This meeting of the House Judiciary will now come to order.
The time is now 1.04 p.m. on Monday, January 26th, 2026.
We are meeting in the Grunberg room, Capital Room 120.
The following members are present.
Vice Chair Cop, Representative Eisheid,
Representative Underwood,
Representative Costello,
Representative Mina,
and myself Representative Gray, Chair.
Like the record reflect that we have a quorum to conduct business
I would also like to recognize the staff supporting this meeting Sophia Tenny from house records Zach log horn from
The genome LIO and my staff Dylan Hitchcock Lucas
We have two items of business on today's agenda. The first will be an overview
Department of law update with attorney general Stephen Cox and deputy attorney General Corey Mills and Deputy Attorney General Angie Kemp
We will then hear HB 47 and it's first hearing.
This is generated of seeing child sex abuse material
by representative Vance.
She is here today, but she's going to come in at that point.
So as our first item of business,
Attorney General Stephen Cox is going
to provide an update on developments
at the Department of Law and his vision
for the department moving forward.
Please put yourself on the record attorney general
and begin your testimony.
Thank you, Chair. My name is Stephen Cox, Attorney General David Nee. This is my first legislative
hearing. First legislative session, it's a privilege to be here. It's privilege
to in this role of Attorney general. But it is a
privilege be in front of you at this committee. Let me let me start with the
Many of these names and faces will be familiar to you, of course, at my left and my right.
On this slide, I've got my two trusted deputies, Cory Mills, as you know,
handles our Civil Division and Angie Kemp,
is our Deputy Attorney General for the Criminal Division.
You'll see that Rachel Whitty remains our Director on the Civil Division.
She oversees a number of sections that focus mainly on sort of the attorney advice side
of The House.
He is the director over our trial part of the Civil Division.
So a lot of litigation will report up to Charles.
Charles just started, I think, in September after a distinguished career in the Navy JAG.
Paul's right there.
I just want to state that we are joined by Representatives Galvin and Representative Holland.
And while we're talking about the two directors,
and this is just my ignorance,
have we always had two Directors of the Civil Division?
I'm gonna defer to Corey on that question.
Okay, again, Corey Mills for the record, Chair Gray,
we have not.
And this was actually a budgetary item two years ago.
I think one of, I'd say, former director Stacey Craley's legacies, we just found that we had about,
we have 16 different sections in the civil division all overseen by one director. A good number of
people to supervise is 10 as the max. It was just getting to be too much, so it was more funneling
paperwork than really being able to do the substantive work of the department. So we reallocated resources
divide this up into two division directors that would hopefully give more support to our supervisors.
I think we've really seen that bear out. So I'm excited in this going forward and I really
appreciate the legislature's help in getting this across the finish line. It didn't really cost
any more money. it was just kind of a reallocation of budget components. But I appreciate this support.
Thank you. Please continue.
On the criminal side, we have one director that's now Rob Henderson.
So that position really oversees all of our district attorneys throughout the state.
We also have Amber LeBlanc, she's our director of administrative services.
She keeps the trains running on time and helps with all sorts of
administrative things that from budget to IT, you name it.
You know, this is the rest of the executive office, and I'll just go one by one. I'm happy to answer any questions
as I go through
Jenna Lawrence as as many of you know is our new solicitor general statewide solicitor General
She helps me with civil appeals and criminal appeals
and also with the growing body of
cases where we're
advancing Alaska's voice and in other courts outside of Alaska
I've got John Skidmore, who is still in the leadership team.
He was a former Deputy Attorney General, probably our best prosecutor in
the office, and I asked him to be a senior litigation counsel.
That's kind of a glorified title, but it's borrowing from the federal
model where you have a really extraordinarily gifted prosecutor.
that you can include in your leadership roles and give sort of special projects and so he is
he's actually been asked to lead my topmost priority which which is the quality of life
initiative and I'm sure we'll get into that soon. Also on this slide we've got
Ann Hauser and Charlotte Mylar, they are two of my senior advisors in the front office that helped me with a wide array of civil division oversight issues from special projects or helping with multi-site letters or tribal matters, you name it, I can throw a lot at them.
we'll pause there for any questions and I'd also if there are any legislators in the room that
would like to join us at the table they are welcome. I guess you were just talking about Chief Assistant
Attorney General Helser. Can you talk a little bit more about what she's actually working on?
Sure. So a couple of things she is working
on right now that are very important to me have to do with
regulatory reform and regulatory initiatives so as you know the governor
announced administrative order 360 a little before I took took office and it
gives the Department of Law a role to play in consultation with the
governor and in concertation with our partners in the executive branch to help
Identify regulations that may have been on the books for many, many years but could be
reduced to reduce red tape and so she's helping my legislation and regulations section
on that project. It's a lot of work and it involves a
lot partnership with our executive branch agencies.
I believe, and I'm gonna turn it to Cori,
I believed she was hired two or three years ago.
And, but I'll defer to Corey.
Corey Mills again for the record.
So yeah, Anne Helter has been with us,
I think a little over 18 months.
She was hired under former attorney general, Trig Taylor.
I will say that since I've been at the department,
most attorneys general have,
had one or two special assistants, similar to the special
assistants under other commissioners, they tend to be
attorneys because, well, we're a lot of department. But that's
that the role she's kind of always filled from my
understanding.
It's okay, I'd like to go to John Skidmore and just ask about
what the duties and responsibilities are for senior
litigation counsel, John skid more. Sure.
Thank you, Chair. So what I asked John to really tackle is my top most priority. The top
priority at the Department of Law is always going to be public safety. And I should say,
in terms of the aggressive cases that we bring in prosecute, it's always gonna be sexual assault.
But a new priority, a initiative that were sort of bringing to the table is what
And I sat down with John and I talked a little bit about some of these lower level offenses
that we see in all over Anchorage, but especially downtown, and whether it's retail theft at the
big box stores or whether its public disorder offenses that that were all familiar with when
And I asked him to think more broadly about what could we do better to tackle these kinds
of offenses and how could build a partnership with the city on this front.
And also, I think historically, we used to have a misdemeanor unit in the Anchorage DA's
office.
But another thought I had about John
was that he could train, he's such a skilled trainer
in terms of training up the next generation of prosecutors.
And, and if he's focused on these lower level offenses that might be an opportunity to grab
a couple of assistant DAs who want to work hard on this cases because they mean a lot.
And I thought he was just the right person to do it.
I also thought that he would have a great relationship with the city and would also understand how
bring sort of an all-of-government approach to the table and be sort
of a single point of contact for the state of Alaska when we're trying to
partner with the city on these complex quality of life issues.
How many attorneys will he be supervising?
I think our current plan I
think is that he would have a couple of assistant DAs
and on this I'll
I'll ask my deputy, Angie, to confirm later on, but I think the idea is he would have
one assistant DA from Anchorage and one Assistant DA, perhaps from the Valley.
I think he's just a force multiplier, and so even if he is only supervising a couple
of those assistant DAs, there may be some investigative resources that he can also help
oversee, he will be able to facilitate through his soft skills, through relationships with
We were just talking during the budget subcommittee about how this has no fiscal impact
But yet we know that folks have large caseloads
So I'm just curious if you can expound a little bit about
how we're able to
create a new division and
move some folks over to do this new work on
You know
retail theft, lower level crimes,
without having an impact on public safety, as you said.
