California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law on Aug. 16 a package of bills intended to crack down on retail crime and other types of property theft.
“These bipartisan bills establish tough new penalties for repeat offenders, provide additional tools for felony prosecutions, and crack down on serial shoplifters, retail thieves, and auto burglars,” said an announcment from Newsom’s office.
These are the 10 bills:
• AB 1779 (Jacqui Irwin, D-Thousand Oaks) – Permits the consolidation of specified theft charges, as well as all associated offenses, occurring in different counties into a single trial if the district attorneys in all involved jurisdictions agree.
• AB 1802 (Reggie Jones-Sawyer, D-Los Angeles) — Eliminates the sunset date for the crime of organized retail theft and for the existence of a taskforce established by the California Highway Patrol to analyze organized retail theft and vehicle burglary and to assist local law enforcement in counties identified as having elevated
property crime.
• AB 1972 (Juan Alanis, R-Modesto) — Expands the regional property crimes tasks force within the California Highway Patrol to include railroad police and cargo theft.
• AB 2943 (Rick Chavez Zbur, D-Los Angeles; Robert Rivas, D-Salinas) — Authorizes peace officers to make warrantless arrests for misdemeanor shoplifting, among other provisions related to retail theft.
• AB 3209 (Marc Berman, D-Palo Alto) — Allows a court to issue an order prohibiting a person from being present on the grounds of, or any parking lot adjacent to and used to service, a retail establishment and any other retail establishments in that chain or franchise, as specified, and makes a violation of the order would
be punishable as a misdemeanor punishable by incarceration in county jail for up to six months.
• SB 905 (Scott Wiener, D-San Francisco) – Creates the new crime of forcibly entering a vehicle with the
intent to commit theft or any other felony and the new crime of unlawfully possessing property acquired through theft from a vehicle with intent to sell where the value of the property possessed exceeds $950.
• SB 982 (Aisha Wahab, D-Fremont) – Removes the sunset date on the provision of law that criminalizes organized retail theft, thereby making the operation of the law permanent.
• SB 1144 (Nancy Skinner, D-Oakland) – Expands existing requirements for online marketplaces, as defined, to collect certain information from high-volume third-party sellers on those platforms, as defined, and permits a district attorney, city attorney, or county counsel to enforce the requirements.
• SB 1242 (Dave Min, D-Irvine) – Specifies that for the crime of reckless arson, the fact that the offense was carried out within a merchant’s premises in order to facilitate organized retail theft shall be a factor in aggravation at sentencing.
• SB 1416 (Josh Newman, D-Fullerton) – Creates new sentencing enhancements for selling, exchanging, or returning for value, or attempting to sell, exchange, or return for value, any property acquired through one or more acts of shoplifting, theft, or burglary from a retail business.