Sacramento, CA-Legislation that would require convicted sex offenders to register with college and university police when they enroll at or begin working on a California campus passed the state Senate Public Safety Committee this morning.

Detective Sally Miller testifies before the California Senate Public Safety Committee in support of AB 4 as Janet Neeley of the Attorney General's Office looks on.

The bill, AB 4 sponsored by Assemblymember Patricia Bates (R-Laguna Niguel), will eliminate the loophole in current law that allows offenders to be on campus without campus police being aware of their presence. Offenders must already register with local police where they live and work.

"This is an important first step in ensuring law enforcement, and specifically campus police have information about sexual predators on campuses so that we can adequately protect our communities," said Detective Sally Miller of the Santa Rosa Junior College Police Department and a leading proponent of the legislation.

"This bill will give campus police the same opportunities to protect their communities that other police have," said S. Daniel Carter of the national campus crime prevention organization Security On Campus, Inc. "California will be the first state to adopt comprehensive legislation giving campus police this resource," added Carter an expert on campus crime.

Although campus police will be able to use the information in investigations, and release some information publicly in the case of "high risk" offenders, there will not be any list of registrants on campus available to the public unless future legislation amends California's "Megan's Law" disclosure provisions to include it.

AB 4 passed the Assembly 74-0 in May and will next go to the Senate Appropriations Committee before it can be considered by the full California Senate.