Can you just talk a little bit about that?
Sure, it's fair for a question, Chair.
I would say one of the top priorities that I've got
is how to leverage resources and to do more with less.
And so this is a great example of that.
We've got, with the municipality as a partner, we have a city attorney's office that's primarily,
they're fully staffed, they are primarily focused on misdemeanor offenses.
And it's a natural partnership that we would have with this city because of the split between
But, like many misdemeanor prosecutors, they would love to prosecute felonies.
And there are ways that you could aggregate, for example, three misdemeanor cases, that
if you aggregate could constitute a felony case.
And so they're eager to work on those kinds of felony cases and we're
as such. And so I think it'll be a way that we can leverage their resources and
and ultimately be forced multiplier on that front and I want to clarify you
mentioned that you might have someone from from the valley and you mentioned
the focus on downtown. I don't want speak for our valley representative but
I'm just curious would this be an initiative also operating in the
My deputy to make sure that I didn't miss miss mistate what we're actually going to do on that front
But I but I also want to come back to a point that you made earlier. I don't think of this as a new division
John is is now in the office of special prosecutions
This is a New Initiative though
Thank you, Chair Gray.
The Attorney General is correct.
John's position is in the Office of Special Prosecutions in a PCN that we had existing
there.
But just to follow up on what the Attorney-General mentioned and your question about
the Valley in particular, we're starting with Anchorage.
and we're gonna tackle Anchorage, so to speak,
first and see how, and then progress out to the valley.
So we don't have a specific prosecutor yet named.
We had one in mind,
and unfortunately that individual elected
to go to leave state service.
So again, what we are doing is we were asking folks
within the offices who have special interests
in these kinds of case types
that they may already be working,
there already are quality of life initiatives underway.
For example, meeting with our partners in the business industry, Walmart, Fred Meyer, et cetera.
So, some of these initiatives have been happening, but now, as the Attorney General mentioned,
we're bringing a full force multiplier by being able to bring on city attorneys
to help really with the bigger cases and tackle, I think, the...
for example, riskitivist offenders and so while we've not perfected what we're going to do in the
valley, that's the plan. I'm curious, it seems to me, and you can educate me and this might be
awkward for you, Deputy Attorney Angie Kemp, but since John Skidmore was in your role and he's now
And maybe I'm wrong, but I am just curious, did he ask for this position or was this
position created for him and was he placed in it?
I think it's helpful if I sort of set the stage when I took the office.
I spent the first 60 days really meeting with the existing leadership team,
section supervisors, line attorneys, support staff, asking them simple questions of what's going well,
what could be improved, what are some of their ideas.
And the reason I was doing that is to learn sort of the ground truth of what was going
on in the department and where I should focus.
I also was using that time to develop sort
of an idea of who I thought the leadership team should be.
And so I approached John and I talked to him about how I wanted to promote Angie to the
Deputy role.
But I also talked about this new priority that he was hearing me talk about for days
really weeks. And I think he was getting excited about the initiative, he had
great ideas, and I thought it was a great fit and
I asked him if he'd be willing to serve in that role. He said yes.
I would leave it at that, you know, personal decisions can be hard, but I think our conversation,
my conversation with John made that easy, and I
think we're both working well together. I mean, he is absolutely part of the leadership team,
and i rely on him daily. Thank you.
I'm going to move on, Representative Mina.
Thank you chair great through the chair. Thank You Attorney General Cox for being here
I'm also curious how related to the low-level misdemeanors
How did the relationship between the Department of Law in the city operate prior to The creation of this new position?
So on this one I would I Would actually want to bring in my deputy and
It was certainly a question that I was asking in those early conversations about what could
we do better on this front.
I will say when we were talking about, when I talked to many of the folks in the building
about these quality of life issues, and to a person, everyone thought it was something
we could be doing more about.
There was a lot of what I call sort of the Alphonse Gaston problem where there's there is people
Sort of saying well really this is not my lane. This is this other agency's lane or
This, is, not, my turf this, Is, My turf, this Is their turf
and I saw a, lot, of
Sort, Of things that we could unstick if we took a partnership approach and so rather than asking about
Well, you know, how do I stay in my lane and how
do i make sure that I'm not doing anything and somebody else's turf or whatnot?
I just invited people together to talk about how we could break down some silos.
This is something that i focus a lot on in the department is breaking down siloes.
and cross pollinating from different divisions.
It's something I talk about frequently.
But in terms of the relationship
and how the relationships was,
I'm gonna bring in my deputy on that one.
Through the chair, thank you, Representative Mina.
We've always had a relationship with the municipality,
and you might remember from previous testimony
where I explained that the Anchorage municipality
does the bulk of the misdemeanor prosecutions.
It used to be that we had
a misdemeanor division in Anchorage,
but as they took on, as a municipality
took more responsibility, that's how that...
And so we don't have a misdemeanor unit largely because of their help with us and trying to tackle crime and anchorage.
So we've always had a relationship.
I'll say that the Attorney General brought an energy and reinvigorated that relationship
by doing what he was describing as trying tackle.
How do we work together with shared limited resources?
inexperienced attorneys similar to the things that we're trying to tackle.
From that, for example, when I testified earlier,
somebody like Mr. Skidmore to come in and train new prosecutors.
First of all, I would be terrified,
but it would it be great and he would have the skill set to do that.
I say that in joking. I'm sure he's going to
do an outstanding job with that but.
But someone like that with his level of experience and intimate knowledge of the laws and how they developed holy smokes
That's as attorney general mentioned. Thats a force multiplier in and of himself
And there was just one thing that I wanted to make clear
You mentioned that we talked about him taking a PCN within special prosecutions that PCM does supervise other positions
So the two initiative positions will be a part of of other folks that he'll
won't directly supervise, you won' t be right in their e-vals, but he'll be managing their
work in a lot of ways. But he will keep the other components of that position.
Thanks. I'm Representative Eishide.
Thank you, Chair Gray, through the Chair. Attorney General Cox, I appreciate the conversations
you had coming in.
I think that's a smart thing to do when you're new, see what the lay of the land is and the
And I appreciate you talking to all the folks in Department of Law on the Quality of Life
Initiative.
Did the municipality approach you asking for this assistance?
I'm trying to see where did the genesis of this come from?
Was it from the immunity or from a state?
Thank you for that question.
Through the chair.
I am learning the rules.
Through of the Chair.
Representative Ayesha.
Thank-you for the question!
I will say that this was something that was a top priority for me,
but it was also something I asked John to communicate with the city
to gauge their interest on a partnership.
It was not long after that that we learned that they would be very interested
in taking on retail theft felony cases.
And so, and there were also a couple of other issues they were asking to partner with us on.
And, so it was a pretty easy start to that partnership, really at the working group level.
I think I kept talking about it with the governor about what we could do with a city.
