By The Star Staff
Gov. Pedro Pierluisi Urrutia has signed into law Senate Bills (SB) 944 and 945, which would amend the Penal Code and the Department of Public Safety law, respectively, to allow prosecutions against those who cause commonwealth emergency agencies to be activated by providing information that turns out to be false.
The governor also signed measures that would broaden protections for victims of gender violence and bills related to health and municipalities.
SB 944 amends the Penal Code so that citizens are required to replace lost funds after causing the activation of law enforcement and emergency agencies by providing information that is false. Also, any person who has caused a general or particular emergency situation and, upon learning that the information was false, does not report it to the relevant authorities, will be held responsible for breaking the law.
SB 945 provides that whoever issues a warning or false alarm in times of emergency, knowing that it is false, and results in damage to the public treasury, third parties or property that exceeds $10,000, or when the conduct results in physical harm to a person, will incur a fixed prison sentence of three years. Additionally, the court may impose the penalty of restitution of funds.
To continue protecting victims of gender violence, the governor also enacted SB 740 to grant the judiciary the power to include in restraining orders a minimum circumferential distance point of 50 meters (164 feet) between the requesting party and the victimizing party.
As an additional effort to combat gender violence, the governor signed SB 786 to elevate to law the training given to public officials on the issue, covered by the law for the Prevention and Intervention with Domestic Violence and the executive orders issued to declare a state of emergency against gender violence.
On health issues, Pierluisi signed into law SB 546 to make technical amendments to the law to offer testing for the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) as part of the routine testing of every medical evaluation performed at least once every five years. The law mandated that health plans cover HIV screening tests and that health providers report test results to the Department of Health (DS by its Spanish initials).
Under the new law signed by Pierluisi, the DS is now allowed to adopt the necessary regulations to obtain results in consultation with the Office of the Insurance Commissioner (OCS) and the Health Insurance Administration (ASES).
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