Police reform legislation, Assembly Bill (AB) 26, passed the California State Assembly Committee on Public Safety last week but continued opposition from the law enforcement lobby is expected, according to the bill’s sponsor.
Despite having significantly reformed the legislation, Assemblymember Chris Holden, who introduced the bill, said law enforcement groups are still moving forward against AB 26 in an aggressive way.
“I don't quite understand why because this bill only adds to transparency and accountability, and it also makes things a lot more clear for the public,” Holden told the Southern California Record. “I don't think operating in the gray areas is the most efficient way to win support from the community and I think there are so many good officers out there that this is a good, important bill that can benefit them as well.”
Also known as the George Floyd Law, AB 26, if enacted, would outline specific actions of intervention that officers are expected to employ when witnessing another officer using excessive force against a citizen.
"In terms of the penalty side, we took out accessory to a crime, which I would have thought still preserves the bill in a very efficient way because there's still, upon investigation, the ability to decertify or disqualify an officer from continuing to be an officer if he fails to intervene but the heavier penalty of accessory to a crime was taken out,” Holden said.
According to the bill, interceding includes, but is not limited to, physically stopping the excessive use of force, recording the excessive force and documenting efforts to intervene, efforts to deescalate the offending officer’s excessive use of force, and confronting the offending officer about the excessive force during the use of force and, if the officer continues, reporting to dispatch or the watch commander on duty and stating the offending officer’s name, unit, location, time, and situation, in order to establish a duty for that officer to intervene.
“The bill died last year in Senate appropriations even though we had the votes to pass it,” Holden said. “There aren't going to be any significant costs if any, because the training measures are already paid for by Police Officer Standards and Training (POST) in the amount of $5 million per simulator. We have a hundred stimulators that officers are being trained under in terms of intervention and how to do that.”
AB 26 would also expand on current law, which decertifies a police officer if he or she uses excessive force, which results in great bodily injury or death or fails to intercede in that incident. The next step for the bill is the Assembly Appropriations Committee.
As previously reported, Holden co-authored AB 979, which mandates racial diversity on corporate boards. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the diversity legislation into law last year in September.