Committee approves amendment creating graduated penalties for deliberate custody noncompliance and false reports

The Senate Judiciary Committee adopted an amendment and voted to advance Senate Bill 2186, a bill that creates criminal penalties for willful, repeated refusal to comply with a court-ordered custody or visitation schedule and for knowingly making false reports alleging harm to a child.

Senator Lueck, sponsor of the amended measure, said the amendment was drafted with advice from a family-law attorney and aims to provide law enforcement and courts a calibrated enforcement tool for situations where a parent repeatedly withholds a child in violation of a court order. The amendment imposes an infraction for the first two offenses, raises the penalty to a misdemeanor for subsequent offenses, and preserves felony treatment where the child is taken out of state in violation of court orders (the out-of-state provision was left unchanged).

Committee members debated evidentiary and enforcement challenges. Senator Ron Bergren said subsection 3 — covering knowingly false reports of child harm — raises concerns because such cases often are contested and can be "he said/she said" matters; others said the amendment includes language requiring the individual to know the information reported was false. Senator Clay supported the amendment, noting it gives guidance to courts while avoiding immediate incarceration for first-time incidents.

The committee approved the amendment by voice vote, then voted to recommend the amended bill do pass.