California state law AB 48 limits police weapons for crowd control
Following violent police suppression of the summer 2020 George Floyd protests, California legislators enacted new state law AB 48, which limits the use of militarized equipment for crowd control. Enacted in 2021, the state law prohibits use of chemical agents and impact projectiles for crowd control except in extreme situations defined in the law, and only after law enforcement has taken several steps to address the situation without these militarized weapons.
AB 48 restricts the use tear gas, pepper spray, rubber bullets, and other “less lethal” weapons for crowd control, except “if the use is objectively reasonable to defend against a threat to life or serious bodily injury”. The weapons can only be lawfully "used only with the frequency, intensity, and in a manner that is proportional to the threat and objectively reasonable".
In these narrowly defined situations, law enforcement may only legally use these weapons after:
- Reasonable de-escalation efforts have been attempted and failed
- Announcing that "less lethal" weapons will be used, and doing so in appropriate languages
- Allowing an opportunity to leave the scene
- Identifying persons involved in violent acts, and who is not involved
Even when weapons are authorized and these steps are taken, the law includes outright prohibitions on:
- Targeting the head, neck, or vital organs with these weapons
- Using these weapons solely in response to a curfew violation, a verbal threat, or noncompliance with a directive from law enforcement
These protections do not extend to those detained in California jails or incarcerated in California prisons
While state law protects people in public from police deploying these militarized weapons into crowds, there is no state law that protects against this state violence in California's jails and prisons.
