SPONSOR: Wallingford
COMMITTEE ACTION: Voted "Do Pass" by the Standing Committee on Public Safety by a vote of 7 to 0.
This bill specifies that nothing in Section 190.307, RSMo, will be deemed to abrogate any immunity that would exist in the absence of the section, including, but not limited to, sovereign immunity, official immunity, or the public duty doctrine.
PROPONENTS: Supporters say that this is a clean-up bill. It says that the language does not abdicate any civil or sovereign immunity under the section. There was a supreme court case in 2005 (Golden v Crawford) that said that the gross negligence statute was an exception to the immunity standard, but that left low-level deputies on the hook for things, and that is not fair. So this makes Chapter 190 consistent on this issue and it would be helpful to recruitment.
Testifying for the bill were Representative Wallingford; Arnie C. Dienoff; Frank Foster; Missouri 911 Directors Association; Missouri Chapter of the National Emergency Number Association; and Missouri Chapter of the Association of Public Safety Communications Officials.
OPPONENTS: There was no opposition voiced to the committee.
Written testimony has been submitted for this bill. The full written testimony can be found under Testimony on the bill page on the House website.
Statutes affected: