BILL ANALYSIS �
SENATE COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC SAFETY
Senator Loni Hancock, Chair S
2013-2014 Regular Session B
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SB 846 (Galgiani)
As Amended February 25, 2014
Hearing date: April 8, 2014
Penal Code
JRD:mc
CRIMES:
VIOLENT CRIME INFORMATION CENTER
HISTORY
Source: Author
Prior Legislation: AB 2282 (Friedman) - Chapter 1456, Statutes
of 1988
Support: California Police Chiefs Association; California
District Attorneys Association
Opposition:None known
KEY ISSUE
SHOULD THE PENAL CODE BE CLARIFIED TO EXPLICITLY STATE THAT LAW
ENFORCEMENT AGENCIES IN CALIFORNIA MAY REQUEST INFORMATION FROM THE
ATTORNEY GENERAL'S OFFICE, AS SPECIFIED?
PURPOSE
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The purpose of this legislation is to make clear that local law
enforcement has the ability to request information and data
maintained by the Department of Justice for the purpose of
linking unsolved missing or unidentified person case with
another case that was previously unknown to be related to that
case, or for the purpose of resolving an unsolved missing or
unidentified person case, as specified.
Current law requires the Attorney General to maintain the
Violent Crime Information Center to assist in the identification
and the apprehension of persons responsible for specific violent
crimes and for the disappearance and exploitation of persons,
particularly children and dependent adults. The center is
required to, among other things, assist local law enforcement
agencies and county district attorneys by providing
investigative information on persons responsible for specific
violent crimes and missing person cases. (Penal Code � 14200.)
Current law requires the Attorney General to establish and
maintain a computer system designed to effect an immediate law
enforcement response to reports of missing persons. This system
must include an active file of information concerning persons
reported to it as missing and who have not been reported as
found. The computer system is to be made available to law
enforcement agencies. However, the Attorney General shall not
release the information if the reporting agency requests the
Attorney General in writing not to release the information
because it would impair a criminal investigation. (Penal Code �
14201.)
Current law requires the Attorney General to establish and
maintain, upon appropriation of funds by the Legislature, the
Violent Crime Information Network within the center to enable
the Department of Justice crime analysts with expertise in child
abuse, missing persons, child abductions, and sexual assaults to
electronically share their data, analysis, and findings on
violent crime cases with each other, and to electronically
provide law enforcement agencies with information to assist in
the identification, tracking, and apprehension of violent
offenders. The Violent Crime Information Network shall serve to
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integrate existing state, federal, and civilian data bases into
a single comprehensive network. (Penal Code � 14201.1.)
Current law requires the Violent Crime Information Center to
make accessible to the National Missing and Unidentified Persons
System specific information authorized for dissemination and as
determined appropriate by the center that is contained in law
enforcement reports regarding missing or unidentified persons.
(Penal Code � 14201.3.)
Current law requires the Attorney General to establish the
Missing and Exploited Children's Recovery Network, an automated
computerized system that has the capability to electronically
transmit to all state and local law enforcement agencies, and
all cooperating news media services, either by facsimile or
computer modem, a missing child poster that includes the name,
personal description data, and picture of the missing child.
(Penal Code � 14201.5.)
Current law requires the Attorney General to establish and
maintain an automated violent crime method of operation system
to facilitate the identification and apprehension of persons
responsible for murder, kidnap, including parental abduction,
false imprisonment, or sexual assault. This unit shall be
responsible for identifying perpetrators of violent felonies
collected from the center and analyzing and comparing data on
missing persons in order to determine possible leads which could
assist local law enforcement agencies. This unit shall only
release information about active investigations by police and
sheriffs' departments to local law enforcement agencies. (Penal
Code � 14202.)
Current law requires that when any person makes a report of a
missing person to a police department, sheriff's department,
district attorney's office, California Highway Patrol, or other
law enforcement agency, the report shall be given in person or
by mail in a format acceptable to the Attorney General. When
the person is found, the sheriff, chief of police, coroner or
medical examiner, or the law enforcement agency locating the
missing person are required to immediately report that
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information to the Attorney General's office. (Penal Code ��
14206 and 14207.)
This bill would allow a law enforcement agency to request
information and data maintained by the Department of Justice,
for the purpose of linking unsolved missing or unidentified
person case with another case that was previously unknown to be
related to that case, or for the purpose of resolving an
unsolved missing or unidentified person case.
RECEIVERSHIP/OVERCROWDING CRISIS AGGRAVATION
For the last several years, severe overcrowding in California's
prisons has been the focus of evolving and expensive litigation
relating to conditions of confinement. On May 23, 2011, the
United States Supreme Court ordered California to reduce its
prison population to 137.5 percent of design capacity within two
years from the date of its ruling, subject to the right of the
state to seek modifications in appropriate circumstances.
