Brown holds bills’ fate
Caltrans study conducted since the veto found that, for both freeways, “HOV lane usage drops substantially after the 6 p.m. hour.”
The sex offender bill that also went to Brown would classify as a felony the willful disabling of GPS tracking devices by those on parole or under community supervision.
The offense would carry a prison sentence of up to three years and would apply to those previously convicted of rape, lewd or lascivious acts against children, sodomy, oral copulation or continuous sexual abuse of a child.
“When a rapist or child molester cuts off his GPS device and evades the law, the state has been put on notice that others are at great risk,” said Sen. Patricia Bates (R-Laguna Niguel), the bill’s author.
She cited two cases in which sex offenders who had been assigned GPS devices evaded the tracking units and are now accused of killing multiple women.
Another bill given final legislative approval would allow felony charges for those convicted of possessing “date rape” drugs, including Rohypnol and GHB, with intent to commit sexual assault.
The bill would plug a loophole created by the passage last year of Proposition 47, which reclassified many crimes from felonies to misdemeanors.
“I firmly believe that voters in California did not intend to weaken sexual assault statutes,” said the bill’s author, Sen. Cathleen Galgiani (D-Stockton).