We ultimately had, we invited the mayor and her municipal manager, the city attorney and
others over to meet with governor and me to formally invite them to do something together.
ongoing conversation. I was in touch with the city attorney probably as recently as this morning
and we're getting to know each other, we are building trust between each
other. We are really trying to take the politics out of this issue because sometimes there are
in these issues, but we're really trying to take that out
and develop a partnership that really works
and produces results as a force multiplier
and leverages each other's authorities.
Thank you.
Thanks, if it's okay, I think we'll move on.
I have some questions about General Lawrence,
Solicitor General.
What are the Smicitor general's duties?
It's a fair question, thank you, Chair, for the question.
It might be helpful to sort of go back to the role
of the state attorney solicitor general that really
began in the 1990s.
And I think it was Texas, maybe the first, that
included a solicitor-general.
And it's modeled off of United States solicitor
general role at the Department of Justice.
And it was based on this idea that in today's sort of modern litigation state,
many legal issues, many an increasing number of legal and policy issues
are deciding litigation, as opposed to fiscal legislature.
And with any given state obviously their circuit.
and the U.S. Supreme Court on federal issues,
and their state Supreme court, of course,
are influencing and governing the laws of the state.
But at the same time, the Supreme
Court and in their circuit,
and even their State Supreme
Court are often influenced by the court cases
and opinions coming out of other state courts
and other circuit courts of appeal.
that frequently the U.S. Supreme Court won't get involved in a case unless there's a circuit
split amongst the circuits. And so the idea in the beginning was to articulate and amplify
the state's voice in those other cases so that they could help shape the law that would
I think most all of the states, I don't have the actual numbers but it's something around
45 give or take, most of all the state have a state solicitor general and I ask the governor
about using an existing PCN to create that kind of office in my front office.
Not to directly supervise the civil and the criminal appellate sections, which are doing excellent work,
and on a wide number of cases.
But to help me stay on top of those appeals, but also to
help think about all of the multi-state litigations, all the
letters and briefs that where we could look out for Alaska's interest and articulate Alaska
's interests. And to that point I should just note, when I started, I remember looking
at a couple of trackers that we have that track the number of multi-state amicus briefs
And I think, to date, we've been asked to join over a thousand multistate Amicus briefs.
And we have joined upwards of, I mean, five or six hundred Amacus briefs since the start
of the Dunlavy administration.
And a lot of time that I was spending early on in my time as AG was nights and weekends
and making sure that if we were going to join,
it was consistent with the past positions in the state.
And also, when a multi-state Amicus briefs comes our way,
and we're asked to joined, along with multiple states,
it's written by an appellate lawyer in The Originating
State, I may not be able to adjust the writing style,
or much at all of the brief, but what I can do is look for what
I call boomerang issues.
These are issues that if we take a position on a particular
legal issue in litigation, in an amicus brief.
This is the kind of thing that could come back and hurt us in some
other litigation.
And so I would be looking for those kinds of issues,
but I was spending a lot of time, nights and weekends
And so, when we thought about bringing in a new solicitor general,
she's taking on the bulk of that kind of work
and helping me evaluate those multi-state amicus briefs that come in.
And also, I shouldn't leave out the multi state letters that we've received.
We've receive hundreds and hundreds of those.
and have signed on to hundreds of those multi-state letters as well,
and they have the same kinds of issues.
do they include statements that could boomerang in some kind of litigation and harm the state's
interest? And so that's really what her job is, is to help me make sure that when we're advancing
Alaska's interest and amplifying Alaska voice, we are doing it deliberately, thoughtfully, carefully,
Thank you. So what I'm hearing is that we had a thousand amicus briefs. It was an overwhelming
number. it was very difficult to keep a handle on.
So we've created a position for someone who has a deep knowledge of Alaska's history,
a Deep Knowledge of Alaskas laws, and is able to really kind of compartmentalize and understand
where these amacus briefs fit. If I am understanding that correctly,
can you teach us about Jenna Lawrence and what made her the most qualified person for this role?
Chair, I would re-characterize it a little bit, if that's okay.
I have a building full of experts in Alaska law.
And on the civil side, upwards of 150 civil lawyers who are the state's best lawyers on
Alaska Law.
On the other hand, what I was looking for, and I did interview multiple candidates, including a few Alaskans,
I were looking at somebody who had very good relationships with the
other Solicitor General's offices that I don't necessarily have, so that we could have conversations
when we come across a brief and say,
We can't join it as written, but if we drop a footnote here maybe we can be able to join
it.
Or somebody who can help me understand, if I take a position over here, could we potentially
get other states to weigh in as amicus supporting the state of Alaska in our own litigation?
She was the Deputy Solicitor General in Indiana.
She is an Assistant S
and during those years she has developed
very good relationships across many different states
so that when legal issues come up
and we want to have some kind of multi-state coordination,
I have somebody who knows these people very well
and has been working with them for years.
So, Chair Gray, I might not know the, well, first of all,
let me go back to the real question,
which is, had she been admitted to The Bar.
She has not taken the Alaska Bar exam.
I believe she's been temporarily admitted
to practice in The Alaska bar.
She has submitted an application.
She had to retake the MPRE, the multi-state professional
responsibility ethics class because Alaska's bar rules have,
they have reciprocity for those who are members of other bars.
But if you haven't taken the MPRA within the last eight years,
you have to take it again.
And so she did that.
She passed.
And then she's going through the paperwork process,
and I don't anticipate any issues.
I just want to follow up question.
If you could just speak a little bit more about her knowledge
of Alaska and her connection to Alaska.
Well, I would say that, Chair Gray,
I'd say what she brings to the table,
is an excitement about Alaska.
Like me, she didn't grow up in Alaska,
but she was excited about the opportunity to serve the state.
And Alaska I think to its credit has embraced her,
and given her a warm welcome, I'll be in the dead of winter.
And I think she will, she's already picked up a number of issues that are particular to the state,
worked with our civil appellate lawyers and our criminal appellate
lawyers to make sure that we're representing the
state in the best interest.
I just have one more question.
It has to do specifically with the Solicitor General's recent amicus brief submitted to the United States Supreme Court in the case of Michael Watson, the Mississippi Secretary of State, versus the Republican National Committee.
Right now, Alaska Law currently allows absentee ballots that have been postmarked by Election Day to be counted if they were received by close-up business on the 10th day after the election, and if the voter is overseas, like military members.
um, the ballot will count so long as it is received by the 15th day after the election.
Um, and this, if the Supreme Court rules against the petition,
then it would effectively invalidate Alaska's absentee ballot law.
And so I'm curious if you can explain why the state of Alaska took no position.
On this case, when it's so essential to our rural state to making sure that people's votes are counted and especially with such a high degree of military members, you know, I just teach me why we have no position, why were not taking a more firm stance.
In any U.S. Supreme Court case, the first question is are you going to weigh in at all?
This is a very controversial case.
The Republican National Committee has sued the state of Mississippi for laws that many states have on their books.
