02/02/2026 Senate Subcommittee on Judiciary

After this. So we'll go ahead and call this meeting to order. Senator Bearden, would you please open us up in prayer? What number are you?

Number 11.

Number 11. Alright.

Lord, I ask you that you just keep us safe today as we go into this late hour hour and for those that's leaving home, keep them safe on their travels. Let us do the right things for the citizens of this state, and also never let us forget the reason why the lord was sent here to this world was to forgive this world and not to condemn it. In Christ's name, I pray. Amen.

Amen. Alright. So this will be a first meeting of the senate judiciary subcommittee. We have two items on the agenda today, senate bill three ninety eight and senate bill four zero five. For those that are here, just to give you a brief rundown of what we're gonna do, we won't take action on either bill today.

We'll hear testimony. I see senator Sitzler's here, so I'm gonna go ahead and let you go first, present the bill. We'll hear testimony. And then based on the testimony, if we wanna do, if you wanna do a substitute or we may just go ahead and get a favorable rep rep, excuse me, recommendation to the full committee. But you wanna go ahead and come up and do senate bill four zero five?

Mister chairman, members of the subcommittee, appreciate your time very much. I bring before you today senate bill four zero five, a bill that does a very simple thing. It raises the maximum threshold for a case in magistrate court from $15,000 to $55.00 dollars. The existing threshold that was put in place in the 1998 session twenty eight years ago. The threshold before had been 5,000.

The threshold then became 15,000. The thinking here being, you know, when the threshold jumped last time, you don't you don't just move it a little bit. You you make a big jump in it. And the thinking all along is really when we think about, civil justice, and there was a lot of talk last session about tort reform, and how do we, you know, provide access to justice for people. One thing I'm very important to me, mister chairman and members of committee, is the idea of what I call small justice.

Not these big nuclear verdicts, not on these massive questions, but on the cases of regular citizens that have a dispute amongst each other. Being able to bring a case in small claims court with simplified process, no requirement to have attorney represent you. You're not tripped up by procedural missteps as you could in a state court. It's a much more streamlined process, but it does allow it's a fact based more fact focused system where judges can make fact based determinations. The thinking here is $50,000 is the cost of the average automobile now.

This is not relating to automobile accidents, but an automobile scale claim. You think about property people own. If something's a car in value or less, that in my mind is kinda what you think about in a small claims court. If it's larger than that, lowering up to to you take on a case is probably the reality. My thinking here, mister chairman, is in the in the realities of our current system.

If a citizen has to engage counsel, has to hire an attorney for 10 or $12,000 to defend a claim that's a 35 or 40 or $45,000 claim, you know, it's just a it's it's overwhelming for citizens. They can't produce the retainer to hire an attorney to get them into state court to be able to file a claim. And I think in in my mind, there are obviously procedural ways. If there's discovery and those kind of things involved, they can certainly move straight to state court. But for for for simple fact specific cases, it's my belief that we should not set a threshold lower than $50,000 because in many cases, claims are very simple, and we shouldn't set an artificially low threshold.

And I believe fifties, even though it's a the same scale jump we saw in '20 in in 1999, we went from 5,000 to 15,000. It's a three x jump. That's about what we're doing here, but it's consistent about with the price of the average automobile, mister chairman. Glad to take questions.

Alright. Does anyone have any questions for the author? We got one. Senator Bearden.

Appreciate you bringing this forward. Any idea how this would affect our magistrate courts? I mean, caseload, because when you usually go in now, it's pretty crowded.

Caseload's gonna increase. I mean, it's certainly if you're if you're making a change like this to to the threshold, I think the question is, where do we put our resources and where our resources most effectively employed? In my in my view, the ability to take advantage of the efficiencies of magistrate court, the ability to get citizens to be able to get to a ruling in a more streamlined way, the justice value again, I use the term small justice warrants that. You know, more resources in the overall judicial pie will flow to matric courts versus state courts in as much as the caseload's gonna move that way. But I think it's a it's a more efficient delivery system, and it's certainly more efficient for the citizens who are who are involved in disputes.

One more question, chairman. It may be a a different committee, but if the minimum liability policy has not increased 25,000, do

you think we should bump that up

to 50,000 as well to

Well, I I saw the I saw the remarks. I I reject the premise that the automobile insurance threshold is somehow tied to this bill. That might have been incidental. It might someone might be making that argument. I don't think the two were linked.

