office of Protective Services (OPS), the
developmental centers' on-site police force, did not complete
even basic forensic evidence collections. The author states
that OPS failed to order a single rape exam during this
period. At other police departments, a rape examination by
trained forensic examiners for suspected sexual assault
victims is considered routine in order to collect evidence for
prosecution.
This bill would require that state hospitals and developmental
centers provide a resident who is a victim or suspected victim
of sexual assault with a medical evidentiary examination at an
appropriate off-site facility. This bill also creates a
penalty for developmental centers that fail to report serious
incidents of abuse or criminal conduct to law enforcement.
The author indicates that, since this bill was introduced, DDS
has reported that they have upgraded their training of first
responder staff and have sent three suspected rapes to outside
hospitals for sexual assault exams. Two of the three have
been confirmed sexual assaults. The author also indicates
that, between July 2010 and June 2013, DSH reports that it has
received 165 reports of sexual assaults by patients and staff.
Of those, approximately 29 patients were sent out to local
hospitals for rape exams.
2)Related Legislation . SB 1051 (Liu and Emmerson), Chapter 660,
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Statutes of 2012, established a requirement for DDS and DSH to
report certain crimes involving death or major injury to the
state's designated protection and advocacy agency, requires
that mandated reporters within a developmental center
immediately report suspected abuse to OPS, and defined the job
requirements for the Director of OPS.
SB 1522 (Leno), Chapter 666, Statutes of 2012, established the
requirement that DDS report major crimes, as specified, to the
local law enforcement agency with jurisdiction over the
developmental center regardless of whether OPS had
investigated the facts of the incident.
Analysis Prepared by : Julie Salley-Gray / APPR. / (916)
319-2081