BILL ANALYSIS �
Senate Appropriations Committee Fiscal Summary
Senator Kevin de Le�n, Chair
AB 2499 (Bonilla) - Local corrections: home detention programs.
Amended: July 3, 2014 Policy Vote: Public Safety 5-0
Urgency: No Mandate: Yes
Hearing Date: August 4, 2014
Consultant: Jolie Onodera
This bill does not meet the criteria for referral to the
Suspense File.
Bill Summary: AB 2499 would:
Prospectively authorize good conduct and work performance
credits to inmates participating in home detention programs
and specified work release programs commensurate with the
credit earning provisions under existing law while in jail
custody.
Expand the information a local law enforcement agency may
receive about offenders on electronic monitoring to include
current and historical GPS coordinates, if available, and
would restrict the use of this information to investigatory
purposes.
Require an agency (police department) that has knowledge
that the subject in a criminal investigation is a
participant in an electronic monitoring program to make
reasonable efforts to notify the supervising agency prior to
serving a warrant or taking any law enforcement action
against a participant.
Clarify that mandatory supervision commences, unless
otherwise ordered by the court, upon release from physical
custody or an alternative custody program, whichever is
later.
Allows time spent in camp, work furlough, other facilities
to count as mandatory jail time, even if the underlying
statute does not require mandatory minimum period of jail
time.
Fiscal Impact:
Potentially significant ongoing cost savings to counties
(Local) to the extent inmates on electronic monitoring earn
credits while participating in home detention or work
release programs reduces jail time and/or an increased
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number of offenders participate in electronic monitoring in
lieu of jail time.
Potentially significant ongoing local cost savings to the
extent allowing time spent in camps, work furlough, and
other facilities counts as mandatory jail time to an
expanded population of offenders (currently only applicable
to defendants with mandatory minimum jail sentences).
Potential minor state-reimbursable costs (General) for
police departments to make reasonable efforts to notify the
supervising agency (sheriff or probation department) prior
to taking an enforcement action.
Background: Existing law provides that notwithstanding any other
law, the board of supervisors of any county may authorize the
sheriff, probation officer, or director of the county department
of corrections to offer a voluntary or involuntary home
detention program in lieu of confinement in the county jail, or
other correctional facility or program under the auspices of the
probation officer. (Penal Code (PC) � 1203.016(a).)
Existing law requires when a defendant has been in custody,
including but not limited to, any time spent in jail, camp, work
furlough facility, and other specified facilities, all days of
custody of the defendant, including home detention for inmates
who otherwise would be in jail in lieu of bail, are credited
toward the term of imprisonment or toward any fine that may be
imposed, as specified. (PC � 2900.5(a).)
Existing law provides that the time a defendant spent in jail,
camp, work furlough facility, and other specified facilities,
qualifies as mandatory time in jail if the statute under which
the defendant is sentenced requires a mandatory minimum period
of time in jail. (PC � 2900.5(f).)
Existing law authorizes a court, when sentencing a person to
county jail for a felony, to commit the person to county jail
for either the full term in custody, as specified, or to suspend
the execution of a concluding portion of the term selected at
the court's discretion. Under existing law, this period of
suspended execution is supervised by the county probation
officer and is known as mandatory supervision.
Existing law requires, on or after January 1, 2015, unless the
court finds, in the interests of justice, that it is not
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appropriate in a particular case that a period of the concluding
portion of a county jail term be served on mandatory
supervision.
Proposed Law: This bill:
Prospectively authorizes good conduct and work performance
credits to inmates participating in home detention programs
and specified work release programs commensurate with the
credit earning provisions under existing law while in jail
custody.
Expands the information a local law enforcement agency may
receive about offenders on electronic monitoring to include
current and historical GPS coordinates, if available, and
would restrict the use of this information to investigatory
purposes.
Requires a local law enforcement agency (police
department) that has knowledge that the subject in a
criminal investigation is a participant in an electronic
monitoring program to make reasonable efforts to notify the
supervising agency prior to serving a warrant or taking any
law enforcement action against a participant.
Clarifies that mandatory supervision commences, unless
otherwise ordered by the court, upon release from physical
custody or an alternative custody program, whichever is
later.
Staff Comments: This bill could result in potentially
significant ongoing cost savings to counties to the extent
inmates on electronic monitoring earn credits while
participating in home detention or work release programs which
reduces jail time and/or an increased number of offenders
participate in electronic monitoring in lieu of jail time.
Additionally, allowing time spent in camps, work furlough, and
other facilities to count as mandatory jail time to an expanded
population of offenders (currently only applicable to defendants
with mandatory minimum jail sentences), will result in
significant ongoing local cost savings..
The requirement on police departments to make reasonable efforts
to notify a supervising agency (sheriff or probation department)
prior to taking an enforcement action on a participant is
estimated to be minor, as in order for the requirement to be
triggered, the police department would have to already have
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knowledge that the person in a criminal investigation is a
participant in an electronic monitoring program.