That certainly was not part of my calculation. I will tell you personally, although this is not this bill, if the average automobile is $50,000, I'm not gonna enter I'm not gonna try to wait into that swamp in this bill. I think if you look at the those numbers over time, perhaps we're not exactly where we're gonna be there. But for the purposes of simplified dispute resolution, I think it's just principally wrong for a transaction cost of both sides possibly having to engage counsel. Not that you can't be pro se in state court, but it's just it's a it's a different level game.

I just think the transaction cost for our citizens of having to engage counsel to get into court to fight out a 35 or $45,000 case, if it's very simple in the facts, is just it's really to talk about a tax on our citizens, that's that that's really the cost I'm most concerned about. Appreciate it. And

I have a question, and this is more for those who are watching. Decision for magistrate court is immediately appealable to a superior court. Is that correct?

Correct.

Alright. Any other questions? If not, we have one person

think we sent each of you a statement of our position. It should be in your packet. We don't necessarily oppose the bill in looking for an increase, but I think most of our judges are a little flummoxed as to what you might call a small claim. So, senator Sessler sets it at $50,000 or the price of a new car. When I bought my first house in Cobb County in '79, it was $50,000.

That was not a small claim. I bought a car about eight months ago, a new car. It was $50,000. To me, that's not a small claim. And I was talking to him.

You know, I went I went to Furman University. I was looking at tuition. Their one half year tuition there at Furman is $42,000. That's not small amount. So, you know, I think what we were looking at is probably a way to come up with a rational and practical way to figure out what a small claim might be because this is the people's court.

The the the Civil Procedure Act isn't really followed in these particular courts. People can come up with a document and show it to the judge. So we felt like maybe the, limits of an automobile insurance policy, which is now $25,000, might be a good premise, to base it on. Let me add to that. Of the 520 magistrate court judges, the ones in metro areas are probably lawyers.

But for the vast majority of magistrate court judges, they are not lawyer judges. Many of the counties have a person who owns the flower shop. They may be the parts manager at an auto dealership or own a pizza restaurant. Those are the people now that you wanna put over these types of cases that have dispositions of $50,000. That's a significant impact on on people and families now.

In 2024, which is the last, number I have, recent number, in state court statewide, there were 600 appeals filed by from magistrate court to state court. To answer your question, senator Hatchett, the state court can also receive appeals from the magistrate court.

And could you repeat that number again, the number of appeals that were received?

Statewide, 600.

600?

Okay. If you treble if you treble that limit now to $50,000, I don't think it takes a rocket scientist to figure out you're gonna have a whole lot more appeals coming from the magistrate court to the to the state courts and the superior courts. But, anyway, we we thought that, we we understand it's probably time for change. But for small claims, we felt like a good basis would be the $25,000.

Okay. You have a couple questions. Chairman Watson.

Thank you, mister chairman. You said how many appeals went to superior court or state court?

They were 600 went to state court.

600 out of how many?

I have no idea. I have no idea how many people don't appeal their cases. It's just that these are the ones that

we're working with. Like a really small number.

Well, it I don't know I don't know how many appeal. I don't know how many go. Okay. And we just started tracking those numbers, and it has increased each year. So it's 600 now.

So relatively insignificant number. Yeah.

But when you get to 15,000

So you're telling me 15,000 up to 15,000, so not many are appealed. So all the other everything now 15,000 above is going to state or superior court then.

Anything above 15,000?

Is that right? I mean

It's anything below

Their advice says yes. Okay. Yeah. Alright.

Alright. Thank you, chairman Watson. Chairman Tillery.

Thank you, chairman Hatchett.

Honored to

be here first here. Bob, thanks for the comment. I just wanna play devil's little bit with you a little bit. Do you think also though that the there will there are cases now that have to go to state and superior court that possibly could get resolved now, a magistrate court. Just playing devil's advocate with the numbers a little bit.

What would you concede that point to me maybe?

Well, sure. I mean, that's always a possibility. I mean, you could set it at a 100,000, and that's gonna be the same fact.

Right.

