Brain Injury News

In California, Cohn Increases Penalty For Brain Injury

SACRAMENTO - The Assembly Public Safety Committee passed Assembly Bill (AB) 1789, authored by Assembly Member Rebecca Cohn (D-Campbell) that would give the perpetrator of a crime resulting in permanent brain injury an additional 5 years in prison.

Currently, if a person is convicted of inflicting great bodily injury on another person, the penalty is a felony with a prison term of four to six years in prison with an additional 5 for causing the victim to become paralyzed or comatose.  AB 1789 makes the additional enhancement a total of 10 years in state prison rather than the current 5 years.

Assembly Member Cohn told the Public Safety Committee, “Offenders should no longer be given leniency because victims have survived but yet are robbed of participating in routine activities of daily living such as feeding themselves, dressing themselves or simply taking themselves to the restroom.”

Cohn also told the committee, “The purpose of this bill is to raise the significance of the punishment if a victim becomes comatose or is no longer able to live a normal life.”

If you or anyone you know has experienced the results of brain injury or any other kind of medical malpractice , please contact our Maine lawyer. We are here to help you.

	Did You Know?
	Brain damage can be devastating. Brain damage is damage that results in impairments in one or more functions, including: arousal, attention, language, memory, reasoning, abstract thinking, judgment, problem-solving, sensory abilities, perceptual abilities, motor abilities, psychosocial behavior, information processing and speech.