HB 36 Hawaii House · 2025 Regular Session

RELATING TO EXCITED DELIRIUM.

Summary

Prohibits excited delirium from being recognized as a valid medical diagnosis or cause of death in the State. Prohibits a medical examiner, coroner, or health care provider from stating on a certificate of death or in any report that the cause of death was excited delirium. Prohibits law enforcement officers from using the term excited delirium to describe an individual in an incident report. Establishes a new Hawaii Rule of Evidence that deems evidence that a person experienced or suffered an excited delirium inadmissible in a civil action. Effective 7/1/3000. (HD2)

Issues: ✓ Criminal Justice

Bill status passed 3 of 5 stages cleared

Introduction

Jan 2025

Committee Review

Mar 2025

House Passage

Mar 2025

Senate Passage

Governor

Introduced Jan 10, 2025 Last action Mar 6, 2025

Maddy AI version diff · 2 comparisons

What changed between versions

HB36_HD1 → HB36_HD2 · 5 edits

MODERATE

This bill prohibits the recognition of 'excited delirium' as a valid medical diagnosis or cause of death in Hawaii. It prevents medical professionals, law enforcement, and government entities from using the term in official documents or testimony. The bill also bars courts from admitting evidence that a person experienced excited delirium in civil cases.

Scope change

The scope remains focused on prohibiting the use of 'excited delirium' terminology across medical, law enforcement, and legal contexts, with no expansion or reduction of covered entities.

REQUIREMENT

Changed the statute chapter reference for incident reports from Chapter 3530 to Chapter 353C in Section 2.

DEFINITION

Updated Section 2's definition of 'excited delirium' to reference the new Section 327C- instead of Section 3270-.

Changed the definition of 'excited delirium' in Section 3 from 'most current version' of the DSM to 'existing version' of the DSM.

Changed the definition of 'excited delirium' in Section 3 from 'the court finds' to 'a court finds' for grammatical consistency.

TECHNICAL

Corrected formatting errors and removed extraneous metadata lines from the document header and footer sections.

Floor votes

How they voted

This bill passed the House by voice vote (no roll call recorded).

Full legislative history

Actions timeline

Total actions

Key actions

Committee

Mar 6, 2025

Committee

Referred to HHS/PSM, JDC.

upper

Mar 6, 2025

Introduced

Received from House (Hse. Com. No. 180).

upper

Mar 4, 2025

Lower · Passed

Passed Third Reading as amended in HD 2 with Representative(s) Alcos, Garcia, Matsumoto voting aye with reservations; none voting no (0) and Representative(s) Pierick, Ward excused (2). Transmitted to Senate.

lower

Feb 26, 2025

Lower · Passed

The committee on JHA recommend that the measure be PASSED, WITH AMENDMENTS. The votes were as follows: 9 Ayes: Representative(s) Tarnas, Poepoe, Belatti, Hashem, Perruso, Takayama, Todd, Shimizu; Ayes with reservations: Representative(s) Garcia; Noes: none; and 2 Excused: Representative(s) Cochran, Kahaloa.

lower

Feb 11, 2025

Committee

Reported from HLT (Stand. Com. Rep. No. 322) as amended in HD 1, recommending passage on Second Reading and referral to JHA.

lower

Feb 5, 2025

Lower · Passed

The committee on HLT recommend that the measure be PASSED, WITH AMENDMENTS. The votes were as follows: 8 Ayes: Representative(s) Takayama, Keohokapu-Lee Loy, Amato, Chun, Marten, Olds, Takenouchi; Ayes with reservations: Representative(s) Alcos; Noes: none; and 1 Excused: Representative(s) Garcia.

lower

Jan 21, 2025

Committee

Referred to HLT, JHA, referral sheet 1

lower

Jan 16, 2025

Introduced

Introduced and Pass First Reading.

lower

Jan 10, 2025

Introduced

Prefiled.

lower

1 primary · 0 co-sponsors