Bill Text: CA SB1141 | 2019-2020 | Regular Session | Introduced

California Senate Bill 1141 (Prior Session Legislation)

NOTE: There are more recent revisions of this legislation. Read Latest Draft

Bill Title: Domestic violence: coercive control.

Spectrum: Moderate Partisan Bill (Democrat 17-3)

Status: (Passed) 2020-09-29 - Chaptered by Secretary of State. Chapter 248, Statutes of 2020. [SB1141 Detail]

Download: California-2019-SB1141-Introduced.html

CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE— 2019–2020 REGULAR SESSION

Senate Bill

No. 1141

Introduced by Senator Rubio
(Coauthor: Assembly Member Lackey)

February 19, 2020

An act to add Section 273.55 to the Penal Code, relating to coercive control.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST

SB 1141, as introduced, Rubio. Deprivation of personal liberty: coercive control.

Under existing law, a person who willfully inflicts corporal injury resulting in a traumatic condition upon a spouse, cohabitant, fiancé, someone with whom the person has an engagement or dating relationship, or someone who is the father or mother of the offender’s child, is guilty of a felony, punishable in a county jail for not more than 1 year, by imprisonment in the state prison for 2, 3, or 4 years, or by a fine of up to $6,000, or by both that fine and imprisonment.

This bill would make it unlawful for a person to deprive or violate the personal liberty of a spouse, cohabitant, fiancé, someone with whom the person has an engagement or dating relationship, or someone who is the father or mother of the offender’s child by means of coercive control. The bill would make coercive control punishable by imprisonment in a county jail not to exceed one year, by imprisonment in the state prison for 16 months, 2 or 3 years, or by a fine not exceeding $1,000, or by both that fine and imprisonment. If a violation occurs within 7 years of a previous conviction of this crime or other specified crimes involving domestic violence, the bill would make the crime punishable by imprisonment in a county jail not to exceed one year, by imprisonment in the state prison for 2, 3, or 4 years, or by a fine not exceeding $10,000, or by both that fine and imprisonment. By creating a new crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program.

The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement.

This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.

Vote: MAJORITY Appropriation: NO Fiscal Committee: YES Local Program: YES

The people of the State of California do enact as follows:

SECTION 1.

Section 273.55 is added to the Penal Code, immediately following 273.5, to read:

273.55.

(a) It is unlawful for a person to deprive or violate the personal liberty of a victim by means of coercive control. A person who violates this section is guilty of coercive control, punishable by imprisonment in a county jail not to exceed one year, by imprisonment in the state prison, or by a fine not exceeding one thousand dollars ($1,000), or by both that fine and imprisonment, except that a violation of this section that occurs within seven years of a previous conviction of this section, subdivision (a) of Section 273.5, or subdivision (e) of Section 243, is punishable by imprisonment in a county jail not to exceed one year, by imprisonment in the state prison for two, three, or four years, or by a fine not exceeding ten thousand dollars ($10,000), or by both that fine and imprisonment.

(b) For purposes of this section, the following terms have the following meanings:

(1) To “deprive or violate the personal liberty of a victim” means substantial and sustained restriction of the victim’s personal liberty through a course of conduct.

(2) “Personal liberty” includes, but is not limited to, liberty of association, movement, labor, daily behavior, access to or use of one’s personal finances or financial information, or access to services.

(3) For purposes of this section, “course of conduct” means two or more acts occurring over a period of time, however short, evidencing a continuity of purpose that includes, but is not limited to, acts of violence, force, fear, stalking, duress, isolation, abuse or threatened abuse of legal process, fraud, deceit, economic abuse, coercion, or threat of unlawful injury to the victim or another person under circumstances where the person receiving or apprehending the threat reasonably believes that it is likely that the person making the threat will carry it out.

(4) “Coercion” means a scheme, plan, or pattern intended to cause a person to believe that failure to perform an act will result in harm to any person. Among the circumstances that may be considered in determining whether a person engages in coercive control are that the person does any of the following:

(A) Isolates the victim from friends, relatives, or other sources of support.

(B) Deprives the victim of basic necessities.

(D) Monitors the victim’s movement through electronic devices.

(5) “Duress” means a direct or implied threat of force, violence, danger, hardship, retribution, or harm sufficient to cause a reasonable person to acquiesce in or perform an act that they would otherwise not have submitted to or performed, a direct or implied threat to destroy, conceal, remove, confiscate, or possess an actual or purported passport or immigration document of the victim, or knowingly destroying, concealing, removing, confiscating, or possessing an actual or purported passport or immigration document of the victim.

(6) “Harm” includes any harm, whether physical or nonphysical, including psychological, financial, or reputational harm that is sufficiently serious, under all of the surrounding circumstances, to compel a reasonable person in the same circumstances to perform an act or refrain from performing an act in order to avoid incurring that harm.

(7) (A) “Victim” means a person who is any of the following:

(i) The offender’s spouse or former spouse.

(ii) The offender’s cohabitant or former cohabitant.

(iii) The offender’s fiancé or someone with whom the offender has, or previously had, an engagement or dating relationship, as defined in Section 243.

(iv) The mother or father of the offender’s child.

(B) Holding oneself out to be the spouse of the person with whom one is cohabitating is not necessary to constitute cohabitation as that term is used in this section.

(C) A person shall be considered the father or mother of another person’s child if the alleged male parent is presumed the natural father under Sections 7611 and 7612 of the Family Code.

(c) (1) For purposes of this section, coercive control may be committed directly, indirectly, or through the use of third parties and by means of any instrumentality, including, but not limited to, electronic communication devices.

(2) For purposes of this subdivision, an “electronic communication device” includes, but is not limited to, telephones, cellular phones, computers, video recorders, fax machines, or pagers. “Electronic communication” has the same meaning as defined in Section 629.51.

(d) Expert testimony on intimate partner battering is admissible in a case brought under this section, subject to Section 350 of the Evidence Code.

SEC. 2.

No reimbursement is required by this act pursuant to Section 6 of Article XIII B of the California Constitution because the only costs that may be incurred by a local agency or school district will be incurred because this act creates a new crime or infraction, eliminates a crime or infraction, or changes the penalty for a crime or infraction, within the meaning of Section 17556 of the Government Code, or changes the definition of a crime within the meaning of Section 6 of Article XIII B of the California Constitution.