Senate Judiciary Committee advances criminal justice reform bills

The Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday passed several criminal justice reform bills during the special session of the Virginia General Assembly in Richmond.

The first bill, SB 5014 would require all law-enforcement officers to complete crisis intervention team training as part of the compulsory training standards. Advanced training would be provided to a CIT team, but methods as simple as first aid training would be provided to officers not on CIT teams, according to the counsel for the bill. SB 5014 passed unanimously.

Next, after discussion, the committee passed SB 5007 by a 9 to 4 vote and referred it to the Finance Committee. It would allow defendants to request sentencing by a judge rather than a jury. Virginia is one of just six states that don’t allow this already.

The bill also originally included a provision that if the jury could not agree on a punishment, then a mistrial would be declared and the trial would take place again. Sen. Bill Stanley (R) pushed back on this with Sen. Chap Peterson (D) supporting him in asking that instead of a mistrial, the sentencing be placed in the judge’s hands. The committee eventually made the change to the bill, with the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Joe Morrissey (D), supporting it.

Republican Senate Leader Tommy Norment spoke out against this bill.

“Just because you speak loudly and passionately doesn’t make it a good concept,” Norment said, directing his comments at Morrissey.

Dr. Zoe Spencer, a professor in criminal justice at Virginia State University, said she supports the bill and believes it will enhance a defendant’s right to reduce misrepresentations. It will be a key component of the anti-racism initiative, she said.

The committee also passed, by a vote of 8 to 6, a bill introduced by Sen. Ghazala Hashmi (D) allowing localities to establish civilian review boards that would have significant freedom to examine and investigate claims of misconduct against police officers.

Under current law, according to Hashmi, the power of such boards is limited because police departments have significant control of the information that can be released to them.

One public speaker who supports the bill stressed the importance of it being enabling, rather than a “top-down mandate.”

Another, Richmond activist Chelsea Higgs Wise, said she was glad to see the bill come together oganically.

“I support how this bill came about by working with community members,” she said. “We must grant [localities] with the full power of subpoenas, audits, and reviews.”

Princess Blanding, the sister of Marcus-David Peters (an unarmed, naked man who was shot and killed by Richmond Police on the Chamberlayne Avenue exit ramp on I-95 in Richmond in 2018 after apparently suffering a mental episode) took a different view, saying she was disturbed that the bill only enables such boards and doesn’t mandate them.

She asked the committee to fix it now. “Not tomorrow, not in 2021,” Blanding said.

The committee also considered a bill that would establish a crisis response team that would respond alongside police officers in cases like Peters’, when someone is suffering an apparent mental health crisis.

The bill, known in Richmond as a “Marcus Alert,” was referred to the Senate Finance Committee, which will make the final decision about whether the bill will become a mandate statewide or not.

“The Marcus Alert system will never bring my brother, Marcus-David Peters, back,” said Blanding. She noted, however, that it should help people moving forward.

– This article first appeared on VirgniaScope.com; it is republished here with permission.