Right? But if it's the people's court and it's supposed to provide access for small claims, where people can introduce a document to the judge and the judge could just look at it, which doesn't happen in the other courts. I also we got jury trials

too. I'm telling you, I've had some interesting times in my court. That's, very interesting times that that would,

would I bet.

Just be interesting. And it's probably gonna be a long time till we do it again. And based on that, I'm wondering without some automatic escalator, which I don't know that we could think of, just sort of leaning that way. But please know that that's nothing against the magistrate court counsel. Your your testimony at all, I mean, you're you are very well regarded in this building.

Well, thank you

very much. Appreciate that. Thank you, sir. Thank you.

Is it center parent?

Yeah. Okay. Thank you, Bob. So I part of me agrees with, senator Tillery's point that we rarely raise it. And in thinking this through where I currently am is I would like the number to be as high as it could possibly be without compromising, the efficiency and the ability for individuals to kind of handle it on their own with limited resources, and that means there can't be too much paperwork.

It just it can't get too complex. And I don't really know what that number is, and it seems like we're not trying to really figure it out. Do we have anyone? Could you or do we have anyone who could fill me in a little bit more about obviously, it's imperfect, but where is that right now where we have to make the judgment call? I, you know, I understand.

But

You bring up a good

Where is

that level right now

in today's dollars?

Typically, what happens is the council of magistrate court judges or if if it was us, the council of secret, would bring this change this legislative change request to the judicial council legislative committee, and then it would get discussed by all the classes of court. And it could get into some of those deep details of what might that number be or what would a good cutoff number be. But because this was introduced without the it's not coming from the council of magistrate court judges, it never got that process. So, that was one of the things we put in our statement was typically, this this you would think this might go before the judicial council, that the judicial branch examine it and get that information, which would be free to you, and then you can make those decisions of how to change that jurisdiction if you needed to. Does that answer your question?

Sort of. Yes. Yes. I mean, certainly as well as you could. Have has input been delivered by the magistrate court judges who most regularly hear these?

Not no. They they we got a letter, from their president this morning that they're taking a a neutral position on this particular bill.

Okay. Thank you. K.

Alright. You have no further questions. Thank you.

Thank you all very much.

Yeah. Senator Sessler, like I said at the beginning, we're not gonna actually take action on this bill today. I've spoken with, chairman Strickland, and what we'll do is we'll make a recommendation to his full committee. K. But wanted to give you the opportunity if you wanted to address any of the issues that were brought up previously, or

you can

just sit down either way.

Appreciate it, mister chairman. Just, I guess, in summary, the crux of this is access to justice. I've got constituent after constituent after constituent that has a small claim issue. They can't scrub together $5,000 to get in the to get an attorney to help them do things. And that's kinda that's kinda your minimum level retainer to get an attorney.

And it's probably gonna be 10 or $12,000 if it has any any real dispute to it. I just that's the reality of of acts of legal counsel today. I think there's when you look at the scale of cases, if someone comes in and trashes a rental house of yours and you're trying to make it make a just kinda work that out, that could easily be a 25 or $30,000 claim depending on what happens. You know, this is not a car insurance thing. When you think about what what what is the what is the value of the property that normal people walking around working class people deal with every day?

Unfortunately, it's a $50,000 car. And my thinking was, what is it what's what's a car value in less? And if if the judge feels like there's a need to go deeper because a document he or she are looking at doesn't feel right. There's there's another process to kick that up to. I just feel like there's enough cases that are fact specific enough that when we set a threshold that it can never go above a certain threshold, this is like the statutory maximum.

I feel like that ought to be set a little bit higher than probably where it's gonna be needed every day. So it was a matter of course. We're talking 25 to 35 to 40,000 other cases. Statutory max at 50. And as senator Tillery said, you know, it was we went from five to 15 laps.

We tripled it last time. My thinking was that's about what this does. It it's no more than that, but it really gets back to that issue of at what point should you have to come up with thousands of dollars to represent yourself? And most folks can't do that today. And in magistrate court, if you were right on an issue, you can win on the merits.

I don't think we should keep you from court if someone does something that's 35 or $40,000 in scale.

That's it. Thank you. Alright. Well, we'll report to senator Strickland, and he'll call you for the full for the full committee, for a further hearing. But thank you for bringing this bill to us.

