Assembly Bill (AB) was introduced in the California Assembly in May 2025. It was titled “Safer Communities Through Opportunities Act.”

To digress, anytime you read the word “safe” or “safer,” in a bill or proposition (Proposition 47 comes to mind) coming from the California Assembly or Senate, it is usually anything but “safe.”

The bill authorized the court to grant pretrial diversion for hundreds of felonies. So, felonies like: child abuse; corporal injury to child; assault likely to cause great bodily injury; false imprisonment; possession of a firearm by a felon; purchasing sex from a minor who is 16 or 17 years old; second degree burglary; looting; maintaining a drug house; possession of fentanyl, PCP, methamphetamine or heroin for sale; organized retail theft; and, many other felonies would qualify.

So, what does this bill do? If someone were let’s say charged with felony child abuse, this bill would allow a judge to grant that abuser diversion, he or she would be released from custody, he or she would get an out-of-custody program with no supervision, there would be no custodial punishment, no........

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