{"id":4963,"date":"2025-10-15T00:25:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-15T00:25:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/4963\/"},"modified":"2025-10-15T00:25:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-15T00:25:08","slug":"governor-signs-south-bay-bill-to-inform-families-in-police-shootings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/4963\/","title":{"rendered":"Governor signs South Bay bill to inform families in police shootings"},"content":{"rendered":"

SAN JOSE \u2014 Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday signed a bill authored by a South Bay lawmaker and sponsored by San Jose civil-rights activists that compels due-process rights for\u00a0families of people seriously injured or killed by police<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Assembly Bill 572<\/a>, spearheaded by Assemblyman Ash Kalra, D-San Jose, and backed by fellow area legislator State Sen. Dave Cortese, will require police in the state to first inform family members of their loved one\u2019s medical condition, then tell them of their right to have an advocate present, before a formal police interview can take place.<\/p>\n

The genesis of the bill, which was initially introduced in the 2024 legislative session<\/a> before it was pulled for lack of votes, is based in large part on the experiences of San Jose families who contend that police investigators leveraged their grief to extract information about their wounded or dead relatives that would later be used to help insulate officers from criminal and civil liability.<\/p>\n

Jim Showman\u2019s 19-year-old daughter Diana was shot and killed by a San Jose police officer in August 2014 after she called 911 while experiencing a psychiatric emergency, and purported to have an Uzi that turned out to be a power drill spray-painted black. Showman says in his desperation to know about Diana\u2019s status, he outlined her mental-health history to police \u2014 which was later used to publicly justify the shooting \u2014 and only found out afterward that she was dead.<\/p>\n

He has since become an advocate for families who experience police violence, and was one of several bill supporters to testify at the state Capitol and help shape and get AB 572 across the finish line.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor all of us, it\u2019s a relief,\u201d Showman said in an interview Tuesday. \u201cNow they can\u2019t consciously take advantage of us. They have to approach this in a more humane way \u2026 It makes it so law enforcement and public officials cannot vilify victims of police violence.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kalra said the bill, which gives police agencies in California until 2027 to create policies that fulfill the new law, is meant to be a deterrent against coercive police interviews of family members left highly vulnerable by the shooting or serious injury of their loved one.<\/p>\n

\u201cAB 572 will hold our law enforcement agencies to a higher standard in their interactions with impacted family members, requiring not only transparency, but prohibiting threats and outright deception,\u201d Kalra said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Requests for comment from statewide police associations, including the California Police Chiefs Association and the Peace Officers Research Association of California were not immediately returned Tuesday. The San Jose Police Department \u2014 whose officers have been involved in several of the shootings that inspired the bill \u2014 declined comment, citing the unavailability of police commanders authorized to speak for the agency on the issue.<\/p>\n

Last year\u2019s incarnation of the bill fell short amid opposition from San Jose police and lobbying groups like PORAC, who were concerned about it impeding critical and urgent investigations, and too closely resembling Miranda requirements. They were also wary of the possible downstream legal consequences and other complexities including the fact family members of people shot by police are not presumptively accused of any crimes.<\/p>\n

The second version of the bill was rewritten to address those concerns, and now a formal Miranda reading \u2014 which requires probable cause for a crime \u2014 exempts police from being subject to the new law.<\/p>\n

Additionally, the legislation includes an exemption for \u201cwhen a reasonable officer believes that delay would result in the loss or destruction of evidence or pose an imminent threat to public safety.\u201d Kalra\u2019s office added that the law involves formal interviews, and will not apply when an officer \u201ccomes into contact incidentally with a family member.\u201d<\/p>\n

The new law also prohibits authorities, namely police investigators, from using \u201cthreats or deception, including knowingly using false information, fabricated evidence, or misleading statements, to coerce an interview.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor more than two years, directly impacted families tirelessly crafted and worked on this bill in pursuit of justice for their loved ones, so that future families do not have to experience the pain they went through after their loved ones were harmed or killed by police,\u201d said Charisse Domingo, an organizer with the South Bay civil-rights group Silicon Valley De-Bug, a chief sponsor of the bill. \u201cThis is just one step in the larger effort for police accountability fueled by families who are turning their pain and trauma into actionable, urgent, and ultimately life-saving reforms.\u201d<\/p>\n

Originally Published: October 14, 2025 at 12:40 PM PDT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SAN JOSE \u2014 Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday signed a bill authored by a South Bay lawmaker and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4964,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[5552,5550,5553,1520,5549,721,5551,3290,5548,88,90,89,225],"class_list":["post-4963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-jose","tag-assembly","tag-de-bug","tag-interrogation","tag-interview","tag-kalra","tag-law","tag-legislature","tag-newsom","tag-police-shootings","tag-san-jose","tag-san-jose-headlines","tag-san-jose-news","tag-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4963"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4963\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}