Panel Rejects Bill on Drive-By Killings

A Democratic-dominated Senate committee Monday rejected a bill making drive-by murder a crime punishable by death, touching off an angry rebuke from its Democratic author.

“This sends the wrong message, the message that the Democratic Party isn’t tough on crime,” said state Sen. Ruben Ayala of Chino after the defeat of the bill by the Appropriations Committee.

The bill (SB 9) failed on a 6-4 vote, one short of approval, and marked the first time this session that a high-profile anti-crime bill met with defeat in the Senate.

The legislation would have made murder by drive-by shooting a special circumstance in which the perpetrator could be executed or put in prison for life without the possibility of parole. Ayala argued that the current sentence of 25 years to life is not tough enough.

Ayala said crime is a leading concern of Californians but that the Democratic Party is perceived as soft on criminals compared with Republicans. “We shoot ourselves on this (issue),” he told reporters.

But state Sen. Patrick Johnston of Stockton, a fellow Democrat and new chairman of the Appropriations Committee, defended the vote on the grounds that Wilson Administration officials were unable to estimate how much the law would cost.

Johnston told reporters that as long as the state budget remains tight, criminal justice bills that create costs will receive extra scrutiny. He said the policy will apply “not just to unpopular bills but to popular (anti-crime) bills, too.”

“This is an area of criminal justice that the Department of Finance seems to pretend . . . they cannot estimate the cost,” Johnston said.

H.D. Palmer, a Department of Finance spokesman, said officials were unable to project the potential impact of Ayala’s bill. The bill would have created a new crime for which there was no prior history, Palmer said.

He said that in order to make an accurate cost forecast, a history of prior or similar cases must be examined. He added, however, that if a cost analysis can be designed for first-degree murder cases involving drive-by shootings, it would be sent to the Legislature.

Johnson said he expects that the Ayala bill will win Senate approval later in the year when the state’s budget picture becomes clearer. A similar measure was approved by the Senate last year but was defeated in the Assembly.