Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-First State Legislature

Regular Session of 2001

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committees on Health and Human Services and Judiciary, to which was referred S.B. No. 400, S.D. 1, entitled:

beg leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to create a criminal offense of elder or dependent adult abuse in the first, second, and third degrees. This measure also defines terms and establishes penalties.

Testimony in support of this measure was submitted by the Executive Office of Aging, Department of Human Services, Department of the Prosecuting Attorney, City and County of Honolulu, County of Hawaii Police Department, Hawaii Catholic Conference, and the Policy Advisory Board on Elder Affairs.

Your Committees find that the aged and dependent adult population are vulnerable to abuse, neglect, and exploitation. Officials estimate the prevalence of elder abuse in the United States ranges from about four to ten per cent of the population sixty-five years and older. Thus, your Committees believe that this measure is necessary to provide safety from domestic and residential care home abuse or neglect.

Your Committees find that although all testifiers supported this measure, there was grave concern that the present draft was seriously flawed. Thus, your Committees have amended this measure to redefine all definitions for clarity, and to include neglect as an offense. Your Committees have also collapsed the offense categories to three instead of the original four.

As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Health and Human Services and Judiciary that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 400, S.D. 1, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Third Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 400, S.D. 2.