Groundbreaking California bill would outlaw 'affluenza' defense
Call it the proposed Spoiled Brat Law. Last month, after a 16-year-old Texas boy said to be suffering from “affluenza” was sentenced to rehab instead of prison for killing four people and maiming two others in a drunk-driving crash, California Assemblyman Mike Gatto wondered whether an attorney could raise the same kind of defense in this state. As he discovered, there was nothing to prevent it.
On Tuesday, the Los Angeles Democrat introduced a bill -- possibly the first in the country -- that would prohibit attorneys from invoking “affluenza” as a defense at trial or as a mitigating factor for sentencing.
Gatto knows there is no universally agreed upon definition for the term, which seems more metaphorical than medical. In AB 1508, he defines it as “the notion that an affluent or overly permissive upbringing prevents a defendant from fully understanding the consequences of criminal actions.”
“People often think of the Legislature as too reactive,” Gatto told me Tuesday evening. “Up until last year, for instance, it was not illegal to commit rape if the victim thought the rapist was her husband or boyfriend, and people said how did you let this stay on the books so long? We’re trying to be proactive.”
http://touch.latimes.com/#section/-1/article/p2p-78906161/
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