Thank

you, mister chairman. Members of the committee.

Alright. So the next item on the agenda is senate bill three ninety eight, which is a bill that I'm carrying. Senator Tillery, would you mind taking over while I go present? Now you have your chance.

Alright. Senator Hatchett, if you

don't mind just telling me the LC number so I can make sure we're all on the same page.

So we have, LC four excuse me, 492505.

And do you have any committee substitutes or anything that you're gonna be bringing here today?

I do not. K.

Any other amendments?

Not yet. Okay.

Go ahead.

Well, we

got a time limit on you. Just five minutes. Five minutes. But go ahead. And if you see me reach for my phone, that's why.

Gotcha. Well, thank you, to the members of the committee for hearing this today. Ten years ago, five years ago, this probably this type of bill would be thought of as something in science fiction. Unfortunately, it's something that we are seeing every single day across the country, across the state. As a father of four daughters, what this aims to prevent, is is something that's somewhat of a nightmare.

Right now, there are apps that use artificial intelligence that can take a photograph of anyone and undress them and make them do pretty much whatever you can imagine. To me, it's a huge invasion of privacy. It is being used to bully, And I don't think there's any place for not this technology, but this use of this technology in our society. I understand artificial intelligence is is coming. And, you know, there's a lot of really good things that can come out of artificial intelligence, but there's also a lot of bad.

And, you know, our criminal code wasn't necessarily written to keep up with the pace of technology. And so what this bill aims to do is essentially make it a criminal offense to use a photograph of someone without their consent, put it into an artificial intelligence type platform or app or drop this bill, I have been approached by several groups. And, honestly, I'm very encouraged, from, you know, the spectrum of people that are interested in this piece of legislation, and we've had some very good conversations. So, for those that are here to testify, for or against, I don't think there's anyone that's necessarily against the policy, which is what I'm focused on. But the bill as drafted is a little bit too broad.

Some examples that have been brought up to me right now, if it was senator Tillery's birthday party and I made a AI image of him for a birthday invitation, technically, that would be a misdemeanor because he would know it's a surprise birthday party. So in these conversations, what I've what I am planning on doing is if you have a copy of the bill, essentially, section b, which which starts at line 39, I'll strike that from line 39 to 45. Section d, which starts at line 55, I'll strike provisions that have to deal with just general use of the AI images, and we'll focus more on the sexually explicit, the I'm gonna call it what it is, child pornography, pornography in general of individuals, because that's that's really the core policy that I want. And I know there there's gonna be some more cleanup. So, when we hear testimony today, I just wanna go and put that out there that I am gonna remove those sections.

And then hopefully, through the testimony today and working with the interested groups, can come up with a substitute that'll accomplish really the policy, which is you shouldn't have to be afraid to post an image of yourself online. You shouldn't be afraid to have a picture of yourself in a yearbook and have that photograph used in the ways that people are using them now. And there needs to be some protections in the law, and I think they need to be harsh punishments. I do I do think it needs to be a felony, especially when it comes to a child. I think it's a huge violation of privacy, and, I look forward to working with the members of the committee and the members in the audience, that have an interest in this.

I'm happy to yield to any questions.

You do have a couple of questions. Senator Parent.

Senator Jones. Jones.

Thank you so much, and I appreciate you bringing this legislation because I actually think this is what we ought to be doing our time with because technology is getting beyond our criminal justice system, quite frankly. But I do have a question. I like the fact that you're gonna strike those two lines, but I still have a question on page three, the lines 46 to 51, I think. Because it seems like there we are talking about it seem material but two things. Number one is still is adult.

But then number two, it also seems like we just we're talking about possession only. So is there a difference now? Because the the law, of course, would allow you to possess it. But there are and initially be for anybody who's also gonna testify. I do see a little bit of a difference because normally if you're possession obscene material, the other person maybe is consented to be in that obscene kinda situation possibly.

This would not be that kinda consent, so that's a little bit different. But how do you kinda rectify the fact that under current law, you can possess obscene material of adult, but you can't distribute it. This looks like possession only.

Yeah. So the policy and I'm glad you brought this up and would like to work with you on this. I guess the policy here is the the creation. Obviously, if you're gonna put this into an app and create it, I wanna punish that person pretty heavily. Now if you if you're that person and you share it and then someone else possesses it, I think the penalties between an adult and a minor need to be different.

