Panel beefs up law on assault of law officers

The penalty for assaulting a police officer a second time could become a lot more serious.

The House Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Committee unanimously approved a bill Friday that would make it a third-degree felony for assaulting a police officer if the accused has previously been convicted of the same offense. Currently, it is a class-A misdemeanor.

"It's time we deal with these people," Rep. Paul Ray, R-Clearfield, the sponsor of HB70, said. "They shouldn't do this to anybody in a position of authority."

The bill was amended to put the emphasis on somebody who is already convicted of assaulting a peace officer, which "was our original intent," Ray said. Focusing on repeat offenders would ensure that one mistake would not saddle a person with a felony.

"We're looking at the hard-core criminal," he said. "I don't want the teenager who is intoxicated and gets in a scuffle with a police officer to be charged with a felony."

Among other things, a felony strips the person of the right to own a gun, which was enough for N.W. Clayton, director of communications for Gun Owners of Utah, to label it an "anti-gun" bill.

"We need to balance the scales of justice," he said. "This is a continuation of felony creep," where more and more crimes are considered felonies that can have serious consequences on a person's rights.

Paul Boyden, the executive director of the Utah Association of Prosecutors, said that while once may be a mistake, multiple instances of assaulting a police officer demonstrate behavior that needs to be punished appropriately.

"Once somebody has been convicted of assaulting a police officer ... now we're talking felony level conduct," Boyden said. "If somebody is that dumb and that violent, then they really should have their guns taken away until they can get their lives back together," Boyden said.

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