H.B. 138 Child Abuse Homicide Amendments: transcript

Thank you, Mr. Vice chair and members of our committee. I appreciate the time and being able to be last on the agenda today. Uh, seated with me is Detective Brent Jacks and he will be pre co-presenting with me today. This is hard to have to wipe my smile at my face. I usually like to smile when I'm presenting, but this is actually a very, very serious issue. It is about child abuse. It is about clarifying in our code whether an immediate approximate, uh, abuse, if that causes, that causes the death of a child by suicide. And I would like to just say, what is abuse? And if you go to Utah Code 76 5 2 0 8, which is on the bill analysis, second paragraph there, child abuse is classified as torturing inflicting injury upon or abandoning a child, committing domestic violence and presence of a child. If an actor causes the death from abuse, that cannot be a suicide, cannot be the defense for homicide. I would like to turn some time over to Detective Jacks.

Thank you. Um, I, uh, I I've gotta be a little careful because it's an active investigation, um, but I'm a detective with the Tremont and Garland Police Department. Um, We're currently investigating a case involving the, uh, death by suicide of an 11-year-old male who had, who had just turned 11. Um, during the investigation, we found patterns of severe abuse, uh, physical and emotional. Um, the, the other remaining children in the home had been removed by the state, uh, in care of, of family, and they're currently thriving. Uh, during the investigation we found in involving, uh, we've had a lot of help in it. We've had help from, uh, the attorney general's office, from the state, from, uh, the FBI and their behavioral analysis unit. Um, the, if I could share the details with you, you'd hate me forever. Um hmm. It's been a rough five months. Um, one of the things that we found was, uh, a problem in the, in the ability to, uh, an, an ability to charge appropriately in this, uh, we found a, an existing, uh, statute in Nebraska, which has the, uh, kind of a similar statute, and they had a sim, uh, very similar case, which Uintah their Supreme Court. And the Supreme Court ruled that the, that the father could be prosecuted for the child abuse homicide under the, under the statute we're, well, quite frankly, we're running into some hiccups on the, on the desire to charge on this, you know, and for a variety of reasons. Um, the concern is that specifically within the age group of These pre-teens, I mean, we, death by suicide increases the older, the older a child gets. But we're seeing these patterns of as young as seven and eight now, and even 20 years ago, I mean, never heard of, of anything below the age of 15, 16. I want to, I wanna point out that it is still the obligation of the law enforcement agency to prove the pattern of abuse. This isn't, this isn't looking to charge every parent whose, whose child dies by suicide. There are a lot of factors that go into it. In this one, the pattern of abuse, uh, the FBI, the Behavioral Analysis Unit at Quantico that's been helping us, they called it a pattern of child torture. This, this bill closes that gap. And one sends a message that when you have children in your care, especially those that, that are under the age of of 14, I know, I don't think we put age restrictions in this, but specifically in that age, age group and younger, we're seeing a, a significant rise in the reported cases of child abuse. And there's a, there's a pattern developing that, that I don't like. And that's the, the reason for this bill.

Okay. World, one more questions. Thank you, um, to the committee for any clarifying comments or questions.

Thank you, Mr. Chair and committee members. My name is Elizabeth Kel. I am the Criminal Justice Policy Director at CCJJ. We appreciate, uh, the, the work of this bill, and we have voted to support it. We had Detective Jacks come in and speak to us, and we provided some clarifying language, which we really appreciate the sponsor in working with us on and, and fully support this bill. Thank you.

Good morning, Marice Jones. I am the Director of the Victim Services Commission. We also support this bill. Uh, our children are the most vulnerable and in these instances of abuse, uh, they, they just simply do not have the network. They do not have the capacity, they do not have the ability to survive it in, in instances. And, and of course, the worst outcome is to lose one of these, one of these precious children. We also are very, um, appreciative of Detective Jacks as well as Representative Shepherd. Um, part of the Victim Services Commission is to elevate a trauma-informed response. And we provided, um, some suggested language and, and reason why we should be abandoning the use of committing suicide and go to the language that they have used today and in their statute talking about death by suicide, dying by suicide, to try and offset that stigma, that negativity and those barriers to reporting, um, and reaching out for help. We want kids, adults, youth, all to reach out for help. So we very much appreciate the conversation that we've had and been able to engage with them. And this is a good bill. We, we hope you'll support it.

I do not know. I don't have that information for you. Um, I know that Utah is consistently in the top 10 of losing our youth. And, um, I know anecdotally, but not statistically that that age is lowering and getting younger and younger.

I don't have that statistic. I can track that down for you if you'd like.