But, you know, really the creation or telling artificial intelligence to create it is the harsh penalty that I that I'm aiming to achieve. And then the possession would be a a lesser offense, which is not, represented in this piece of legislation yet, but will hopefully be in the substitute after we work those out.

So your intent on this would be if you create it without any distribution, that would still be a a crime.

Correct. Okay. Because I I just understand that. From a policy perspective, I think that's a huge invasion of privacy to take someone's photo and undress them. I think there's a there's a level of privacy that we need in our society and that crosses the line.

Alright. Thank you. You have no other questions from the committee? Yep. I'm sorry.

Senator Parent.

Thank you, chairman Tillery. Thank you so much, senator Hatcher. Okay. So the this contemplates, just making sure I'm correct about this, that it's all, real people

Correct.

Who okay. And can you just, speak a little bit about the elimination of the fine for immediate family members?

Which which time was that?

Well, 50 it's it's in here several times. Each time was a felony. I think you had a yes. Like line 84. Yeah.

And it's on 54, but I think that maybe

That's one of the ones who struck.

80 Yeah.

Right. I thought that one got struck, but the other one, I don't believe did, 84.

Yeah. I think I mean and I may have to lean on ledge council for this one because that was actually something that was that we we discussed. And I'm does it have something to do with the family purpose doctrine in civil suits or or or just monetary fines from a family perspective?

Or I

think I think the idea was that it would be an indirect, penalty on the victim. If if the victim's family member had to pay that penalty, that would just indirectly negatively impact the victim.

Can I follow-up on that and ask, a spouse is an immediate family member? Right?

Yes.

What what if we were in a situation, because I could see it happening, where there was an estranged couple? It might even be more likely that there might be a scenario with sort of

Right.

Obscene images within a strange couple. So that's kind of what was going through my head.

Well, I think the policy there would be if you are an estranged couple and you were to create this without the consent of your estranged spouse, in my opinion, civil penalties should still apply. But as far as the the fine itself, I mean, if you're still married technically, like Michael was saying, it would could negatively impact.

Yeah. And you I mean, I get that we can't think of every scenario, but that one seemed kind of obvious. So just wanna raise it. Thank you.

No more questions from the committee. Is there anything else you'd like to add before we call witnesses?

That's it. It.

Have a couple of witnesses who have signed up. Thank you, chairman Hatchett. Kendrick Holder from the ACLU of Georgia.

Good afternoon, chairman, members of the committee. My name is Kendrick Holder. I am a legislative fellow with the ACLU of Georgia, an organization that enhances and defends the first amendment right of all Georgians. And I'm here to testify in opposition of Senate Bill three ninety eight. SB three ninety eight does two very different things, and it's critical to separate them.

First, the bill targets nonconsensual, sexually explicit AI generated images. And let me be very clear. The harms caused by the images are real, very serious, and are growing across The United States. At the same time, we do have concerns about subsection b of this bill, pages one and two, lines 39 through 45, and subsection d of this bill, lines 55 through 64, that would criminalize the production and possession of non obscene images even when there is no distribution or proof of harm. Under this overly broad language, a person could face criminal penalties simply for generating an image, including satire, political commentary, artistic expression, parody, and other content that's, protected by the first amendment.

This approach is far more expansive than other states' deep fake laws, such as Louisiana, Iowa, and South Dakota, which are limited to sexually explicit content alone. We've seen in other states what happens when legislators adopt overly broad approaches to regulating deep fakes. In Arizona, for example, the governor vetoed a similar bill over concerns, that it would criminalize protected speech. Any solution must be narrowly tailored to the harm at issue, and SB three ninety eight fails that test. As written, this bill is overly broad and risks criminalizing protected speech.

For those reasons, we urge the committee to reject the bill as written. Thank you for your time, and I yield for questions.

Any questions for the committee? I have one.

Yes, sir.

Clearly, the ACLU would not support deep fake child porn. No, sir. So where do you draw your line? What what rule would you suggest to us?

So the amended language that we have written would make it very specific to obscene images, to create the, narrowly tailored, solution that we're looking for.

Do you have that language?

