AN ACT Relating to reviewing laws related to criminal insanity and competency to stand trial;
HB 1359 creates a temporary task force to review Washington’s laws on criminal insanity and competency to stand trial. The task force is charged with examining chapter 10.77 RCW and related statutes, identifying barriers to public safety, fairness, efficiency, and understanding, and recommending changes to modernize the system. Its work includes reviewing terminology, improving coherence between legal and medical language, reducing stigma, and considering reforms that would improve diversion, treatment, and safe hospital discharge practices.
The bill also directs the Code Reviser to reorganize and recodify a number of statutes within chapter 10.77 RCW, including provisions on definitions, general provisions, authorized leave and furloughs, community notifications, evaluations, criminal insanity, and competency to stand trial. It further decodifies several related statutes and requires correction of statutory cross-references. The act is temporary in nature: the task force must report its findings and recommendations to the governor and the Legislature by December 2026, and the section establishing it expires in December 2026. The bill contains a funding contingency stating that if specific funding is not provided by June 30 in the omnibus appropriations act, the act becomes null and void.
The bill would not directly change substantive criminal insanity or competency standards immediately, but it would initiate a statewide review process and authorize a statutory cleanup and recodification of laws in chapter 10.77 RCW. It affects the Department of Social and Health Services, the Department of Corrections, the Health Care Authority, the Attorney General, public defense, courts, prosecutors, defense attorneys, law enforcement, victim advocates, disability rights and mental health organizations, counties, cities, labor, hospitals, and people with lived experience in the forensic mental health system. The recodification and decodification provisions would alter how related statutes are organized in the RCW, while the task force’s recommendations could lead to future legislative changes affecting competency restoration, forensic treatment, and discharge procedures.
Overall, the bill appears to have broad support, with strong majorities in both chambers and unanimous votes in the Senate committees that considered it. The House and Senate both passed amended versions, indicating general agreement on the need to study and modernize this area of law. The vote margins suggest some partisan or policy-based disagreement in the House, but not enough to prevent passage.
The main points of contention likely centered on the scope and direction of reform, especially around balancing public safety with patient-centered language, diversion, treatment access, and hospital discharge practices. The bill’s task force includes a wide range of stakeholders, including prosecutors, defense attorneys, law enforcement, victim advocates, disability rights advocates, mental health advocates, hospitals, counties, cities, labor, and people with direct lived experience, which suggests competing interests in how the system should be changed. The funding contingency may also have been a practical concern, because the act becomes void without specific appropriations.