Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions S644

STATEMENTS ON INTRODUCED BILLS AND JOINT RESOLUTIONS

By Mr. HATCH (for himself, Mrs. FEINSTEIN, Mr. DEWINE, Mrs. HUTCHISON, Mr. SESSIONS, and Mr. GRASSLEY):

S. 644. A bill to enhance national efforts to investigate, prosecute, and prevent crimes against children by increasing investigatory tools, criminal penalties, and resources and by extending existing laws; to the Committee on the Judiciary

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, today, I again rise in support of the Comprehensive Child Protection Act. I am proud to be standing with Senator HATCH as a co-sponsor of a bill that represents one of the most comprehensive pieces of legislation ever drafted to protect children. The miracle that Elizabeth Smart was found safe and sound, reminds us of how important this bill is.

As a former chairman of the Youth Violence Subcommittee and Ranking Republican on the Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs during the 107th Congress, I have been greatly concerned with the increase in reports of child abductions and murders, so I am glad to be a part of this effort to address this growing problem. In my tenure on the Judiciary Committee, I have long fought for our Nation's children, and have ardently supported laws that bring them and their families greater protection.
This legislation comes at a critical time because we are hearing more and more about children being taken from their homes or schools and abused, or worse, murdered. Our children are a gift to us, are our national treasure, and are our future. We must do all that we can to protect these innocents and give law enforcement every tool possible to ferret out the criminals who would do our children harm. With this legislation, we will be ensuring a greater measure of protection for our children. The miracle that Elizabeth Smart was found safe and sound, reminds us of how important this bill is.

The bill does many important things. First, it helps law enforcement respond immediately to incidents of child abduction, because, as we've seen with the Amber Alert system, time is critical in any abduction case to thwart further injury or harm. The bill creates a National Crimes Against Children Response Center at the FBI that will integrate the resources and expertise of all Federal, State and local law enforcement sources to provide a rapid response for crimes involving child victims. The bill also helps law enforcement by making it possible to get wire taps for suspected sex trafficking and exploitation offenses, and will require that all Federal child sex crimes offenders have their DNA added to the national DNA registry. So the bill will help to centralize information about criminals and crimes, and makes the job of the criminal investigator easier and more accurate through wiretaps and DNA evidence.

The bill also creates a website registry for convicted child sexual offenders so that parents, neighbors, and police know who in their communities is a convicted child predator. This website will supplement registries in all 50 States. This important tool will help families make better and fully informed decisions about their children's safety, and will greatly aid law enforcement's response to reports of child abductions and other offenses against children. The bill also gives new tools to prosecutors and the courts. It extends the statute of limitations for prosecuting child offenders, allows prosecutors to introduce evidence of past child sex crimes in sentencing hearings, removes the so-called "spousal privilege" so that a spouse can't stand silent in the prosecution of the other spouse for child sexual abuse, and increases the maximum sentences and probation periods for child sex offenders. These important tools will make our communities safer by helping to rid them of child predators, and by keeping a tight leash on predators when they get released from prison.

So this bill helps the public know about sexual predators in their communities, improves the nation's ability to respond to child abduction reports, and aids criminal investigators and prosecutors in their efforts to protect the public by identifying and locking-up child predators. I ask my fellow Senators to support this important bill.