November 7, 2019

Governor Newsom signed 870 bills into law this year. To keep counties informed of new laws that impact them, CSAC will be publishing a series of articles to spotlight those laws in each policy area. This week, the Administration of Justice policy area provides information on new laws affecting a wide range of subjects.

The new laws listed below become effective January 1, 2020 unless noted otherwise.

AB 32 (Bonta) – Detention Facilities: Private, For-Profit Administration of Services. Prohibits CDCR from entering into or renewing a contract with a private, for-profit prison to incarcerate state prison inmates, but would not prohibit the department from renewing or extending a contract to house state prison inmates in order to comply with any court-ordered population cap.

AB 45 (Stone, M) – Medical Care Fees for Inmates. Prohibits the secretary of CDCR or a sheriff, chief or director of corrections, or chief of police from charging a fee for an inmate-initiated medical visit of an inmate of a state prison, a county jail or city jail.

AB 206 (Chiu) – Public Nuisance: Abatement: Lead-Based Paint. Makes a property owner, or agent thereof, who participates in a program to abate lead-based paint created as a result of a judgment or settlement in any public nuisance or similar litigation, and all public entities, immune from liability in any lawsuit seeking to recover any cost associated with that abatement program and prohibits participation in a lead paint abatement program from being considered as evidence that a property constitutes a nuisance, or is substandard or untenantable, as provided.

AB 218 (Gonzalez) – Damages: Childhood Sexual Assault: Statute Of Limitations. Expands the definition of childhood sexual abuse, which would instead be referred to as childhood sexual assault; increases the time limit for commencing an action for recovery of damages suffered as a result of childhood sexual assault to 22 years from the date the plaintiff attains the age of majority or within 5 years of the date the plaintiff discovers or reasonably should have discovered that the psychological injury or illness occurring after the age of majority was caused by sexual assault, whichever is later; and provides for the recovery of up to treble damages against certain defendants in these actions, and would revive time-lapsed claims in certain circumstances.

AB 392 (Weber) – Peace Officers: Deadly Force. Redefines the circumstances under which a homicide by a peace officer is deemed justifiable to include when the officer reasonably believes, based on the totality of the circumstances, that deadly force is necessary to defend against an imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury to the officer or to another person, or to apprehend a fleeing person for a felony that threatened or resulted in death or serious bodily injury, if the officer reasonably believes that the person will cause death or serious bodily injury to another unless the person is immediately apprehended.

AB 597 (Levine) – Probation and Mandatory Supervision: Flash Incarceration. Extends the authorization of the use flash incarceration by probation departments until January 1, 2023.

AB 1076 (Ting) – Criminal Records: Automatic Relief. Requires the Department of Justice, on a monthly basis, to review the records in the statewide criminal justice databases and to identify persons who are eligible for relief by having their arrest records, or their criminal conviction records, withheld from disclosure, as specified. The bill requires the department to grant relief to an eligible person, without requiring a petition or motion. The bill does not limit petitions, motions, or orders for relief, as required or authorized by any other law.

AB 1215 (Ting) – Law Enforcement: Facial Recognition and Other Biometric Surveillance. Prohibits a law enforcement agency or law enforcement officer from installing, activating, or using any biometric surveillance system in connection with an officer camera or data collected by an officer camera. The bill authorizes a person to bring an action for equitable or declaratory relief against a law enforcement agency or officer who violates that prohibition.

AB 1331 (Bonta) – Criminal Justice Data. Requires a summary of arrests, pretrial proceedings, the nature and disposition of criminal charges, sentencing, incarceration, rehabilitation, and release, about criminal offenders reported to include additional information related to identifying the arrestee.

AB 1390 (Stone, M) – Deferred Entry of Judgement Pilot Program. Authorizes a defendant who is 21 years of age or older, but under 25 years of age on the date the offense was committed, to participate in the Transitional Age Youth Pilot program if approved by the multidisciplinary team established by the county.

AB 1394 (Daly) – Sealing of Records for Juveniles. Prohibits a superior court or probation department from charging an applicant a fee for filing a petition to seal records.

AB 1421 (Bauer-Kahan) – Supervised Release: Revocation. Prohibits the revocation of supervision for failure of a person to pay fines, fees, or assessments, unless the court makes the same determinations.

