The SB755 bill created by San Jose Senator Jim Beall (D) has been signed into law by Governor Jerry Brown the Los Angeles Times reported. Senator Beall authored the bill after meeting with parents who would decide to not file suit againstchild sex offenders for fear that the defense lawyers would traumatize their children.
Liberty Law’s founder, Micha Liberty, was interviewed by the Los Angeles Times, and quoted as stating, “horrific abuses of the [legal] process had caused sustained trauma” to young victims and witnesses.
Prior to the new laws signing, a minor could be subject to countless hours of deposition and examination by defense lawyers or their medical specialists who required private, 1-on-1 meetings. In one such example, Ms. Liberty discovered her 6-year old client being refused a restroom break during a mandatory private session, resulting in the boy urinating himself while being examined. Ms. Liberty forcibly opened the doors, stopped the examination, and the case was shortly thereafter settled in favor of her client.
Defense attorney Decio Rangel said he thought the three-hour limit was a good idea. It protects a young victim from unscrupulous questioning, said Rangel, who previously worked as a deputy district attorney in Los Angeles County with a specialty in sexual assault.
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