States are grappling with what to do in the event the U.S. Supreme Court weighs
in. Now, I did not have any kind of authorization to take a position on that
controversial case, but what I was able to
do is offer a brief where we could articulate
the special, you know, situation that Alaska has with respect to his geography,
remoteness, and articulate to the U.S. Supreme Court, in support of neither
party, the real-world effects of a decision by the the US Supreme
Court to change the rules. And what we asked for was clarity and I think, I
That brief will be read and and taken into account as the U.S. Supreme Court makes that decision oftentimes
The most interesting briefs and this is not the first one and on this maybe I'll bring in my deputy
To talk about a past
Brief where we did something similar to this but oftentimes
The Most Interesting brief is the brief and in support of neither party
When the U.S. Supreme Court is looking for how to decide a case when, you know,
dozens and dozens of Amicus briefs are on both sides and the advocacy is going
to be top-notch, it always is, the US Supreme court and my hope is
that this brief gets attention and makes a difference in terms of the clarity
of rules or whether there are exceptions and whatnot.
But on this, I do want to give an opportunity for my deputy to talk about the fact that
this is not the first time that we have filed a brief that's in support of neither party
or akin to being in supportive neither-party.
So Corey Mills, for the record, we've talked a lot about how many amicus requests we get.
What we haven't talked a lot about is how many we author, and the state does not author that many because it's a
lot of work to get a brief ready for the Supreme Court, even an amicus brief.
It takes the same level of commitment as it does to do the actual brief from the parties.
A year ago or two years ago there was another case it involved the federal communications
commission and how certain money was provided and in Alaska that money goes a long way.
It has to do with the telecommunications and we did something very similar.
like come in on a side but we didn't actually advocate for any side. We again just detailed the
drastic consequences a decision would have on Alaska and asked for you know an understanding
of that and that the court would take that into account. In the end the Court
ruled that the funding and the way it was set up,
it's a delegation issue, very kind of esoteric issue.
But they ruled, that it, was constitutional,
and therefore the fund to Alaska continued
and we did not have to face those consequences.
But the brief,
very much detailed similar issues with the geography
of Alaska and rural Alaska, any impacts there too.
Two quick follow-ups, I guess.
When you said that this is a controversial case, this
is the case having to do with the counting ballots after election day,
did you find that that was controversial among Alaskans?
I wouldn't say that I didn't do any research into
But my experience is that with respect to election law and how the rules are said is
that it's highly controversial in any state.
I'll just make a comment that we are different.
We're a very, very big state with a large military population and it takes along.
We see those numbers change after election day as more and more ballots come in from
You mentioned authorization from the governor. Maybe I misheard, but I mean it I just want to clarify
Did you not?
Did the Governor not let you weigh in on this issue or you weren't art authorized to wait?
I'm I don't make sure I understood correctly sure Gray when I say
Authorization I am speaking at a very high level and a conceptual level
any brief that we file, any position we take,
any multi-state letter we join.
We want to make sure that
we do that in consultation with the governor
and other commissioners and
other parts of the executive branch.
Ultimately, my job is to serve the people of Alaska
and I do it through intermediaries.
And the Governor is...
is the head of the executive branch.
And one of things that I have to think about
in any of these multi-state briefs or multi state letters
is what kind of position has the state taken
over the last years of The Dunlaby administration.
And if there's a particular issue,
we haven't taken a position on.
or whatnot, then I may want to flag that with the governor's office.
I might want flag with other commissioners so that we can make sure that
we're doing something in the best interest of the state as best as I can determine.
Are there any other questions from committee or will move?
Anyone else in here you wanted to talk about?
Oh, and so, I think I left off at Anne in Charlotte.
And then Sam Curtis is my communications director,
public information officer,
and Nina Dizon.
makes the world go around. I rely on her every day. She's my executive secretary.
She is the reason that things go smoothly in our office. And so that's the end of this slide.
So this this line is more of sort of an opportunity for us to discuss
What the Department of Law is really all about?
And and ultimately it's about supporting and defending the rule of law
we we there are multiple functions and and
Responsibilities that we have on on that front on the civil side
We have the role of advising the executive branch agencies
advising, the governor's office
legal matters. We also have the responsibility of bringing and defending
civil litigation and then on the criminal side we have
the Criminal Prosecutions side of the house.
And all of that is very, very busy work and it's challenging and I've got a great team
to help me manage that.
But ultimately what we're trying to do is uphold the rule of law and make sure that
it is consistently applied.
The last part of this sentence is really, you know, the most important point.
Ultimately, my client is the people of Alaska.
I serve that client not like a typical private sector lawyer, private practice lawyer.
Has an individual client they're dealing with in the office.
through other commissioners, through the executive branch,
through of course.
I serve the people when I respond to questions,
legal questions about bills from the legislature.
But ultimately the clients is the People of Alaska.
And so the goal is to make sure that we're doing
the best job to uphold the rule of law
in service of the the peoples.
I thought on this slide, before I turn it over to my much more capable deputies to talk
about the good work of the Civil Division and the Criminal Division, is to
talk a little bit about a couple of enforcement priorities.
We've already talked about The Quality of Life Initiative, but I'd be remiss to just
not take the opportunity to talking about that again.
This is a core function that we're going to be providing in partnership with the with The City
and
And it's going To allow us to take an all-of-government Approach in
Partnership with, the federal our federal Partners in
Partnership With The city and
And to do more with Less to Leverage those resources Leveraged those authorities
To bring and improve the the quality of Life
I have a couple of questions about this as we came back to quality of life.
So my understanding is the municipality of Anchorage
prosecutes violations of the municipal code and the state
prosecuts violations at the criminal code. And so I'm just curious if the
municipality Anchorage would now be empowered to prosecute state crimes and
maybe I am just wrong.
Chair Gray, we were actually we just recently signed an MOU with the city a few
weeks ago and and that will allow us to cross-designate and allow the City
attorneys, for example, to prosecute state felonies for retail theft. This is
John Skidmore will be a great trainer of theirs.
He will second-chair, I think, some of those cases,
help them get up to speed about bringing those
cases to the grand jury.
And so, yes, in fact, we're working on the paperwork
imminently.
to make sure they're crossed as daytime.
And you just teed up my next question,
which is we keep talking about retail theft.
I'm curious if you can talk about what other crimes
qualify as quality of life crimes that would be prosecuted.
Sure.
I mean, yeah, it's a great question.
So there's really two problems
to the quality-of-life initiative.
One is retail theft, and the other is really more sort of public disorder offenses and public spaces.
And there, it's even more challenging, as you know.
And, there we want to be a partner and, of course, multiplier for the city.
Because the City has done a lot of good work in the last six months to a year on this front.
and they've closed a lot of camps, cleared a
lot camps. They've also introduced new
municipal ordinances that are quality of
life ordinances.
They're currently, I think, proposing even
more, you know, these kinds of quality
of life and offenses. And what we have
offered to the city,
is that they could also cross-designate some of our prosecutors to assist them
and work hand-in-glove with them on some the right-of-way and camping prosecutions.
But we'll also be bringing other tools at the table as well, for example, on the civil side.
The city has asked us if we could use some our state civil authorities
with nuisances where we can seek abatement, specifically like hot zones for drugs, drug
houses and that sort of thing.
So we're going to be bringing all of that.
I'm glad you brought up drugs.
I know that APD is piloting some programs to divert people at the point of arrest treatment
so that they avoid the criminal justice system entirely.
