BILL NUMBER: SB 1284 AMENDED
BILL TEXT
AMENDED IN SENATE MARCH 28, 2016
INTRODUCED BY Senator Hernandez
FEBRUARY 19, 2016
An act to amend Section 7105 of the Health and Safety Code,
relating to human remains.
LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST
SB 1284, as amended, Hernandez. Human remains: conservator of the
person or estate.
Under existing law, if a decedent has not otherwise given
directions, the right to control the disposition of the remains of
the deceased person, the location and conditions of
internment, interment, and arrangements for
funeral goods and services vests in, and the specified corresponding
duty devolves upon, certain persons in a specified order of
succession. Existing law lists these persons, in order, as an agent
under a power of attorney for health care who has the right and duty
of disposition, the surviving spouse, other specified relatives, and,
when the decedent has sufficient assets, a conservator of the
person, a conservator of the estate, and the public administrator.
Existing law requires, if the agent under a power of attorney, the
surviving spouse, or any of the other specified relatives who have
the right to control the disposition and arrange for funeral goods
and services fails to act or cannot be found within a specified
period, that the person's right to control the disposition and
arrange for funeral goods and services be relinquished and passed on
to the person or persons of the next degree of kinship in accordance
with the above list. This provision does
Existing law also provides that if any of those persons who would
otherwise have equal rights to control the disposition and arrange
for funeral goods and services fail to agree on disposition and
funeral goods and services to be provided within 7 days of the date
on which the right and duty of disposition devolved upon
the persons, a funeral establishment or a cemetery authority having
possession of the remains, or any person who has equal right to
control the disposition of the remains, may file a petition in the
superior court, as specified, seeking an order of the court
determining, as appropriate, who among those parties will have the
control of disposition and to direct that person to make in
terment of the remains. These provisions do not apply to a
conservator of the person or a conservator of the estate that fails
to act or cannot be found within the specified timeframe
period.
This bill would add a conservator of the person and a conservator
of the estate to the above provision
provisions for purposes of relinquishment,
relinquishment or petition, as specified.
Vote: majority. Appropriation: no. Fiscal committee: no.
State-mandated local program: no.
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:
SECTION 1. Section 7105 of the Health and Safety Code is amended
to read:
7105. (a) If the person or persons listed in paragraphs (1), (3),
(4), (5), (6), (7), and (8) of subdivision (a) of Section 7100
that who would otherwise have the right
to control the disposition and arrange for funeral goods and
services fails to act, or fails to delegate his or her authority to
act to some other person within seven days of the date when the right
and duty devolves upon the person or persons, or in the case of a
person listed in paragraph (2) of subdivision (a) of Section 7100,
within 10 days of the date when the right and duty devolves upon the
person, the right to control the disposition and arrange for funeral
goods and services shall be relinquished and passed on to the person
or persons of the next degree of kinship in accordance with
subdivision (a) of Section 7100.
(b) If the person or persons listed in paragraphs (1), (3), (4),
(5), (6), (7), and (8) of subdivision (a) of Section 7100
that who would otherwise have the right to
control the disposition and arrange for funeral goods and services
cannot be found within seven days of the date when the right and duty
devolves upon the person or persons, or in the case of a person
listed in paragraph (2) of subdivision (a) of Section 7100, within 10
days of the date when the right and duty devolves upon the person,
after reasonable inquiry, the right to control the disposition and
arrange for funeral goods and services shall be relinquished and
passed on to the person or persons of the next degree of kinship in
accordance with subdivision (a) of Section 7100.
(c) If any persons listed in paragraphs (1), (3), (4), (5),
and (6), (6), (7), and (8) of
subdivision (a) of Section 7100 that who
would otherwise have equal rights to control the disposition
and arrange for funeral goods and services fail to agree on
disposition and funeral goods and services to be provided within
seven days of the date on which the right and duty of disposition
devolved upon the persons, a funeral establishment or a cemetery
authority having possession of the remains, or any person who has
equal right to control the disposition of the remains may file a
petition in the superior court in the county in which the decedent
resided at the time of his or her death, or in which the remains are
located, naming as a party to the action those persons who would
otherwise have equal rights to control the disposition and seeking an
order of the court determining, as appropriate, who among those
parties will have the control of disposition and to direct that
person to make interment of the remains. The court, at the time of
determining the person to whom the right of disposition will vest,
shall, from the remaining parties to the action, establish an
alternate order to whom the right to control disposition will pass if
the person vested with the right to control disposition fails to act
within seven days.
(d) If the person vested with the duty of interment has criminal
charges pending against him or her for the unlawful killing of the
decedent, in violation of Section 187 of, or subdivision (a) or (b)
of Section 192 of, the Penal Code, the person or persons with the
next highest priority prescribed by Section 7100 may petition a court
of competent jurisdiction for an order for control of the
disposition of the decedent's remains. For this purpose, it shall be
conclusively presumed that the petitioner is the person entitled to
control the disposition of the remains if the petitioner is next in
the order of priority specified in Section 7100.