[Approved by Governor September 30, 2016. Filed with Secretary of State September 30, 2016.]
AB 2417, Cooley. Child abuse reporting.
Existing law requires the Department of Justice to maintain an index of all reports of child abuse and severe neglect submitted by agencies mandated to make those reports. Existing law requires the Department of Justice to make relevant information contained in the index available to specified law enforcement agencies, county welfare departments, and other agencies that are conducting a child abuse investigation.
Existing law authorizes a designated Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) program to submit to the department fingerprint images and related information of employment and volunteer candidates for the purpose of obtaining information as to the existence and nature of any record of child abuse investigations contained in the Child Abuse Central Index, state- or federal-level convictions, or state- or federal-level arrests for which the department establishes that the applicant was released on bail or on his or her own recognizance pending trial. Existing law requires the department to charge a fee sufficient to cover the cost of processing the requests for state- and federal-level criminal offender record information.
This bill would instead prohibit the department from charging a fee for state-level criminal offender record information.
The people of the State of California do enact as follows:
Section 11105.04 of the Penal Code is amended to read:
(a) A designated Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) program may submit to the Department of Justice fingerprint images and related information of employment and volunteer candidates for the purpose of obtaining information as to the existence and nature of any record of child abuse investigations contained in the Child Abuse Central Index, state- or federal-level convictions, or state- or federal-level arrests for which the department establishes that the applicant was released on bail or on his or her own recognizance pending trial. Requests for federal-level criminal offender record information received by the department pursuant to this section shall be forwarded to the Federal Bureau of Investigation by the department.
(b) When requesting state-level criminal offender record information pursuant to this section, the designated CASA program shall request subsequent arrest notification, pursuant to Section 11105.2 of the Penal Code, for all employment and volunteer candidates.
(c) The department shall respond to the designated CASA program with information as delineated in subdivision (p) of Section 11105 of the Penal Code.
(d) (1) The department shall charge a fee sufficient to cover the cost of processing the requests for federal-level criminal offender record information.
(2) The department shall not charge a fee for state-level criminal offender record information.
(e) For purposes of this section, a designated CASA program is a local court-appointed special advocate program that has adopted and adheres to the guidelines established by the Judicial Council and which has been designated by the local presiding juvenile court judge to recruit, screen, select, train, supervise, and support lay volunteers to be appointed by the court to help define the best interests of children in juvenile court dependency and wardship proceedings. For purposes of this section, there shall be only one designated CASA program in each California county.
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