New California Bill Would Lower Penalties for Adults Who Have Sexual Relations with a Minor

Posted on by Willania Ortiz

A proposed new California bill, that would reduce punishments for adults who have an agreed sexual relationship with a minor within a 10-year age difference, is set to go to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk after this proposition passed in both legislative houses.

What We Know:

  • The bill, SB 145, pertains to cases where victims are between the ages of 14 and 17 and is set to revoke a current registration requisite for oral and anal sex. The state senate and assembly have both currently voted in approving the bill on Tuesday regardless of Republican opposition in the Senate and bilateral opposition in the assembly.
  • The present-day law states that it is illegal for an adult to have consensual sex with a teenager within 14 and 17 years old, who cannot give permission.
  • Senate Republican Leader Shannon Grove tweeted Tuesday that If this new bill would be signed into law, it means that a 24-year-old could have sexual relations with a 15-year-old child without being mandated to register as a sex offender.

  • Scott Wiener, State Senator, who presented the bill, is claiming this bill is to treat the LGBT offenders equally as heterosexual offenders. He stated there is a similar exception from required registration for vaginal sexual intercourse between partners of a similar age difference.
  • Wiener also mentioned in a statement, when a similar version of the bill passed the state senate in May 2019, that such discrimination on the sex offender registry was created when California prohibited LGBT sex. He went on to say this distinction between vaginal intercourse and other forms of intercourse is a fragment of California’s discriminatory past, and it’s time to bring an end to it.
  • Wiener also mentions how being placed on the sex-offender list can destroy a young person’s life, creating more difficulty for them into finding housing and jobs. He believes this terrible discrimination needs to be brought to an end.

If Newsom were to sign such bill into law, judges would still mandate offenders to register, but it would be up to their judgment to use as a replacement instead of a statutory requirement.

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