Yes, sir. We do. Okay. And we do have one pagers as well, that covers the issue areas along with the talking points. I believe that was sent out.

Do you have that already, Chairman Hatchett?

If not, we can.

They're one lang okay. Gotcha. Mister chairman, look Don't think we have that.

Admitted yet.

Yeah. Gotcha. I've got your one pager. I just didn't see what language you suggested. Right.

Yep. Thank you. You senator Parent, do you have a question?

I do. K. But only if you're done.

That's true. Yes, ma'am. That's all.

Thank you so much. Looking at your your, one pager on thank you for being here and for your testimony, it seems that some of the initial, amendments proposed by the author would address a a big chunk of the concerns, obviously, by focusing more on sexually explicit and pornographic, pictures. But, is it the case that distribution and proof of harm that you believe that those also need to be requirements to the extent that they are not for criminal liability in in the proposal?

So we do believe that the image creation in itself is a crime

Okay.

And that the language regarding the distribution or proof should be tailored specifically, to that fence.

Yeah. We got we got a little confused. So if the, if the if the creation is a is a crime, then then there wouldn't be necessarily the distribution. Half. Right?

So I would seek some clarity around, you know, the the con in terms of the constitutionality that that your organization is speaking to and or best practices from other states, whatever whatever you'd like to offer to the committee, in your talking points here about distribution and proof of harm for criminal liability. Just curious about the sort of specifics of that input.

Yeah. Thank you.

I think what senator parents telling you is you're gonna get into the old law school debate of defining obscenity. Right. I think Chairman Hatchett has made a really good attempt at that. So I look forward to hearing what ways you can make that be more narrowly tailored.

Yes, sir.

There's no more questions for you. Thank you for being here, mister Horner.

Thank you all.

I think it's, miss James from Georgia now.

Thank you all so much for having me, and it's good to see you all here. Especially good to see my senators, senator Bill Den. I live in your district. Hint. Hint.

You're my senator in my district, District 30. But thank you all so much for bringing this bill. I'm kind of in the middle. Again, I'm Triana Arnold James. I'm the president of Georgia National Organization for Women.

And, I just wanna share with you, as someone who travels often and stay in hotel, virtual peeping is the part that I got from the bill, feels wrong because it ignores the realities of life on the road. When you're constantly moving, hotel WiFi, shared networks, and unfamiliar devices already create privacy risk. Adding a virtual, people on top of that invites unnecessary exposure of personal person personal data, conversation, and behavior in spaces that are supposed to be private. People take work calls, pray, change clothes, decompress, and rest in those spaces. The idea that someone could virtually peep into that space whether through monitoring software, data tracking, or digital surveillance crosses a line.

Convenience should never come at a cost of dignity and consent. For frequent travelers, trust and security matters. Virtual PP undermines both by normalizing intrusion instead of respecting those boundaries. Privacy should travel with you no matter where you are. So I said I'm kinda in the middle, so I'm waiting to hear a little bit more information.

S b three ninety eight, so I'm for it and against, you know, I'm in the middle.

You fit in well in our senate sometimes.

Oh, I wanna see more. So s v three ninety eight broad definition may put everyday users and creators at risk of prosecution for actions that were never meant to harm anyone ultimately chilling techno technological development and creative expression without creating clear standards that distinguishing harmful conduct, refine the bill to ensure protection privacy without undermining innovations and free speech. Strong protections against virtual peeping are both necessary and overdue. Criminalizing this conduct is appropriate, response to clear violation of privacy and personal dignity. Individuals who use technology to secretly observe, record, or simulate intimate images such as AI of others without consent or engaging in harmful behavior that deserves, serious legal consequences.

However, hint hint, s b three ninety eight should be carefully carefully tailored to ensure that it targets the bad actors specifically rather than casting such a wide net that it it captures lawful, non exploitive uses of digital tools such as, like, if you wanna create a birthday card, if you wanna put your, you know, your significant other on the birthday card and doing a happy dance or something like that, that should be innocent. But this bill can't cast a wide net. So, however, it should be carefully tailored to ensure that it targets the bad actors specifically rather than casting such a wide net that it captures lawful, non exploitive uses of digital tools by clearly distinguishing intentional invasive misconduct from legitimate, creative, educational, or technological, activities. Lawmakers can hold offenders accountable while preserving constitutional protection, and avoiding unintended consequences for innocent users. Thank you so much for having me.

