20250AB__035293CHP INTRODUCED 2025-01-30 AMENDED_ASSEMBLY 2025-03-17 AMENDED_SENATE 2025-06-12 AMENDED_SENATE 2025-06-25 AMENDED_SENATE 2025-08-29 PASSED_ASSEMBLY 2025-09-08 PASSED_SENATE 2025-09-04 ENROLLED 2025-09-10 CHAPTERED 2025-10-10 APPROVED 2025-10-10 FILED 2025-10-10 AB CHP CHP Introduced by Assembly Member Pacheco LEAD_AUTHOR ASSEMBLY Pacheco

An act to amend

Section of the Penal Code, relating to crimes. crimes Crimes: criminal threats.

Existing law makes it a crime to willfully threaten to commit a crime that will result in death or great bodily injury to another person, with the specific intent that the statement is to be taken as a threat that, on its face and under the circumstances in which it is made, is so unequivocal, unconditional, immediate, and specific as to convey to the person threatened a gravity of purpose and an immediate prospect of execution of the threat, and thereby reasonably causes the threatened person to be in sustained fear for their own safety or the safety of their immediate family, as defined.

Under existing law, this crime is punishable as a misdemeanor or in state prison as a felony. This bill would, for the purposes of sentencing for a felony violation of these provisions, authorize the court to consider, as a factor in aggravation, that the defendant willfully threatened to commit a crime that would result in the death or great bodily injury of a person the defendant knew was a state constitutional officer, a Member of the Legislature, or a judge or court commissioner, as specified. MAJORITY NO YES NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO The people of the State of California do enact as follows:

SECTION 1.

Section of the Penal Code is amended to read: 422. (

a) Any person who willfully threatens to commit a crime which will result in death or great bodily injury to another person, with the specific intent that the statement, made verbally, in writing, or by means of an electronic communication device, is to be taken as a threat, even if there is no intent of actually carrying it out, which, on its face and under the circumstances in which it is made, is so unequivocal, unconditional, immediate, and specific as to convey to the person threatened, a gravity of purpose and an immediate prospect of execution of the threat, and thereby causes that person reasonably to be in sustained fear for their own safety or for their immediate family’s safety, shall be punished by imprisonment in the county jail not to exceed one year, or by imprisonment in the state prison. (

b) In sentencing a person convicted of a felony violation of subdivision (a), the court may consider, as a factor in aggravation, that the defendant willfully threatened to commit a crime that would result in the death or great bodily injury of a person the defendant knew was a state constitutional officer, a Member of the Legislature, or a judge or court commissioner, as defined in subdivisions (a), (b), (c), (n), and (

q) of

Section 7920.500 of the Government Code. (c)

(1) For purposes of this section, “immediate family” means any spouse, whether by marriage or not, parent, child, any person related by consanguinity or affinity within the second degree, or any other person who regularly resides in the household, or who, within the prior six months, regularly resided in the household.

(2) For purposes of this section, “electronic communication device” includes, but is not limited to, telephones, cellular telephones, computers, video recorders, fax machines, or pagers. “Electronic communication” has the same meaning as the term is defined in Subsection of

Section of Title of the United States Code.