Bill Denies Rapists Rights to Custody : Laws: Governor signs legislation barring those convicted in sex assaults from claiming offspring conceived during commission of their crimes.

Gov. Pete Wilson on Monday signed legislation that would stop convicted rapists from claiming custody of children they father during the commission of their crimes.

“Rapists will not be permitted access to a child that was conceived by way of a violent assault on the mother,” said Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar), author of the legislation.

Katz said he hoped passage of the bill, AB 1296, would bring an end to several pending cases in California in which biological fathers have sought custody of children conceived during non-consensual sexual intercourse.

“It’s unconscionable to allow convicted rapists to win a custody battle,” Katz said. The new law also covers statutory rape in cases where the father is over 21 and the mother is younger than 15, said Katz.

One of the pending cases involves an ongoing adoption battle in the San Fernando Valley. A 43-year-old Sherman Oaks advertising executive and his wife have been fighting for the past two years to retain custody and adopt a baby girl who was fathered by a man later convicted of unlawful sex with a minor.

The father was 22 and the mother was 14 at the time the baby was born. After serving a 15-day jail sentence for having sex with the girl, the father filed suit to obtain custody of the baby, said the advertising executive, who asked not to be identified.

He said the father took advantage of the young girl, who went into counseling after the sexual liaison. The father was originally charged with child molestation and statutory rape, but that was later reduced, said the businessman.

“What you’ve got here is a predatory adult,” said the Sherman Oaks man. “Now he wants to keep the fruit of his crime.”

The Sherman Oaks couple, who have been unable to have children on their own, learned of the girl’s pregnancy through a lawyer specializing in adoption. At the time the suit was filed, the Sherman Oaks couple were in the process of adopting the baby, with the consent of the mother.