Maryanne Christensen, executive Director of Utah Legislative Watch, and I'm here to speak in favor of the bill. Most everything that you do as legislators up here is to solve emerging problems. And this bill is addressing one of those really critical emerging problems. Our children are exposed more and more to violence, um, in video games and, um, online, I have some statistics. Um, 85% of the video games that our children are playing contain violence. 60% of the content on TV has violence in it. 70% of teens, ages 13 to 17, have been exposed to real world violence that they see in news reports and, and videos online. 97% of our youth, ages 12 to 17 are gaming and two thirds of the games they're playing have them participating in violence, committing violent acts. Um, virtually 11% of males who who, who use high violence video games end up convicted of violent crimes compared to only 3% of their peers. And, and, um, people who, who are, who see a lot of violence online or participate in violent video games are 39% more likely to participate in domestic violence. Now, we had a really, um, high profile case of this exact thing happening years ago with Chand Brown, where she was groomed into committing suicide, aided in finding the rope that she needed to hang herself taken to the place where she committed suicide, and then her perpetrator videotaped her death. And we live in a society where, um, Our children are so disconnected from each other and they're separating into groups, those who are, who are being bullied and who become susceptible to this kind of grooming. And then those who are getting a thrill from the violence that they see in front of their eyes all the time. I couldn't find any statistics on addiction to violence, but we certainly know that violence, seeing violence leads to, um, a curiosity and a, an escalation. And sooner or later seeing violence and then participating in virtual violence, it leads to wanting violence in real life. And we need to be able to deal with those situations. If we don't get on top of it, we're gonna see more and more happen happening just because of the world that our children are growing up in now. It's so different than the one that I grew up in. So thank you very much for voting for the bill. Thank you.

I'm John Larson. I'm a commissioner from UIC County. I'm speaking for myself. However, I have spent this year will be my 50th year in law enforcement. Suicide is a natural phenomenon that people don't understand, and the reason I say that is because it's not common. It's not something that people plan on doing. I can't tell you how many cases in my career I've looked at that this bill would've made my life so much easier. It's not. We go out and do investigations. We go through the criminal side of it, it earmarks everybody involved for life. As you all know, there's a fund set aside for law enforcement officers to get mental health counseling because of things like this. This bill is sadly needed. I wish it had been here about 30 years ago. It made my life so much easier. I strongly support this bill, and I believe that you as legislators, please look at all the information that you've been given and understand it's gonna touch you and your family someday in your life. In the last three months, I have had five children, 15 and under commit suicide. Was it all from child abuse? No. I can't discuss any more than that for some of the cases 'cause they're still pending. But do you know every one of 'em that does that brings back memories, anxiety to me, and unfortunately for my family, because they had lived through me trying to deal with it. This is probably one of the most important bills I've seen on the hill, and I strongly, strongly ask for your support on this and to forward it on. Thank you.

Uh, do we need to adopt a sub? We're Good? No, I think we're good.

Thank you. Thank you so much for, for your attention on this one. And thank you to those who have spoken, uh, regarding this bill. I actually didn't know some that many people were going to speak in favor of the bill. I just like, this is a really hard one. This has been a difficult one to put myself into the place of, of the people who do abuse and more into the extreme cases of abuse. And that's what this bill is targeting. Those extreme cases, I think of a child who's been locked in a cage and has no way out. I think of a child who's been beat to the pulp and thinks there's no way out of that kind of abuse, whether by a parent or whether by another adult. I think us as adults and as just other humans, we need to consider that we need to do no harm. These children, they look to us, they trust us. If there is only one case that this bill can affect and one child who's protected and justice is served by this bill, it's worth it. Even if it's used just as a deterrent. So adults hopefully do less abuse or no abuse. I think this bill is worth it. I thank you for your consideration.

Uh, I think this committee has very, uh, has spent a lot of time to be very thorough and in making sure that crimes against children are taken very seriously and have punishable offenses and that investigators have the teeth and the, and the tools and the laws from the laws that we have put in. And I, I think this is something that has pr probably been part of many investigations without the ability for this type of prosecution. And so I appreciate the clarity, um, and the teeth that this bill puts into our code.

Adjourn From Representative Shepherd.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have with me Detective Brent Jacks, and he will be helping in my presentation. Utah Code 76 5 2 0 8 defines child abuse as torturing inflicting injury Upon abandoning a child or committing domestic violence in the presence of a child death resulting from intentional abuse is a first degree felony and death from reckless or negligent abuse. Abuse is a second degree felony hospital, 1 38 clarifies that a child's death under this statute includes suicide if the suicide was a direct approximate result of the abuse. This bill also provides a coordinated clause to merge changes between this bill and Senate Bill 32, which makes some technical corrections to that part of the code. I have Detective jsa will, will tell you why we want to put this in the code. Welcome. Just tell us your name and in the organization you represent.