Beginning in early 2007, Senate leadership initiated a policy to
hold legislative proposals which could further aggravate the
prison overcrowding crisis through new or expanded felony
prosecutions. Under the resulting policy, known as "ROCA"
(which stands for "Receivership/ Overcrowding Crisis
Aggravation"), the Committee held measures that created a new
felony, expanded the scope or penalty of an existing felony, or
otherwise increased the application of a felony in a manner
which could exacerbate the prison overcrowding crisis. Under
these principles, ROCA was applied as a content-neutral,
provisional measure necessary to ensure that the Legislature did
not erode progress towards reducing prison overcrowding by
passing legislation, which would increase the prison population.
In January of 2013, just over a year after the enactment of the
historic Public Safety Realignment Act of 2011, the State of
California filed court documents seeking to vacate or modify the
federal court order requiring the state to reduce its prison
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population to 137.5 percent of design capacity. The State
submitted that the, ". . . population in the State's 33 prisons
has been reduced by over 24,000 inmates since October 2011 when
public safety realignment went into effect, by more than 36,000
inmates compared to the 2008 population . . . , and by nearly
42,000 inmates since 2006 . . . ." Plaintiffs opposed the
state's motion, arguing that, "California prisons, which
currently average 150% of capacity, and reach as high as 185% of
capacity at one prison, continue to deliver health care that is
constitutionally deficient." In an order dated January 29,
2013, the federal court granted the state a six-month extension
to achieve the 137.5 % inmate population cap by December 31,
2013.
The Three-Judge Court then ordered, on April 11, 2013, the state
of California to "immediately take all steps necessary to comply
with this Court's . . . Order . . . requiring defendants to
reduce overall prison population to 137.5% design capacity by
December 31, 2013." On September 16, 2013, the State asked the
Court to extend that deadline to December 31, 2016. In
response, the Court extended the deadline first to January 27,
2014 and then February 24, 2014, and ordered the parties to
enter into a meet-and-confer process to "explore how defendants
can comply with this Court's June 20, 2013 Order, including
means and dates by which such compliance can be expedited or
accomplished and how this Court can ensure a durable solution to
the prison crowding problem."
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The parties were not able to reach an agreement during the
meet-and-confer process. As a result, the Court ordered
briefing on the State's requested extension and, on February 10,
2014, issued an order extending the deadline to reduce the
in-state adult institution population to 137.5% design capacity
to February 28, 2016. The order requires the state to meet the
following interim and final population reduction benchmarks:
143% of design bed capacity by June 30, 2014;
141.5% of design bed capacity by February 28, 2015; and
137.5% of design bed capacity by February 28, 2016.
If a benchmark is missed the Compliance Officer (a position
created by the February 10, 2016 order) can order the release of
inmates to bring the State into compliance with that benchmark.
In a status report to the Court dated February 18, 2014, the
state reported that as of February 12, 2014, California's 33
prisons were at 144.3 percent capacity, with 117,686 inmates.
8,768 inmates were housed in out-of-state facilities.
The ongoing prison overcrowding litigation indicates that prison
capacity and related issues concerning conditions of confinement
remain unresolved. While real gains in reducing the prison
population have been made, even greater reductions may be
required to meet the orders of the federal court. Therefore,
the Committee's consideration of ROCA bills -bills that may
impact the prison population - will be informed by the following
questions:
Whether a measure erodes realignment and impacts the
prison population;
Whether a measure addresses a crime which is directly
dangerous to the physical safety of others for which there
is no other reasonably appropriate sanction;
Whether a bill corrects a constitutional infirmity or
legislative drafting error;
Whether a measure proposes penalties which are
proportionate, and cannot be achieved through any other
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reasonably appropriate remedy; and,
Whether a bill addresses a major area of public safety
or criminal activity for which there is no other
reasonable, appropriate remedy.
COMMENTS
1. Need for This Bill
According to the author:
The need for SB 846 evolved after the recovery of
loved ones who had been missing in my district since
the 1980s. There are 25,000 active missing and
unidentified in the Attorney General's repository of
cold cases. I have a law enforcement task force in
place and we have identified a need to give the
Attorney General greater discretion to assist local
law enforcement with identifying similarities between
cases. Our goal is to give local law enforcement
additional tools to increase the likelihood of
matching records of missing and unidentified loved
ones, and resolving their cold cases.
2. Effect of this Legislation
The California Department of Justice maintains the "Missing and
Unidentified Persons Unit:"
Through the Missing and Unidentified Persons Unit, the
California Department of Justice assists law
enforcement agencies throughout the state in finding
missing persons.
The Missing and Unidentified Persons Unit maintains
statewide files containing the dental records,
photographs and physical characteristics of missing
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and unidentified persons.
Staff assist law enforcement agencies in locating
missing persons and identifying unknown live and
deceased persons through the comparison of physical
characteristics, fingerprints, and dental/body X-rays.
(See Sections 14200-14213 of the California Penal
Code.) (http://oag.ca.gov/missing/mups)
While the ability of local law enforcement to ask for
information from the Department of Justice appears to be
implicit in existing law, this legislation makes it clear that a
local law enforcement agency can request information and data
from the Department of Justice for the purpose of linking
unsolved missing or identified person cases.
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