HB 66, the Ritual Abuse Amendments, expands Utah’s law-enforcement training requirements and sentencing law to address offenses committed as part of a ritual. It requires the existing trauma-informed sexual assault and sexual abuse training for law enforcement to include instruction on identifying indicators of ritual in sexual assault cases and on the impact of ritual-based abuse on victims. The bill also directs the advanced training for investigators to cover these indicators, while keeping the broader framework for sexual assault, sexual abuse, and human trafficking training in place.
The bill further creates a new aggravating factor for sentencing when a defendant commits certain offenses against a child or minor as part of, or to facilitate, a ritual or ritual practice. The aggravating factor applies to a wide list of child- and minor-victim offenses, including child abuse, kidnapping, human trafficking of a child, sexual offenses, and unlawful kissing offenses. Courts must consider the factor at sentencing and include it in the judgment, and the Board of Pardons and Parole must consider it when determining imprisonment length. The bill also includes a coordination clause to align with S.B. 24, which creates the separate offense of child torture and adds it to the aggravating-factor list if both bills become law.
Impact
HB 66 amends Section 53-10-908 of the Utah Code to broaden required peace officer training and enacts Section 76-3-203.19 to establish a new sentencing aggravator for ritual-related offenses against children and minors. It does not appropriate money, but it changes how law enforcement is trained, how prosecutors and courts may characterize certain offenses, and how the Board of Pardons and Parole evaluates sentence length. The bill also contains technical and conforming changes and a coordination clause that would incorporate the new child torture offense from S.B. 24 into the aggravating-factor statute if that bill is enacted.
Sentiment
The bill appears to have been received very positively in both chambers. It advanced unanimously through House and Senate committee votes and passed the House and Senate floor votes without any recorded opposition. The voting history suggests broad bipartisan support and little visible controversy in the legislative process.
Contention
There is little evidence of formal contention in the available record, since no committee transcripts are provided and all recorded votes were unanimous. The main policy issue inherent in the bill is the creation of a ritual-based aggravating factor, which could raise questions about how broadly “ritual” is defined and how it will be applied in sentencing. The coordination with S.B. 24 is another point of legislative complexity, because the final scope of the aggravating-factor list depends on whether the child torture bill also becomes law.