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Legislation that would impose penalties of up to six months in jail for smuggling cellphones into prisons, aimed at what prison officials say is a flood of illicit devices, cleared its first legislative hurdle Tuesday.
The Senate Public Safety Committee, on a 6-0 vote, approved Senate Bill 26 after its author, Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Los Angeles, agreed to some amendments that the committee's chair, Berkeley Democrat Loni Hancock, demanded. Her amendments reduced the penalties on inmates who use cellphones to commit other crimes.
Padilla said he didn't want to take the amendments, but acceded after Hancock told him the bill otherwise would be held in committee. Padilla did, however, propose his own amendments to equalize penalties for prison employees and non-employees who are caught smuggling phones. As written, his bill was somewhat tougher on non-employees.
Last year, then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed another Padilla anti-smuggling bill, saying that supply phones to inmates should be a felony. Prior to Tuesday's hearing, Padilla, flanked by law enforcement officials, staged a news conference on the Capitol steps, including a display of hundreds of phones confiscated from inmates.
Prison officials testified that last year nearly 11,000 illicit phones were confiscated from inmates.
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