And so I am curious if you guys are supportive of those efforts to, you know, we've got
4,400 folks in our DOC.
We have a very hypercapita incarceration rate.
One way of avoiding that is to not,
is like instead of arresting them,
taking them to treatment,
would you guys be supportive of APD
and their efforts to do that?
Chair Gray, thank you for the question and like I said on this important initiative we
really are trying to take an all of government approach and we want to think about all the
tools at our disposal.
So one of the very early things I discussed with John and with Angie, and I may bring Angia up here to fill in a little bit more of
the details, is whether we could establish a pre-trial diversion policy.
Because we are going to be, to your earlier point, we're going be using resources, existing resources to bring these kinds of cases.
But we also want to make sure that, you know, for first time offenders where they've got
a relatively clean criminal record, is there a way for us to put them into some kind of
diversion program where can do some community service, perhaps clean up some of these camps,
for example.
There are also treatment opportunities.
the private sector and with nonprofits to tackle this from a lot of different directions.
But I'm not, I wouldn't profess to be an expert in that particular pre-trial diversion
that you're talking about with APD.
My deputy might know a little bit more about that, but we're actually developing our own
pre trial diversion policy, which will have a quality of life component to it that is
Go ahead.
Okay, Chair Gray, if you have more questions on that, I have spoken with Chief Case at
APD and talked to him about his program and some of the things that he learned and I
think he's traveled at least the west coast to try and understand and how best to implement
this program.
So, we've definitely had conversations.
Our conversations have really been in line with what the Attorney General is describing
If their focus is the pre arrest, pre charge, posture, focusing on low risk offenders and
what we can do to get them services and get funneled out of the criminal justice system.
And from the state's perspective, where are there other gradations of tackling the problem?
So to use an example, if that doesn't work,
then we can take an all-government approach and focus our resources potentially on that person.
So if they're committing criminal trust passes in your neighborhoods repeatedly and it's not
seemingly need to work, then perhaps that's where Mr. Skidmore steps in and helps facilitate that
prosecution. So it really is trying to look at the criminal justice system, figure out where our
And I think that we're doing that and we are exploring that with our own diversion programs.
We have a diversion policy in place already, but finding ways to again maybe rethink about
the tools that you have, a little bit better, and how we can address some of the complexities
that both you and last year Representative Aisha had pointed out to me.
So it's not lost on me, I remember those conversations.
Thanks, I'm gonna go to representative Costello
I just want to say that we do have a big bill presentation that were gonna get to today
And so I want say we're gonna
Limit our time for five more minutes, and then we'll need to go represent a Francis bill. So representative costello
Thank you. I know in the previous administration and the Bronson administration there were we joined an amicus brief with the
Grants pass case, which was successful, And I am curious
how
how that's changed the ability for the municipality
to go after unlawful camping,
and what role you see that in terms of the efforts
with this new quality of life initiative.
I'll thank you through the chair,
Representative Costello, for question.
I will just say at a high level,
and then I'm turning it over to my deputy for more details,
I think that was an important case that came out of the US Supreme Court.
And as I mentioned to you last week,
I remember when I was at the U.S. Department of Justice in 2019,
and I spoke with the International Association of City Attorneys, I
municipal attorneys. This was an issue that that a lot of city attorneys were
facing and they wanted some kind of change and and the Ninth Circuit rules
that had been in place for for years established that basically there were
some eighth amendment problems with enforcing these kinds of camping
ordinances. The city alongside many other cities asked the U.S.
Supreme Court to revisit that, and the U.S. Supreme
Court reversed the Ninth Circuit in that case.
I believe it was because of that the city was actually able
to introduce some of these municipal ordinances,
and I, I believed it might have, you know,
unstuck something that now allows us and
to do good work on this front, but I wasn't in government when the decision came down
So I can't speak to specifics. I'm not even sure if my deputy will be able to speak the specifics about that
But that's my take
Well, I threw the chair representative Costello. I think I can in general
I could tell you I was prosecuting cases here locally and I and recall when that decision
I Can't tell the date, but I remember in General when the decision came out and it really
made things very challenging for a lot of our cities and
Was really frustrating for law enforcement and of course
business owners and communities
Because we sort of had to just tolerate these things and the issues that went along with them
And that really was the thing that, as I understand,
really has empowered local cities, Juneau as an example.
And then, of course, Anchorage to be able to more meaningfully tackle some
of these issues, but to represent a chair grace point doing it in a way that's balanced
and also respects the folks who are in those situations.
And really, I think that is what Chief Case's program is designed to get out.
various ways in which we try and tackle the criminal justice problem and how we address it.
Since we're here, I think the fear that some folks have is this is going to be a more stringent
criminalization of homelessness and without investing in treatment. We know that in DOC itself,
alcohol and substance abuse treatment, and I'm just curious, you know, in my district,
it's a lot of renters. Our rents have gone up substantially. A major reason why people
lose their apartment is they haven't paid their rent.
common reason for eviction. So I'm just curious, like, from your perspective, this is not about
criminalizing poverty. This is about locking people up because they were unable to pay their rent and
are now homeless. Chair Gray, our focus is on crime and when something is actually a crime.
repeat crime. And there are going to be instances where a crime has occurred, but ultimately there's
a mental health issue that prevents the state from being able to prosecute. We have to come up with
other solutions.
And that's why we have to bring sort of an all-of-government approach and think about
bringing in folks in the Department of Corrections, bringing
in, folks from the department of health.
This morning I was in touch with, I think, our point of contact there, who can help bring
sort- of a public health perspective and a
public housing perspective.
These are not easy issues, and I realize that.
The point is we want to help.
We want work in partnership with the city.
Part of the reason John Skidmore is the man for this
is that he brings a lot of experience to the table.
He brings lot relationships to that table
and can talk to city in terms of what we can bring
to this table from the state's perspective,
even if it's not necessarily criminal prosecution.
Would you support a statutory diversion program like other states have?
On this point, my own view is that
this should be a tool of prosecutorial discretion.
It's really a tools that the prosecutors should have at its disposal
and one of the reasons it should
it should be left at the prosecutor's discretion,
is because what I can do, department-wide,
is make sure that it's consistently applied.
Sometimes in other states, I might worry about
whether depending on which judge seats the issue
or which courts you're in front of,
there's an uneven application of pretrial diversion.
And so my preference would be to keep it on our side.
And that's why it was one of the first things
I remember talking to John about,
we announced it to our, at our DA's conference
in early October, that it would
be something that we'd be working on.
Thank you so much.
We're going to have to end it there.
I apologize that we didn't make it through all your slides.
We are very grateful to Deputy Attorney General Corey Mills, Deputy attorney general Angie
Kemp, and to Attorney general Stephen Cox.
Thanks for being here today.
Hopefully, we could have you back and finish up at a later date.
But we're gonna go at ease and we'll reconvene in about five minutes with Rep. Vance's bill.
back on the record.
Our second item of business is to bring House Bill 47
generated obscene child sex abuse material
for its first hearing in our committee.
