BILL ANALYSIS
SB 691
Page 1
SENATE THIRD READING
SB 691 (Yee)
As Amended August 20, 2010
Majority vote
SENATE VOTE : Vote not relevant
BUSINESS & PROFESSIONS APPROPRIATIONS
(vote not relevant) (vote not relevant)
SUMMARY : Expands the requirement that witnesses report the
murder, rape, or specified sexual offense upon minors under the
age of 18. Specifically, this bill :
1)Increases the age triggering a reporting requirement from 14
years of age to 18 years.
2)Expands the sex crimes that witnesses must report to include
sodomy, oral copulation, and sexual penetration, as specified,
where those crimes are accomplished by use of force, violence,
duress, menace, or fear of immediate and unlawful bodily
injury on the victim or another person.
3)Creates an alternative infraction to the existing misdemeanor
violation of failing to report.
4)Specifies that victims cannot be prosecuted for failing to
report crimes against themselves.
5)Includes domestic partners to the list of relations that are
not required to report one another for committing a specified
crime.
6)Specifies that minors under the age of 12 may not be
prosecuted for failing to report as specified.
EXISTING LAW :
1)States that any person who reasonably believes that he or she
has observed the commission of any of the following offenses
where the victim is a child under the age of 14 years shall
notify a peace officer: murder, rape, and specified lewd and
lascivious acts committed by force or fear.
a) The reporting shall not be construed to affect
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privileged relationships as provided by law.
b) The duty to notify a peace officer imposed is satisfied
if the notification or an attempt to provide notice is made
by telephone or any other means.
c) Failure to notify as required is a misdemeanor and is
punishable by a fine of not more than $1,500, by
imprisonment in a county jail for not more than six months,
or by both that fine and imprisonment.
d) The requirements of this section shall not apply to the
following:
i) A person who is related to either the victim or the
offender, including a husband, wife, parent, child,
brother, sister, grandparent, grandchild, or other person
related by consanguinity or affinity.
ii) A person who fails to report based on a reasonable
mistake of fact.
iii) A person who fails to report based on a reasonable
fear for his or her own safety or for the safety of his
or her family.
2)Provides that in any case in which the defendant, voluntarily
acting in concert with another person, by force or violence
and against the will of the victim, committed an act of rape
or sexual assault, either personally or by aiding and abetting
the other person, that fact shall be charged in the indictment
or information and if found to be true by the jury, upon a
jury trial, or if found to be true by the court, upon a court
trial, or if admitted by the defendant, the defendant shall
suffer confinement in the state prison for five, seven, or
nine years.
3)Provides that every person who, after a felony has been
committed, harbors, conceals or aids a principal in such a
felony, with the intent that said principal may avoid or
escape from arrest, trial, conviction or punishment, having
knowledge that said principal has committed such a felony or
has been charged with such a felony or convicted thereof is an
accessory to the felony and is guilty of an alternate
felony/misdemeanor.
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4)Provides that it is a crime for any person having knowledge of
the actual commission of a crime to take money or property of
another, or any gratuity or reward, or any engagement or
promise thereof upon any agreement or understanding to
compound or conceal a crime or abstain from any prosecution
thereof or to withhold any evidence thereof. The penalty for
such crime is an alternate felony/misdemeanor if the crime
being concealed was punishable by death or life in prison or
any other felony and a six-month misdemeanor if the crime
being concealed was a misdemeanor.
FISCAL EFFECT : According to the Assembly Appropriations
Committee analysis, unknown, likely minor, non-reimbursable
local costs to the extent increasing the victim age requirement
results in additional prosecutions under the existing
misdemeanor failure to report.
Unknown, potentially moderate, state costs for increased state
incarceration to the extent eliminating the victim age
requirement results in more and/or more successful prosecutions
and additional state prison commitments for murder, rape, and
specified lewd and lascivious acts. For example, just one
additional annual state prison commitment per year would result
in increased annual General Fund costs of almost $200,000 in
four years. Costs could increase depending on the conviction
offense and the sentence.
COMMENTS : According to the author, "This bill would update the
Sherrie Iverson Child Victim Protection Act in the light of the
alleged rape in Richmond.
"This bill requires, with specified exceptions, any person who
reasonably believes that he or she has observed the commission
of either a murder, rape, or a lewd or lascivious act with a
child under the age of 18 years to notify a peace officer by
telephone or by any other means. The failure to notify as
required would be a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of $1,500,
or by imprisonment in a county jail for up to six months, or
both.
"Six other states have similar statutes requiring aid to victims
or reporting crimes (Massachusetts, Minnesota, Ohio, Rhode
Island, Washington, and Wisconsin).
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"It is unconscionable someone could turn its back to a minor
being assaulted; this bill is an attempt to reassert the
collective duty to protect our children"
Please see the policy committee for a full discussion of this
bill.
Analysis Prepared by : Gabriel Caswell / PUB. S. / (916)
319-3744
FN: 0006501