“Utah has an urgent need for immediate action to tackle the high rate of child sexual abuse,” Rep. Stephen L. Whyte, R-63, said Monday afternoon while discussing revisions to his sponsored bill HB207 regarding changes to sexual offenses.
Statistics from the Utah Women & Leadership Project from 2023 found that Utah outranked the national average in sexual violence, and Idaho and California are the only two states with higher rates.
Utah: 21.2% for girls (1 in 5) and 7.6% for boys (1 in 13).
United States: 16.6% for girls, 5.2% for boys.
Highlights of Whyte’s bill include changing sentencing regulations for repeat sexual offenders, expanding child exploitation to include when an offender accesses child sexual abuse material with the purpose of viewing and removing the option of a lesser sentence for sexual offenders who acted with minors between the ages of 14 and 18.
Whyte emphasized that Utah is behind its neighboring states in how it penalizes repeat child sex abuse offenders.
“Nevada has a one-year mandatory prison. Colorado, two years; Wyoming, five years; Arizona, 10 years. Utah sentencing guidelines recommend 105 days,” he said during the House law enforcement and criminal justice committee meeting.
“Utah law has no effective difference between a first and a second offense. Utah has enhancement provisions for many kinds of offenses, including DUI, domestic violence, even theft, but Utah law does not provide increased or enhanced penalties for repeat sexual offenders.”
In 2022, Senate Majority Whip Chris H. Wilson, R-Logan, had a similar child exploitation bill signed into law that Criminal Defense Attorney Mark Moffat said was “very hotly contested and extensively negotiated” and that “this bill undoes everything that was put into that bill.”
His greatest concerns about the potential passing of Whyte’s bill include its impact on the prison population and its potential to “limit the ability of judges and the Board of Pardons to handle these cases appropriately,” he said in Friday’s meeting.
Steve Burke, representing the Defense Attorney Association, also argued against the bill, saying it would significantly increase prison sentences for repeat offenders of child pornography possession. Though he acknowledged the seriousness of the offense he suggested that the proposed increase — from a typical three-year sentence to potentially eight years or more — is not the most effective approach.
“If you look at how we treat sex offenders, somebody who’s been committed to child pornography, they become a sex offender on the registry, and they’re isolated from society, and those people will often have a higher risk of this addiction because of their isolation,” Burke said. “So we’re pushing them out of society and saying, ‘We never expect you to engage in this addiction again, and then if you engage in it, we’re already punishing them by three years in prison.’”
But if HB207 becomes law, “We’re saying eight years in prison, and the cost of that, based upon (the) annual cost of imprisonment, is going to be about $325,000 over that additional time. What can we do with that money, as far as helping victims, increasing enforcement, increasing treatments, so that we can actually reduce the chance that somebody will re-offend rather than just sticking them in prison for an extra five years,” he added.
Despite some public opposition to the bill, the House committee passed it with a favorable recommendation. It will next be heard by a Senate committee.
Rep. Ryan Wilcox, R-Ogden, whose own bill regarding improvements to penalties against offenders who travel longer more than 50 miles to participate in child sexual assault was discussed and passed unanimously during the meeting Monday, said, unfortunately, “most people who engage in these things don’t actually care about what our laws say,” but that he appreciated the bill and all the negotiations Whyte has gone through to get in before the committee.
Rep. Mark A. Strong, R-Bluffdale, added that when he first started on the House Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Committee four years ago, bills regarding crimes against children were few and far between.
“I don’t recall having this many child-related bills. I’ve got one myself this year, and it’s just a sad state of affairs that we have to be addressing talking about these things,” he said. “Yet here we are, and I appreciate Representative Whyte bringing this to us.”