At this time, I would invite the sponsor,
Representative Vance and her staffer, Isaiah Smardo,
to put themselves on record and begin your presentation.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee,
and representative Sarah Vance of House District 6,
and this is my legislative staffer Isaiah Smarto.
For the record, my name is Isaiah Smardo, and I'm the Legislative Staff for Representative Servants.
I want to thank you for the opportunity to hear House Bill 47, which addresses the critical issue of AI-generated child sexual abuse material, or what is now called CCM.
It addresses creation, possession, and distribution of harmful material created through advanced artificial intelligence technologies.
And I just want to let everyone know that this bill was developed in House Judiciary Committee a couple of years ago,
and was specifically some of the aspects of it,
the Miller test was brought forth by the current chair representative Gray.
because we saw the need of how quickly AI was moving.
And just in the year that this bill was last heard
in another committee until now,
we've all seen on social media how advanced AI technology is.
And my best friend sent me a cute little baby AI video.
We've seen them and she's like,
these look so realistic.
What all can they do with AI?
And, my response was everything.
They can do everything with AI and it looks incredibly realistic.
So the urgency for this piece of legislation has only increased exponentially.
AI-generated CCM poses serious risks to children by enabling perpetrators
to produce highly realistic virtual images of child abuse.
These images are often indistinguishable from real ones.
complicating identification by experts and overwhelming law enforcement's ability to
identify real victims.
Additionally, these realistic synthetic images create new avenues for predators to exploit
minors and their families through extortion and financial coercion, significantly escalating
harm and trauma.
You might wonder, why wasn't the soldier prosecuted?
And the answer is yes, he was.
And last year, right before this bill came forward,
there was a soldier up at J-Bear that used AI
to make new fake images of children he knew.
These realistic synthetic images are only
becoming more realistic as the advances in technology grow.
That soldier was prosecuted under federal law, not state law.
And currently, Alaska must rely on federal prosecutions due to our lack of a statute addressing this issue.
I also had some mothers in Homer contact me probably about a year and
a half ago now that their 13 year old daughters had been subject to the use of AI.
These were children. These are girls in my daughter's circle and they were moms saying
What can we do? They went to law enforcement and
Homework police department said Alaska statutes do not address AI generated use of images
And so this hit really close to home to me because we often think about this stuff is happening far from us
But it's not it happening to our very own children
The absence of state-level legislation specifically prohibiting AI-generated CCM creates significant enforcement challenges.
It blurs legal boundaries and overburdens law enforcement agencies hindering their ability to identify and rescue real-life victims.
A recent study by the Internet Watch Foundation has documented a concerning rise in AI generated CCMs.
The imagery involved is becoming increasingly severe, depicting more extreme and graphic forms of child abuse.
The video provided on the slide further illustrates the troubling trend.
This is a little girl between 7 to 10 years old, and it's a very realistic, extremely violent image.
It's...
the worst of the worse when it comes to child sexual abuse imagery.
The deeply disturbing image being described has been made with artificial intelligence.
In the last six months, the Internet Watch Foundation has found more web pages containing
child abuse, images and videos made of AI than in the previous 12 months.
The illegal content isn't just hidden on the dark web, 99% has
been found on sites easily accessible by the public.
It might be that somebody has used some software and typed in prompts and they've said,
I want to see a young girl, I wanna see her in this position doing these particular things.
And then the software will generate that image for you.
Alternatively, somebody could take an image that already exists of a child being sexually abused
and then using software, they can tweak that images to show the children in a different scenario.
It's up to these people to get that material removed.
You are really seeing what exists in the minds of the worst people out there
because they're now able to create what they are thinking of.
Incredibly highly realistic situations that I don't want to describe
because their really disturbing.
Really awful and would upset you if I were to go into much detail about them.
We're not able to view or broadcast any criminal imagery of children.
The image on Tamsen's screen has been heavily redacted to ensure nothing is viewed by me,
the crew or any members of the public.
For most people looking at these images, you wouldn't believe that they're
not real photographs because they are so realistic.
Although these image are fake, the victims are real.
These are some of the things charities hear from victims of this type of abuse.
The accounts are based on stories of real young people, but their words have been voiced by actors.
I'm so scared. I don't know what to do. Someone I met online has used some sort of deep fake AI thing
to make a porn video with my face on it. It looks so real.
I am worried what will happen if my friends find out.
They must have taken the pictures from my Instagram and edited them.
The pictures are really convincing. I'm so scared they'll send them to my parents.
Boys at school made fake videos of loads of the girls.
People think that they saw me naked and I have to see these boys every day.
Meta has just announced new measures to try and fight sixth-dortion on Instagram,
including a feature that automatically blurs nude images sent in direct messages.
The tech is so easy to use that school pupils are creating these images too.
In data shared exclusively with Channel 4 News,
6% of more than 3,000 teachers found that their students have used AI
to create sexually explicit images of their classmates.
Childline's a counselling service for under 18s and sees first-hand how this abusive material affects children.
The impact is the same for young persons, whether the images are created by themselves or an abuser has created them.
With AI, an abusive doesn't have to have a sexualised image of a child because they can create those images themselves.
or asking for money.
There's also evidence that some people looking at this material
can go on to commit abuse to children offline.
One psychologist who works with offenders
told me that people can become desensitized to it,
leading them to seek out real photographs
or physical interactions with children
to get the same level of sexual gratification.
While charities like the IWF and Childline deal with the consequences of this material,
they say it needs to be stopped at the source. The NSPCC told us,
developers who create AI software and social media sites where images are often shared
have objectively failed to put safeguards in place to prevent their products
from being exploited by offenders, and that the government must put child protection
A home office spokesperson said,
we're working closely with law enforcement partners,
the IWF, technology experts and other child protection charities,
to identify more perpetrators exploiting these new technologies
and bring them to justice.
This AI-generated material is only...
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the indulgence of the video.
I feel that the Video is able to capture and say that...
It's so much better than I could of talking about the breadth of of what perpetrators are doing
nationally momentum is building rapidly with
Now 47 states total that are enacting laws criminalizing AI generated or computer edited CCM
More than half of these states adopted such laws in 2024 alone
Many of these states' laws specifically criminalize imagery representing actual children,
but some lack provisions addressing wholly-thinsatic, yet obscene images.
For the detailed breakdown of state-level laws, we have an excellent resource that's been provided to the committee.
Additionally, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children reported approximately 4,700 incidents involving generative AI in 2023 alone.
In the first half of 2025, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children,
Cybertipline received 485,000 reports of AI-generated child sexual abuse material.
A huge jump compared to the 67, 000 reports for all in 2024.
Let me see that again.
The missing and exploited children's cyber tip line in 2025 as compared to 67,000 the prior year.
The year before that was 4,700.
We are seeing the AI use of child abuse exponentially climb in these crimes against our children,
and they are happening in Alaska.
House Bill 47 explicitly criminalizes the production, possession, and distribution of AI generated or computer edited CCM.
It addresses it in two important ways.
Number one, it prohibits artificially generated images depicting identifiable children by expanding existing CCAM statutes.
It prohibits wholly synthetic yet realistic images that meet established
obscenity criteria under the Miller test,
aligning the penalties with existing CCAM statutes.
