Bill Text: NJ S2361 | 2020-2021 | Regular Session | Introduced
Bill Title: Establishes second degree crime of making credible threat to infect another with COVID-19 or similar infectious disease that triggered public emergency.
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Republican 2-0)
Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2020-05-11 - Transferred to Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee [S2361 Detail]
Download: New_Jersey-2020-S2361-Introduced.html
Sponsored by:
Senator KRISTIN M. CORRADO
District 40 (Bergen, Essex, Morris and Passaic)
SYNOPSIS
Establishes second degree crime of making credible threat to infect another with COVID-19 or similar infectious disease that triggered public emergency.
CURRENT VERSION OF TEXT
As introduced.
An Act concerning making terroristic threats concerning infectious disease and amending N.J.S.2C:12-3.
Be It Enacted by the Senate and General Assembly of the State of New Jersey:
1. N.J.S.2C:12-3 is amended to read as follows:
2C:12-3. Terroristic threats.
a. A person is guilty of a crime of the third degree if he threatens to commit any crime of violence with the purpose to terrorize another or to cause evacuation of a building, place of assembly, or facility of public transportation, or otherwise to cause serious public inconvenience, or in reckless disregard of the risk of causing such terror or inconvenience. A violation of this subsection is a crime of the second degree if it occurs during a declared period of national, State or county emergency. The actor shall be strictly liable upon proof that the crime occurred, in fact, during a declared period of national, State or county emergency. It shall not be a defense that the actor did not know that there was a declared period of emergency at the time the crime occurred.
c. A person is guilty of a crime of the second degree if he threatens to infect another with COVID-19, or any other infectious disease for which a national, State or county emergency has been declared as of the date of the threat, with the purpose to put him in imminent fear of serious bodily injury or death under circumstances reasonably causing the victim to believe the immediacy of the threat and the likelihood that it will be carried out.
(cf: P.L.2002, c.26, s.11)
2. This act shall take effect immediately.
STATEMENT
Presently, N.J.S.2C:12-3 establishes the crime of terroristic threats which, depending on the circumstances and the intended effect of the threat, is graded as a crime of the third degree or a crime of the second degree.
This bill provides that a person commits a crime of the second degree if he threatens to infect another person with COVID-19, or any other infectious disease for which a national, State or county emergency has been declared as of the date of the threat, with the purpose to put him in imminent fear of bodily injury or death under circumstances reasonably causing the victim to believe the immediacy of the threat and the likelihood that it will be carried out.
COVID-19, a novel virus strain discovered in December, 2019, has reached worldwide pandemic level. COVID-19 has triggered the declaration of a national emergency and a State Emergency and a Public Health Emergency in New Jersey. A crime of the second degree is punishable by up to 10 years imprisonment, a fine of up to $150,000, or both.
It is the sponsor's view that a threat to infect another with COVID-19 or any other disease outbreak significant enough to be the cause of a declaration of a public emergency warrants a severe punishment if the circumstances of the threat reasonably cause the victim to believe in the immediacy of the threat and the likelihood that it will be carried out.
