The Orange County D.A. does it. The Riverside D.A. does it. Heck, even the San Francisco D.A. does it. And if Sen. Tom Umberg and Co. had their way, every court in every California would do it, too.
In an attempt to rein in the devastation wrought by fentanyl-laced street drugs, the stunningly bipartisan Senate Bill 44 would have required courts to issue warnings to convicted fentanyl dealers that their fake Oxycontin or Xanax pills can kill — and that if they keep selling the drugs, and someone dies from a fentanyl overdose, they could be prosecuted for homicide.
A parade of anguished parents, carrying portraits of their dead children, implored the Senate public safety committee to approve the bill at a hearing on Tuesday, March 28, in Sacramento.
Dubbed “Alexandra’s Law,” it was named after Alexandra Capelouto, who thought she was taking Percocet and died from fentanyl poisoning a few days before Christmas in Temecula in 2019.
Co-author Sen. Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh, R-Yucaipa, choked back tears as she acknowledged the pain in the room. “This is an advisement,” she stressed for Senate committee members who’ve blocked myriad attempts to get tougher on fentanyl dealers. “This seeks to educate offenders of the consequences on their own lives.”
When someone pleads guilty to, or is convicted of, selling or distributing drugs containing fentanyl, the court would deliver a warning fashioned after the one drunk drivers receive upon a first offense. If there’s a second offense, and someone dies, the warning would allow prosecutors to argue that the accused had “an abandoned and malignant heart” and exhibited “a wanton disregard for life,” setting the stage for a homicide charge.
It’s not a panacea, but just another tool, argued Umberg, D-Santa Ana, former deputy director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, U.S. Attorney and career prosecutor.
“They’re on notice. It doesn’t…
Read the full article here