And that you can find on page 4. Now the
the bill is rather lengthy. I do want to point out to the committee
that on Page 2
in section two is kind of the new material, the rest is mainly conforming language.
So please don't be intimidated by the number of pages in this bill,
but it is getting all the other statutes aligned with this.
And I do want to give credit to representative Chair Gray
for bringing up the Miller test under the obscenity laws.
because we had a very deep conversation in the prior judiciary committees about what is
protected under First Amendment rights. Pornography is protected as a First
Amendment freedom of speech. However, obscenity laws are not, and when it comes to abusing children,
We were able to take them, utilize the Miller test to put this in the obscenity laws to add a further protection without it bringing up constitutional concerns.
And I just want to highlight the brilliance of Representative Gray in doing that and the persistence in working on this issue.
This has been something that we have found we're both passionate about and wanting to protect our children.
And, I think it's about time that Alaska get up to speed.
Importantly, this bill includes necessary exemptions for internet service providers and telecommunications professionals,
allowing them to safely detect and report illegal materials without fear of legal repercussions.
By passing House Bill 47, Alaska will greatly strengthen protections for our children,
providing clear legal guidelines and empowering law enforcement to respond effectively to this rapidly involving threat.
In conclusion, House Bill 47 reinforces our commitment
to protecting children from exploitation,
ensures accountability for perpetrators
and positions Alaska at the forefront of addressing
the growing threat posed by AI-generated
child exploitation content.
And I just wanna thank you for prioritizing this bill
and bringing this forward.
I'm open to questions, but before we do that,
I will have my staffer go over the summary
of changes from the last committee.
Thank you
For the record my name is Isaiah Smardo, and I am a legislative staff for representative Saravans
So for section two amends paragraph B to provide a
Contractor of a technology company who while acting in the scope of employment
Accesses the prohibitive material solely to remove the material would not be held the criminal liable
section 4 adds a new paragraph to
to provide that an employee or contractor
of a technology company who, while acting
in the scope of employment,
access is the prohibited material
solely to remove the material
would not be held criminally liable.
And just in summary, this basically is just saying
that people acting in good faith to move
and remove and prohibit access to material
would be not prosecuted or held liable, thank you.
I'll start with a question that's mainly just to help refresh my memory because we last
worked on this issue a long time ago in house judiciary.
I recall that the easier crime to prosecute was when there was an identifiable child because
then there were a victim.
the other aspect of the bill,
which when it's not actually an identifiable child
and how that, how there's pushback on that
and we're able to get around it.
Thank you, Representative Gray.
Yes, it has been a minute since we discussed this.
And I will just let people know,
I'm sure there are some people saying,
well, why didn't you all pass it then?
Well, It was combined with a larger
A.I. bill that had two other components and kind of became a casualty.
And so that's why I introduced it just on its face value.
But if you look on page two, section two which is the new sections
that talks about the distribution of generated
obscene child section beast material, it covers some of this.
you have to be able to identify a child.
Well, the prosecutors really have
to work hard at finding that victim.
But under this bill, if there is someone
that there's an AI-generated likeness, they can use that.
And the scenario that we discussed in committee
was say that, there was a local soccer star in our neighborhood.
and someone created an AI image of her and said,
oh, well, this isn't anybody.
This is just a fake AI, you know, image
that they could say, no,
this is clearly this,
you now, soccer star named Susie or whatever.
And you're creating abusive material.
for that. This bill covers that that says that if there's a
likeness, it doesn't have to be an identifiable victim because
clearly, as the video states, there are victims, but it does
include both. Does that answer your question? Yes, thank you.
Are there any questions for coming? Representative Mina.
Thank you, Chair Gray.
Through the Chair, thank you Representative Vance for bringing this bill forward.
It's a really important topic and really should be updating our state statute on this area.
I was looking up other states that have passed similar AICM laws.
I saw that the California Attorney General sent a cease and
desist letter to XAI, which is the company that has the GROC AI that's on Twitter.
formerly known as Twitter X, is there anything in this bill that would lead to the state being
able to hold a company liable for creating AIC SAM or is it just about updating the current
statutes to holding an individual user liable? Through the Chair, Representative Mina, this
Just to back up a little bit on page four section five is where it defines identifiable child
But to your question, I do have another bill
That seeks to hold the the tech companies accountable for the images and the things that our children are getting
But this one is getting all of our current seastam statutes up to speed to include the AI generated images because they currently do not have that
if it does allow for a broader sweep to target companies,
I think that would be for the Department of Law to answer
and I'd think we're gonna have them here on Friday.
Thank you.
Any other questions from committee?
If not, is there invited testimony?
I believe we have Trevor Storrs
who has been waiting patiently online.
Thank you.
Mr. Stores, if you can take yourself off of Mute, put yourself on the record and make
it in your testimony.
Good afternoon for the records.
My name is Trevor Stores president, CEO of the Alaska Children's Trust.
The statewide lead organization focused on prevention and child abuse and neglect.
Thanks for that opportunity to test find strong support of House Bill 47.
Alaska has one of the highest per rate capital rates
of child sexual abuse, I should say, in the nation.
One in seven children will experience an allegation
of Child Sexual Abuse before their 12th birthday.
The U.S. Department of Health and Social Services reported
a 168% increase in reports with child sex abuse
from 09 to 19 in Alaska.
From 2013 to 15, we saw 13.7% of Alaska adults reported experiencing child sexual abuse,
and in 2020, 35% percent of the Alaska women reported
experiencing sexual abused when they were a child.
The National Center for Missing and Exported Children reported 67,000 AI-generated child
sexual-abuse material reports in all of 24.
and 485,000 in the first half of 2025.
That's the latest 625% increase.
HB 47 ensures a legal system keeps pace
with emerging threats by addressing a critical gap
in a lot of the law.
Advances in AI technology have made it possible
to create sexual images of children
that are indistinguishable from real children,
as you've seen in this video.
They're using real children as models.
Research on issues such as child sex abuse has profound lifelong impact.
The creation and the circulation of child sexual abuse material,
whether it involves real or systemic image,
normalizes exploitation, fuels demand, and perpetuates harm.
HB 47 helps interrupt that cycle.
This bill aligns Alaska with national and international legal landscape.
Research by Enough Abuse, a National Sexual Abuse Prevention Program shows that over 50 states have criminalized A.I. generated a computer-edited child sexual abuse material.
HB 47 appropriately expands Alaska's criminal statutes to ensure that individuals who create for that or get to mute this material can be held accountable.
And thank you for the opportunity to testify and happy to answer any questions.
Thank you, Mr. Storrs. Are there any
questions? Seeing no questions, thank
you so much. Is it okay to open public testimony?
I'm ready when you are. Okay. We will open
public-testimony.
Is there anyone in the room that would like to
testify on House Bill 47?
Seeing no one in the room, we will go online.
I will ask Colletta Walker to please take yourself off mute.
Identify yourself and begin your testimony.
and support HB 47 to protect the life of children.
Our children deserve protection,
not we pose for the predators.
And continuously throughout history,
it seems that the predictors just agree light.
And the children are kind of left out there
to the thin for themselves.
So I would like to see our state rise up to occasioning.
