Criminal procedure: prohibited violations.

The entire amendment to Section 2936 of the Penal Code was deleted. This provision required CDCR to submit reports to the Legislature and Legislative Analyst's Office before proposing regulatory changes affecting inmate credit earning, including rationale and population impact estimates.

A new category was added to the 'prohibited violation' definition in Section 629.51: 'Exercising any rights protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.' This means law enforcement cannot use wiretaps, search warrants, or other legal process to investigate or recover evidence of First Amendment exercise (speech, assembly, religion, petition, press). Note: the bill text numbers this as item (iii) creating a duplicate numbering with the existing 'participating in a lawful protest' item, which appears to be a drafting error.

The introductory language of the prohibited violation definition was changed from 'arising out of, either any of the following' to 'arising out of, any of the following,' removing the word 'either' to accommodate the expanded list of more than two items.

Assembly Member Schultz was added as a coauthor of the bill.

The fiscal committee vote changed from 'no' to 'yes,' reflecting the removal of the CDCR reporting provision which would have had ongoing administrative costs.

The definition of 'prohibited violation' was simplified from listing separate items for (i) legally protected health care, (ii) facilitating/obtaining such care, (iii) participating in a lawful protest, and (iv) criticizing the government, to just three items: (i) legally protected health care, (ii) facilitating/obtaining such care, and (iii) exercising any rights protected by the First Amendment. This broadens protection beyond just protests and government criticism to cover all First Amendment activities including religion, assembly, and petition.

A new Section 629.52 was added establishing when a judge may enter an ex parte order authorizing interception of wire or electronic communications. It lists specific serious offenses (large-scale drug trafficking, murder, gang crimes, weapons of mass destruction violations, etc.) for which interception is permitted and requires that normal investigative procedures have been tried and failed.

New Section 629.52(e) explicitly prohibits any magistrate from entering an ex parte wiretap order for the purpose of investigating or recovering evidence of a prohibited violation (First Amendment activity). However, it carves out an exception: interception related to enumerated serious offenses is still permitted even if the communications may also involve First Amendment-protected expression.

The bill now amends four sections of the Penal Code (629.51, 629.52, 1524.2, and 1546.5) instead of three, reflecting the addition of the new wiretap authorization section.

The bill now amends Sections 629.51, 1524.2, and 1546.5 of the Penal Code in addition to Section 2936, expanding from a single technical correction to a multi-section digital privacy and civil liberties framework.

New definition of 'prohibited violation' in Section 629.51 includes: (1) providing, facilitating, or obtaining legally protected health care activities lawful under California law, (2) intending or attempting to do so, (3) participating in a lawful protest, and (4) criticizing the government.

Section 1524.2 requires that out-of-state or federal warrants seeking records from California corporations include an attestation that the evidence sought is not related to an investigation into or enforcement of a prohibited violation. California corporations are entitled to rely on that attestation.

Section 1546.5 prohibits California corporations (or those with principal executive offices in California) providing electronic communications services from complying with any federal or out-of-state warrant, court order, subpoena, wiretap order, pen register/trap and trace order, or other legal process that relates to an investigation into or enforcement of a prohibited violation.

The Attorney General is given authority to commence a civil action to compel compliance with the new prohibition on producing records related to prohibited violations.

The fiscal committee vote changed from 'no' to 'yes,' indicating the bill now has fiscal implications requiring fiscal committee review.

The original Section 2936 amendment (CDCR reporting on inmate credit changes) was retained with the same minor grammatical corrections: 'pursuant to' changed to 'by', and 'proposed changes change' corrected to 'proposed change'.