AB 1423 (Wicks) – Juvenile Court Transfers. Authorizes a person whose case was transferred from juvenile court to a court of criminal jurisdiction to file a motion to return the case to juvenile court for disposition under specified circumstances, including, among others, when the person is convicted at trial only of an offense that was not the basis for transfer from juvenile court to the criminal court, as specified. Upon return to the juvenile court, the bill requires the probation department to prepare a social study on the questions of proper disposition, and would impose additional duties on the clerk of the court with respect to notice and court records.

AB 1454 (Jones-Sawyer) – Trauma-Informed Diversion Programs For Youth. Authorizes grants to be awarded by BSCC to nonprofit organization applicants to administer the diversion programs and increases the maximum grant award to $2,000,000 and requires an applicant to provide a cash or in-kind match.

AB 1600 (Kalra) – Discovery: Peace and Custodial Officers: Personnel Records. Limits the written notice requirement with respect to motions pertaining to the discovery of peace or custodial officer personnel records to civil actions.

AB 1603 (Wicks) – California Violence Intervention and Prevention Grant Program. Codifies the establishment of the California Violence Intervention and Prevention Grant Program and the authority and duties of BSCC in administering the program, including the selection criteria for grants and reporting requirements to the Legislature.

AB 1819 (Committee on Judiciary) – Inspection of Public Records: Use of Requester’s Reproduction Equipment. Grants a requester who inspects a disclosable record on the premises of the agency the right to use the requester’s equipment on those premises, without being charged any fees or costs, to photograph or otherwise copy or reproduce the record in a manner that does not require the equipment to make physical contact with the record, unless the means of copy or reproduction would result in damage to the record, or unauthorized access to a computer system of the agency or secured network.

SB 22 (Leyva) – Rape Kits Testing. Requires a law enforcement agency to either submit sexual assault forensic evidence to a crime lab or ensure that a rapid turnaround DNA program is in place and requires a crime lab to either process the evidence or transmit the evidence to another crime lab for processing.

SB 36 (Hertzberg) – Pretrial Release: Risk Assessment Tools. Requires each pretrial services agency that uses a pretrial risk assessment tool to validate the tool by January 1, 2021, and on a regular basis thereafter, but no less frequently than once every 3 years, and to make specified information regarding the tool, including validation studies, publicly available.

SB 136 (Wiener) – Sentencing. Imposes an additional one-year term served for each prior separate prison term served for a conviction of a sexually violent offense

SB 230 (Caballero) – Law Enforcement: Use of Deadly Force: Training Policies. By no later than January 1, 2021, requires each law enforcement agency to maintain a policy that provides guidelines on the use of force, utilizing de-escalation techniques and other alternatives to force when feasible, specific guidelines for the application of deadly force, and factors for evaluating and reviewing all use of force incidents, among other things. Also requires each agency to make their use of force policy accessible to the public.

SB 439 (Umberg) – Criminal Procedure: Wiretapping: Authorization and Disclosure. Authorizes a peace officer or federal law enforcement officer to disclose contents of intercepted wire or electronic communications relating to crimes if they relate to grand theft involving a firearm or maliciously exploding or igniting a destructive device or any explosive causing bodily injury, mayhem or great bodily injury, or death.

SB 543 (Pan) – Pedicabs. Deletes the repeal date for requirements on pedicabs that allow passengers to consume alcohol while on board the pedicab, thereby extending those requirements indefinitely.

SB 591 (Galgiani) – Mental Health Evaluations for Incarcerated Persons. Requires psychiatrists or psychologists from the State Department of State Hospitals, the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, or the Board of Parole Hearings be given access to prisoners being temporarily held at a county correctional facility, a county medical facility, or a state-assigned mental health provider.

SB 716 (Mitchell) – Juveniles: Delinquency: Postsecondary Academic and Career Technical Education. Requires a county probation department to ensure that juveniles with a high school diploma or California high school equivalency certificate who are detained in, or committed to, a juvenile hall, ranch, camp, or forestry camp have access to, and can choose to participate in, public postsecondary academic and career technical courses and programs offered online, and for which they are eligible based on eligibility criteria and course schedules of the public postsecondary education campus providing the course or program.