Be out there in the front. Take you at the strongest bill against these people. Thank you very much.
Thank You for your time.
Thank
You so much for you testimony. I will now call on Raymond Walker if you would take yourself off of mute.
Identify yourself and begin your testimony
Brendan Walker, thank you for that.
I'm sorry. You won't be able to testify.
Oh, thank you so much, Ms. Walker.
I understand.
All right.
Thank you.
I am seeing no one else online to testify.
We will close public testimony.
I would now like to set an amendment deadline for HB 47 for Thursday, January 29th.
26 at 5 p.m. Please work with my committee aid Dylan Hitchcock Lopez. If you have any
amendments that you would like to submit and we will be setting aside House Bill 47 to
bring it back up on Friday January 30th. I had planned on giving a preview of House
so I will
So from my three years of serving on this committee, I feel like there's been some big problems that have kind of
Dominated a lot of the different topics that we've had
We have a high rate of incarceration in Alaska a higher per capita rate
of keeping people in our
correction system. We have a very long wait time for getting a disposition. People are held pre-trial
sometimes for years at a time before going to trial and we know that we have very high rate of
substance abuse and
mental health challenges in the folks that, we, have in our
DOC system and so I think I really want to frame
are any hearings that we have outside of legislation this coming session on ways of addressing those
issues. We mentioned it with the Attorney General here talking about novel ways
of helping people avoid the criminal justice system altogether. Anchor's police department is
doing the pre-charged diversion like before someone's charged with a crime they're offered
We also have the Anchorage Fire Department taking medical providers into the field and
providing medically-assisted therapy to folks in the
field, which is completely new in novel, and hopefully giving them a little window of clarity
to make decisions like trying to get themselves into treatment.
And so I want us to support those novel efforts to try to keep people out of the criminal justice
We also know that our therapeutic courts, when people do participate in therapeutic
courts have very good outcomes. I've set it on the record in the past couple of years that
I'm just surprised that we're not maxing out the number of therapeutic court spots that
we have. And so I really want to take a hard look at what do we
have to do to remove barriers to people to participate
in these alternative court systems that have worked hard to establish.
something that's come up last year we had the record high number of deaths in
custody in at DOC and when you listen to DOC talk about it they talk
about having an older, sicker population, lots of folks who have a lot of health
problems because older folks have more health problems than younger folks. We
have something called geriatric parole in Alaska that we haven't used.
And so I did meet with DOC, there are some reasons why geriatric parole is not being used.
So geriatrics parole, if you're over the age of 60 and you've served a certain part of your sentence
and committed these qualifying crimes, then you could be paroled earlier.
And it's in the interest of the Alaskan public because the greatest expense of DOC is healthcare.
DOC has not able to build Medicaid.
anybody who's in DOC, DOC must take from their own budget to provide them with the
health care that they need. It is extraordinarily expensive. If somebody is at Goose Creek and they
need to see a specialist in Anchorage, a correctional officer must chaperone them.
It's an all-day orchestrated event to figure out how to do that. So anything that we can do
to find an alternative to having this older, sicker population behind bars, I think we should be
every federal study that you're going to look at will show that the older someone is the less likely
they are to recommit the crime. And so it's not going make the public less safe.
And I think we need to be talking about that. So we will. We will talk about parole in general.
We've just seen that people are not getting paroled this often.
I really want to understand more what is the barrier to allowing people to be parholed,
who qualify for it, and then we're going to continue to asking questions that we had
in this subcommittee today about when we have prosecutors and defenders who have way more
What do we do?
And I think Deputy Attorney General Kemp talked about it,
about a possible study, something to tell us in Alaska,
what is the optimal number of cases
that a prosecutor or a public defender can handle?
And what do need to do to get to that level?
Because how can we speed up the process
if people are overburdened and don't know the cases
that are in front of them?
I want to look at the racial disparities. I'm going to bring up OCS, OCA, and in O.C.S. custody
two-thirds of our foster kids are Alaska Native. We know that 40% of the D.O. C. population
roughly is Alaska native.
I... want... to understand more why those disparities are there and how we can better address it.
I think we talk a lot about the problems in OCS and the
problems and DOC. In general, we don't talk about our
juvenile justice system in the same way. I want to do a
deeper dive into juvenile Justice.
I did a meeting with McLaughlin, which is the DJJ
play. It's in my, it's a couple blocks from my house.
And I met with the principal.
It was the last thing I
did before I came to Anchorage.
It is interesting when I ask the question,
how many folks from this facility end up in DOC
when they're adults, and the answer was, I don't know.
And I want to look at those numbers,
I wanna talk about that,
and I wanted to really start wrapping our arms
around what I believe are related issues,
which is OCS, Department of General Justice,
and DOC.
We compartmentalize in this building. OCS is HES committee. Public defenders is
community and regional affairs.
Department of Juvenile Justice is his HIS committee
I don't want to step on other chairs toes, but I want
to have a more holistic view of what's happening.
We also need to talk about public guardians also a HES issue, but how many folks in DOC have guardians?
How short are we on public Guardians right now?
And how Many folks need public audience but aren't getting them because we're short
I mean my question here is are We so short that we are saying somebody doesn't need a public guardian?
So that We can avoid that disconnect. I just want to ask those questions
And then finally, I think when I look at all of it together,
I
think an overarching issue is poverty.
I
think
when you are born extremely impoverished in Alaska,
the chances of you ending up in the
in
the foster care system are higher.
The chances
of
you
ending
up
in
DOC are
higher
and I want to
prevent
are prone to trauma and pipeline them from OCS to DJJ
to our criminal justice system.
And I guess the last question I ask in this committee
that I wanna ask this session is how safe are the folks
that we have in our DOC system?
I have had concerns about assaults happening in DOC,
murders and suicides happening and DOC.
I want to know that
If someone is in prison and they are assaulted that they have a way of
reporting that assault that is going to make it to the people who can investigate it,
I want to know that those investigations are happening that
they're real and when people are murdered in custody or people commit suicide in
custody, I wanna know
that the investigations were legitimate.
I'm not saying that, they aren't. I love our DOC Commissioner.
Commissioner Cockrell and the troopers investigate these crimes in prison
But ask yourself if there's a crime in the community and there is a Crime in DOC
What's one are you gonna prioritize?
And I just think it's common sense you're gonna prioritise what's happened to the Community. I want to know that what we're doing
that we are doing right because at the end of the day being a
How do I
Being in DOC raises your risk of being a victim of crime.
It's kind of a counterintuitive notion,
but it is a risk factor in and of itself.
And I wanna make sure that we're doing right by them.
So those are the sorts of questions
I want to be asking this session.
So I've given you the preview.
And that concludes today's business before the committee.
Before we adjourn, here's a preview of our next meetings
on Wednesday.
We'll hear House Bill 24,
aggravating factors of sentencing
prohibit fees for paper documents by Representative Sadler.
And on Friday, we will hear an introduction
of House Bill 213 data sharing social security
by representative Jimmy,
and we'll have our second hearing on House bill 47
with Representative Vance.
The time is now 2.46 p.m.
and this hearing of house judiciary committee is adjourned.