On Monday, Sept. 23, local Assemblyman Heath Flora announced that his bill, AB 1892, which protects children from child predators and human trafficking, has been signed into law by the Governor.
AB 1892 was inspired by Flora’s experience last year when he joined the Sacramento County Sheriff on a large sting operation to track down and apprehend criminals who target children for sexual exploitation.
“Today is one of those rare days as an elected official where we get to see the actual fruits of our labor,” said Flora about the bill’s signing. “What started as a ride-along with the Sheriff turned into a yearlong process of lawmaking to add another tool to their toolbox that helps law enforcement go after these predators and traffickers.”
Current law allows for a judge to authorize the interception of electronic communications with probable cause that the suspect is committing or about to commit certain felonies related to murder, kidnapping, and other serious crimes. However, child sexual exploitation had previously not been on that list, until now.
“Some of the text messages and other electronic correspondence we saw between suspects planning to sexually exploit children were extremely disturbing,” Flora said of the sting operation. “These people, if you can even call them people, talk openly and in explicit detail about what they plan to do with these innocent kids.”
AB 1892 (Flora) would add child pornography and exploitation-related felonies to the list of crimes eligible for expedited search warrants if a judge determines probable cause, expanding options while maintaining judicial discretion.
“To keep it simple; AB 1892 gives judges the authority to expedite search warrants if probable cause is determined that child exploitation is taking place,” Flora explained of the bill. “We had a companion bill to this one that did not make it out of the Legislature, so we are very excited that AB 1892 got all the way through the process and became law.”
AB 1892 would expedite the search warrant application process allowing the court to issue an order authorizing an interception of wire or electronic communications of child predators if a judge finds that there is probable cause to believe an individual is committing, has committed, or is about to commit a felony violation of specified statutes relating to the child pornography and exploitation.
Assemblyman Flora serves the communities of Acampo, Copperopolis, Del Rio, Denair, Empire, Escalon, Farmington, Galt, Hickman, Hughson, Ione, La Grange, Lathrop, Linden, Lockeford, Lodi, Manteca, Oakdale, Rancho Murieta, Ripon, Riverbank, Salida, Waterford, and Wilton.
