Senate Bill S1458

                                BILL NUMBER:S1458

TITLE OF BILL:
An act
to amend the penal law, in relation to the commission of aggravated
sexual abuse

PURPOSE:
To provide that a person is guilty of the crimes of aggravated sexual
abuse in the first, second or third degree when the victim is less
than 13 years of age and the actor is 18 years of age or older.

SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:
Section 1 of the bill amends paragraph (c) of Subdivision 1 of section
130.66 of the Penal Law by adding a new provision to aggravated
sexual abuse in the third degree. Under the new provision, a person
is guilty of the crime when he inserts a foreign object in the
vagina, urethra, penis, or rectum of another person who is less than
thirteen years old and the actor is eighteen years old or older.

Section 2 of the bill amends paragraph (c) of subdivision 1 of section
130.67 by adding a new provision to aggravated sexual abuse in the
second degree to provide that a person is guilty of the crime when he
inserts a finger in the vagina, urethra, penis, or rectum of a person
who is less than thirteen years old and causes physical injury to
that person and the actor is eighteen years old or older.
              

Section 3 of the bill amends paragraph (c) of subdivision 1 of section
130.70 by adding a new provision to aggravated sexual abuse in the
first degree to provide that a person is guilty of the crime when he
inserts a foreign object in the vagina, urethra, penis, or rectum of
another person who is less than thirteen years old and causes injury
to that person and the actor is eighteen years old or older.

EXISTING LAW:
Under the current law, a defendant may be found guilty of these
offenses if the crime was committed by forcible compulsion, or the
victim was physically helpless or the victim was under the age of 11
years.

JUSTIFICATION:
Prior to the enactment of the Sexual Assault Reform Act of 2000
(SARA), a person was guilty of the strict liability provisions of
rape or sodomy in the first degree when he or she engaged in sexual
intercourse or anal or oral sexual intercourse with a person who was
less than eleven. In amending those provisions so that a person over
the age of eighteen would be guilty of those crimes when the victim
was less than thirteen, SARA served to better protect more children
from acts of sexual violence by bringing eleven and twelve year olds
under its provisions. However, SARA did not make a similar change in
the age threshold for the crimes of aggravated sexual assault in the
first, second and third degree. This bill would correct the oversight
in SARA by amending the provisions of aggravated sexual abuse in the
first, second and third degrees, to
increase the victim age threshold for these strict liability crimes
from less than eleven to less than thirteen years old.


LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:
2003:    Passed Senate
2004:    Passed Senate/Assembly Codes Committee
2005-06: S.3841 Passed Senate/A.6912 Assembly Codes Cmte.
2007-08: S.3841 Passed Senate/A.6912 Assembly Codes Cmte.
2009-10: S.3238 Codes Cmte./A.7928 Codes Cmte.
2011-12: S.3207 Passed Senate/Assembly Codes

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:
None.

LOCAL FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:
None.

EFFECTIVE DATE:
This act shall take effect on the first of November next succeeding
the date on which it shall become a law.