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NEW LAWS FOR 2008
Beginning Dec. 1, drivers caught going more than 25 mph over the speed limit will no longer be able to plead guilty to having a faulty speedometer or have a judge issue a prayer for judgment to lessen the punishment. School bus drivers or anyone getting paid to drive children to school will face a $100 fine if caught talking on a cell phone while driving. Other new laws increase punishments for carrying a weapon when breaking a domestic violence order and punish those who intentionally starve an animal or damage a grave.
The following public law provisions were enacted during the legislative 2007 session with an effective date of December 1, 2007. Click the link to view the entire act.
S.L. 2007-14 (HB 42) Amend DV Laws/Homicide Reporting. An act to amend criminal procedure laws affecting domestic violence victims and to require domestic violence homicide reporting as recommended by the joint legislative committee on domestic violence. [See sections 1 & 3] S.L. 2007-80 (SB 34) Killing a police animal. An act to make it a Class H felony to willfully kill a law enforcement agency animal or assistance animal and to make it an aggravating circumstance for other criminal offenses that a law enforcement agency animal or assistance animal was seriously harmed or killed while the animal was engaged in performing official duties.
An act to increase the punishment for violating certain laws regulating Certified Public Accountants.
An act to clarify standards for code-enforcement officials.
An act to modify the law regarding the desecration of a grave, as recommended by the house study committee on abandoned cemeteries. S.L. 2007-134 (SB 125) Alcohol inhalers illegal. An act to add ethyl alcohol as a substance specifically named as a toxic vapor and to make illegal an instrument that can be used to vaporize or introduce ethyl alcohol into the body unless it is a device used to deliver a prescription medication or an approved over-the-counter medication.
An act to enact the North Carolina residential mortgage fraud act.
An act to allow earlier conditional restoration of a drivers license in certain circumstances, and to provide for the use of continuous alcohol monitoring systems to be used to monitor individuals who have been sentenced for DWI convictions or as necessary by the courts to ensure compliance with conditions of release, probation, or parole. [See sections 1-5 & 9]
An act to provide procedures and sanctions to address contempt by juveniles. S.L. 2007-172 (SB 17) Sex offenders/Pretrial release. An act to amend the pretrial release requirements for sex offenders.
An act to create a motor vehicle chop shop law regarding the receiving, possession, and distribution of stolen or altered motor vehicles and motor vehicle parts. S.L. 2007-180 (SB 1424) Allow Earthdog trials. An act to allow Earthdog trials.
An act to ensure district attorneys receive all necessary information from law enforcement agencies as recommended by the house interim study committee on capital punishment. S.L. 2007-188 (HB 554) Assault disabled person/institutional setting. An act to increase the criminal penalty for assault on a patient in a health care facility or resident of a residential care facility when the conduct evinces a pattern of behavior, is willful or culpably negligent, and causes bodily injury to the patient or resident.
An act to create a felony offense for persons who knowingly violate a domestic violence protective order while armed with a deadly weapon as recommended by the joint legislative committee on domestic violence.
An act to make it a criminal offense to make a false report concerning a threat of mass violence on educational property.
An act to increase the penalty for the malicious, intentional starvation of an animal and make other changes to the animal cruelty statute. [See sections 1 & 3]
An act to clarify the procedure for satellite-based monitoring of sex offenders and to make other changes to the sex offender laws. [See sections 2, 6-9, 9a & 15] S.L. 2007-260 (SB 1359) Red light exception for motorcycles. An act to allow the operator of a motorcycle to proceed through an intersection controlled by a traffic signal only if the traffic signal uses an inductive loop vehicle sensor that activates th traffic signal and the inductive loop fails to detect the motorcycle and activate the traffic signal.
An act to make it
unlawful to use a mobile telephone or additional
technology while operating a public or private school
bus, while operating a school activity bus, or while
transporting students for hire in any vehicle.
An act to allow persons
who are convicted of certain driving while license
revoked offenses to obtain a limited driving privilege.
An act to bring state law into compliance with the federal Violence Against Women Act of 2005. [see sections 1 & 3]
An act to strengthen the
law regulating the sale of certain metals by secondary
metals recyclers, to add wireless and cable
telecommunications equipment to the statute providing
penalties for the injury or destruction of wires, phone,
telegraph, and electrical fixtures, to increase the
criminal penalties for violations of those regulations
of the injury or destruction of wires, phone, telegraph,
and electrical fixtures, and to provide for forfeiture
of vehicles used in felonious theft of metals. An act to update and improve laws covering unauthorized insurers. [See sections 1-3 & 5-7]
S.L. 2007-323 (HB 1473) 2007 appropriations act. An act to make base budget appropriations for current operations of state departments, institutions, and agencies, and for other purposes. [See sections 30.11(c), (d) & (e)]
An act to make technical, clarifying, and other modifications to the current operations and capital improvements appropriations act of 2007. [See sections 9.1(a) & (d)] S.L. 2007-348 (HB 1111) Clarify state government ethics act.
