Subcommittee amends Senate Bill 156 to narrow fentanyl-induced homicide language, sends bill forward

Chairman Jeff Johnson said the Criminal Law Subcommittee gave a favorable report on Senate Bill 156, as amended, after members approved a technical change by unanimous consent.

The bill would create a new felony offense for “fentanyl-induced homicide,” defined in the bill text as the unlawful delivery or dispensing of fentanyl or a fentanyl-related substance to another person who dies after injecting, absorbing, ingesting or otherwise taking the substance. The subcommittee amendment added an explicit cross-reference to the trafficking-in-fentanyl statute and clarified how prosecutors must prove the offense.

The clarification was offered and explained at the subcommittee meeting by Lisa Catalanado, executive director of the South Carolina Commission on Prosecution Coordination. Catalanado told the committee she provided proposed edits limited to subsection A of the statutory provision cited in the bill; those edits, she said, would require that the drug unlawfully provided actually contained fentanyl or a fentanyl-related substance and that the substance’s toxic effect either was the sole cause of death or contributed to the cause of death. Catalanado said the edits would also require proof that the person charged knew they were providing a controlled substance, but not that they knew it specifically contained fentanyl.

"These edits would accomplish the following: while limiting the cause of death to a fentanyl overdose, the proposed changes would make it easier to capture and convict street dealers by eliminating the burden to prove that the dealer knew that the substance contained fentanyl," Catalanado said.

Catalanado said the amended language would also capture deaths caused by medical emergencies related to fentanyl exposure, including asphyxiation, kidney failure or stroke, and that her office provided two alternative phrasings — one drawn more directly from the bill text and an alternate closer to case law (she cited State v. Burton and State v. Dantoneo) — for the committee's consideration.

Representative Robbie Robbins proposed a technical, housekeeping amendment to the statutory citation on line 24 to specify subsection (E)(9) of 44-53-370, the trafficking-in-fentanyl provision. "I think we need to make one housekeeping change," Robbins said, asking the committee to add the parenthetical reference. He moved for unanimous consent to make that change.

Chairman Jeff Johnson asked for unanimous consent to adopt the amendment. "All in favor say aye," Johnson said; the ayes carried and the amendment was adopted by unanimous consent. The committee then ordered a roll call. Johnson, Representative Bailey and Representative Robbins each cast a recorded aye, and the bill was reported favorably as amended to the full committee agenda for later that day.

The meeting record shows only one public sign-up and a single witness presentation; there were no recorded public objections or recorded votes in opposition during the subcommittee session. The committee did not adopt any other substantive changes to subsections B or C of the bill during the meeting.

Senate Bill 156 will appear on the full committee agenda this afternoon for further consideration.