Child Sex Assault Pattern Offense Place Of Trial
In current law, several sex-assault-on-a-child crimes are designated 'pattern' offenses, meaning that the defendant has a pattern of sexually assaulting the same child repeatedly. When such assaults occur in more than one jurisdiction, the district attorney in each such jurisdiction must prosecute a case for the incident that occurred in his or her jurisdiction. The bill allows a prosecutor to charge and bring a pattern-offense case for all such assaults in any jurisdiction where one of the acts occurred. The bill allows the prosecution of a defendant charged with sex-assault-on-a-child pattern offense or sex-assault-on-a-child-in-a-position-of-trust pattern offense to be tried:
- In a county where at least one or more of the incidents of sexual contact occurred; or
- In a county where an act in furtherance of the offense was committed.
(Note: This summary applies to the reengrossed version of this bill as introduced in the second house.)