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Committee declines to advance change making physical injury during a riot a felony; bill held for further work
Summary
The Senate Judiciary and Rules Committee declined to advance House Bill 125, which would have added physical injury as a basis to elevate riot to a felony, and instead held the bill for further refinement after law‑enforcement testimony and member concerns.
BOISE, Idaho — The Senate Judiciary and Rules Committee considered House Bill 125, a proposal to add "physical injury" as a qualifying element that would elevate riot to a felony, but a motion to send the bill to the fourteenth order for possible amendment failed and the bill was subsequently held in committee for further work.
Representative Jaren Crane, R‑Nampa, introduced the bill, saying current law (Title 18, Chapter 64) lists three subparts defining riot: (a) physical injury to a person; (b) damage or destruction to public or private property; and (c) disturbance of the peace. Crane said penalties already attach to disturbance of the peace and property destruction but "we do not...have any penalties assigned to physical injury of a person" within the riot statute and that concern was brought to him by the Nampa Police Department.
Sergeant Matthew Richardson of the Nampa Police Department told the committee that, in practice, officers use the riot statute in gang‑related group fights and other chaotic incidents where it is difficult or impossible to identify the single individual responsible for an injury. "When you have a lot of agitating...because it is such a melee, we're not able to identify who is the one that threw the punch," Richardson said, describing cases including a bar fight in which a woman suffered a traumatic brain injury and a multi‑person stabbing where property damage allowed a felony riot charge under current law.
Richardson asked the committee to add physical injury to the felony rubric so investigators could charge persons involved in large, chaotic violent incidents where identifying the specific attacker is not possible. He and other law‑enforcement witnesses discussed using hospital records and video evidence to document injuries.
Several senators expressed concern about the proposed change. Senator Wintrow and others asked whether the bill could sweep up peaceful protesters who happened to be present when a disturbance began. Members discussed substituting a narrower injury definition — for example, "traumatic injury" or "serious bodily harm" — language already used in other statutes to permit felony charges only where the injury crosses a more significant threshold. Senator Keiser urged caution, saying the probable‑cause standard for arrest could lead to overly broad application.
Representative Crane said he was open to an amending order to more precisely define the qualifying injury.
Senator Foreman moved to send House Bill 125 to the fourteenth order for possible amendment; the motion failed on a roll call. After debate, the chair announced the bill would be held in committee subject to call of the chair for further consideration.
The committee heard testimony from prosecutors and public safety officials that the current riot statute is sometimes the only tool available in complex group incidents; opponents and some members of the committee worried about subjectivity, potential overcharging and the collateral consequences of adding felony exposure for participants in large assemblies. No final statutory language was adopted during the hearing.
Votes at a glance: Motion to send House Bill 125 to the fourteenth order for possible amendment failed on roll call; the committee later held the bill in committee subject to call of the chair. (Transcript records the outcome but does not provide a complete, unambiguous roll call tally in the hearing record.)