Thanks. Uh, my name's Detective Brent Jackson with the, uh, Tremont and Garland Police Department. Um, it's a, uh, forgive me, it's been, I It's Been a rough six months. Um, You know, the, uh, the state does a pretty good job of protecting our children against, uh, hazing and abuse and, and things like that in, in schools and in other settings. Um, one of the gaps is what happens when that hazing and that child torture is happening inside the home? Uh, I, I have to be a little bit vague because it's still a pending case. Uh, but we have a case of a 10-year-old boy who died by suicide. Um, in investigating that, that death by suicide, uh, we found extreme amounts of child abuse, uh, physical emotional, uh, to the point that the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit out of Quantico, who's been assisting us on it, they classified it as, as child torture. Uh, the problem that we are having is that there, there seems to be a little bit of a gap in the statute that allows us to quite frankly, charge the parents with the, with the death of that, that child, even though the evidence is overwhelming on the abuse, uh, we, we have the documented evidence. There's no, uh, there's no question about the amount of times or the, the length that, that they Uintah do that. And I believe that's probably all I, I should say on the, the investigation point.

Yeah, I can, can I ask just one quick clarifying question?

Suicide often has kind of multiple factors, right? Mental health and bullying, and maybe there's, so help me out with kind of establishing causation, right? That, you know, the abuse right, resulted in the, the, the, the, the suicide was direct result of abuse and not some other contributing factor that might have pushed them.

Correct. It would be the absolutely be the obligation of the, of the investigating agency to, to prove that abuse. And, and really the, the age that we are concerned about is that we're, we are seeing child deaths by suicide happening at a younger and younger age. Uh, I believe, uh, somewhere in the state we had a child as young as seven that died by suicide. So part of that investigation is figuring out what, what the cause is. Uh, I have a couple of very close friends who lost, uh, their children, uh, by suicide that were from bullying at school. It had nothing to do with the home environment. Um, this is specifically, and, and also when you start getting into the, into the teenage years and, and things like that, there, there are a lot more external factors that, that seem to be at, at play. And so this one is specifically when we can, when we can prove, uh, when we can prove the, the source of the neglect and showing that it is consistent enough and aggravating enough that a reasonable person would believe that that would,

So representative, I think where I'm having pause is on line 76, 'cause this is the trigger an individual's death under subsection two includes an individual's suicide if the suicide was a direct in the second word or proximate. Yes. So direct seems direct approximate result of the actor's conduct.

If I can on, on that, I, so as, at least in the law enforcement world, uh, when we looked at, at direct approximate, we would look at direct as standing there, you know, talking them through it and, and guiding them, like physically approximate would be their conduct that that caused that.

Okay. And I know there was a, there was a prior case a few years ago where, where there was a, a question between the direct and approximate. Okay, Mr. Chair, I'll make a motion. Yes, please. A motion to be, to favorably recommend, um, HB 1 38 child abuse homicide amendments. Actually, that'd be second substitute to HB 1 38 child abuse homicide amendments.

Um, seeing none, I'm, I'm looking at other states. I think that California, Massachusetts, and Indiana and Missouri have prosecuted people for causing suicide. Um, so I'm gonna, uh, uh, representative, I'm gonna look at that, the language from those statutes to see how our language matches up. I know that, um, um, at least one state Indiana says causing suicide. Um, but, um, anyway, so I just wanna look at that direct approximate language.

Shepherd. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Broan death resulting from intentional abuse abuse is the first degree felony death or from reckless or negligent abuse is a second degree felony. HB 1 38 clarifies that a child's death under this statute includes suicide. If the suicide is a direct result of result of the abuse or approximate result of the abuse. It also has a coordinated clause that merges the changes between Senate bill 32 and it makes a technical aggression correction to 76 5 2 0 8. This is my presentation. Thank you.

Thank you Mr. Speaker ProAm. Will the sponsor yield to a question?

Thank you, Mr. Speaker ProAm. I'm not very, um, well versed in this I, um, in this situation, but how can one determine that a suicide resulted from child abuse? Is it that simple?

Oh, the police depart. The prosecutors will have to make their case on what it is. There are some extreme abuse of neglect and beatings. I actually just watched a video last night about one, and some of you may have seen one where it was a, a parent, a father who had custody prior custody of a child and, and subjected them to total abuse, physical exercise abuse. And that child did not die from suicide, but had the child's committed suicide at that age, then they definitely would have prosecuted them under this statute.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker Protime.

I'll waive. Thank you. Summation is waived.