An act to make clarifying
changes to the state government ethics act, the
legislative ethics act, and the lobbying laws. [See
sections 12, 13, 18 & 44]
An act to amend various
larceny statutes and to create the criminal offenses of
organized retail theft. An act to prohibit the fraudulent obtaining, selling, or soliciting of telephone records.
An act to increase the "safe zones" near child care centers and school grounds regarding illegal drug sales from three hundred feet to one thousand feet, and to expand the "safe zone" for public parks to include all public parks, not just those with playgrounds, and to increase the distance of those safe zones to one thousand feet.
An act to amend the law allowing improper equipment as a lesser included offense of speeding and to preclude a prayer for judgment continued as a disposition where a driver exceeds the posted speed limit by more than twenty-five miles per hour. S.L. 2007-382 (SB 924) School bus safety act correction. An act to change the element making passing a stopped school bus and striking a person a felony from requiring "serious bodily injury" and removing the requirement of signage being at least eight inches from the definition of school bus to correspond to the changes made to G.S. 20-217 in the 2005 session and requiring that school buses be painted yellow. [See section 1 & 4] S.L. 2007-391 (HB 1743) Election amendments. An act to clarify the perjury provision in campaign finance statutes; to provide civil penalties for deceptive late filing of campaign reports; to repeal the three-thousand-dollar presumption of a committee's major purpose; …. [See sections 1, 9, 16 & 17] S.L. 2007-403 (HB 118) Sex offenders/test for STDs. An act to provide that a person charged with a sex offense who is ordered to be tested for a sexually transmitted infection must be tested within forty-eight hours of the court order and to provide that HIV testing under these provisions will use the HIV-RNA detection test for determining HIV infection. S.L. 2007-404 (SB 1495) Vehicles used for towing to be marked.
An act to require that a
vehicle used to tow or transport another vehicle be
marked so that the owner may be identified and to add an
exemption from the seat belt law for drivers or
passengers of a residential garbage or recycling truck
while the truck is operating during collection rounds
and while traveling to and from garbage and recycling
material loading and unloading locations. An act to waive the requirement to obtain a concealed handgun permit to carry a concealed handgun for certain persons authorized by federal law to carry concealed handguns and for certain federal and state retired law enforcement officers, and to exempt armed armored car service guards and armed security guards while performing duties from prohibitions on carrying weapons on certain educational property. [see sections 1, 3-5 & 7]
An act to clarify the definition of public vehicular area in motor vehicle law and to require access to gated communities for emergency service vehicles.
An act to amend the plant protection and conservation act. S.L. 2007-463 (HB 1094) Increase penalties for audiovisual piracy. An act to modify the punishments for unlawful operation of an audiovisual recording device.
An act to make technical corrections to the motor vehicle laws pertaining to impaired driving offenses and to provide that the court may order secure custody of a juvenile when the juvenile is charged with a violation of either driving while impaired or underage drinking and to authorize the legislative research commission to study the dispositional alternatives for juveniles who are adjudicated delinquent for a driving while impaired or an underage drinking violation. [See sections 26-31 & 33] S.L. 2007-505 (SB 1364) Scrap vehicle purchase/parts-records. An act to require secondary purchasers of motor vehicles for scrap metal or salvage parts to maintain records, and to amend the junked motor vehicle law applicable to the city of Monroe. [See sections 1, 2 & 4] S.L. 2007-526 (SB 831) wireless telecommunications facilities. An act streamlining local government regulation of wireless facilities and wireless support structures and the collocation of wireless facilities. S.L. 2007-534 (HB 454) Identity theft. An act to protect the identity of individuals by authorizing the taking of a photograph of a person who is cited for a motor vehicle moving violation, who does not produce a valid drivers license upon the request of a law enforcement officer, and where the law enforcement officer has a reasonable suspicion regarding the true identity of the person, and to provide a cause of action for a person whose identifying information is published over objection. S.L. 2007-537 (HB 1277) drivers license revocation for ABC violation. An act to provide for the revocation of the drivers license of any person convicted of giving alcoholic beverages to, or aiding and abetting the purchase or possession of alcoholic beverages by, an underage person and to allow for a limited driving privilege.
An act providing protections for victims of human trafficking. |