Any questions for, miss James? Thank you.

Thank you so much.

And I'll be Cindy battles from the people's agenda.

Good afternoon. We're in afternoon. Right? Awesome. Fantastic.

First of all, my name is Cindy Battles. I am the policy director with the People's Agenda. I would like to thank leader Hatchett for the work that we have often done together on legislation and the fact that he was willing to meet with us and the fact that you've already mentioned that you'll be removing subsection b and d. You'll love to know that that cuts out about three fourths of my testimony. You're welcome.

I do still wanna talk a little bit about the fact that, we are, creating a felony when a 16 year old uses AI, to to create an obscene image. And I am not going to sit here and say that the people's agenda is okay with deep fake porn. I think everyone knows that the obvious answer to that question is no. What I am thinking about is 16 year old or like 16 year old boys are I am a parent. No offense to the men on this panel, but 16 year old boys are dumb.

Okay? You have a tool that will very easily create a a naked image and you're telling a 16 year old boy whose whose brain is barely fully formed, certainly not their frontal lobe, that they cannot do that thing. So we have created protections around AI so that we can't regulate AI even though AI is the one that's making this very easy and then we're gonna go after a 16 year old boy. So and and not just not just not with with no intent to distribute, just to have it. So the only other suggestion that I would make and I know that we've talked about this is I don't think a 16 year old child should be charged with a felony for having an image that they created using AI.

And if we're going to do something like that, then we definitely need to make it harder to create those images. And and honestly, at this point, that's all I've got. And I'm just gonna point out, you kind of said it yourself when you said that there's no you no use for the there's no place to use technology for that kind of thing. But yet, again, we're protecting the companies that's making space for that and punishing kids. That's all I have and I'm open for questions.

I just have one question. On line 70

Mhmm.

It looks like to me I hear you quite thing on felony. Would you have the same concern about the 16 year old having a misdemeanor? Because I think on line 70, senator Hatchett's bill limits this to a misdemeanor.

So my understanding when we had the meeting is it's a misdemeanor if the if the person who has it has consent. Am I wrong about that? Okay. Okay.

Any other questions? Thank you, miss Battles.

Thank you.

And, mister Feldman from the Southern Center for Human Rights.

Good afternoon, chairman and members of the subcommittee. Blake Feldman, and I'm senior policy counsel at the Southern Center for Human Rights. That aspect of the bill as introduced that concerns us at the Southern Center is that the carve out for teenagers that, was just being discussed. The carve out for teenagers who generate obscene material, depicted in the model is narrower than we, think that it should be. And this is assuming if subsections b and d are removed that what is in d two would be moved to subsection e.

So I'm specifically, discussing the carve out that is in, line 65 to 77 of senate bill three ninety eight. Late last March, when house bill one seventy one, was before the senate judiciary committee, the hatchet Amendment, which we were big fans of, was adopted, and it incorporated a very similar carve out to the one that, is in this bill, line 65 to 77. Essentially, the carve outs require that the image depicting a minor, must not depict a minor who appears to be under the age of 14. The defendant themselves must be a minor. If the defendant distributed the image, whether to apply the carve out is up to the court's discretion if and only if three things are true.

The prosecution agrees to apply the carve out, the distribution was not for commercial purposes, and the distribution was not intended to harass, intimidate, or embarrass anyone. Our only issue with the carve out as it appears in, Senate Bill three ninety eight, is that it includes one more additional requirement, and that is that the image was generated with the consent minor, and that's line 69. We, would ask the subcommittee, to consider striking that prong of the carve out. As all of you know, but I think it's important to reiterate, the effect of the carve out is to protect some teenagers by reducing the offense to a misdemeanor. It does not decriminalize the generation of explicit images of minors.

And teenagers who do distribute the obscene images would not benefit from the carve out unless the prosecution of the court determine that it should be applied and those other conditions are satisfied. Broadening the carve out to protect teenagers from being convicted of a serious felony sex offense in no way condones or excuses the conduct that we're talking about today and we're talking about in senate bill three ninety eight. It only reduces the offense to a misdemeanor. And plenty of misdemeanors concern really serious conduct that we as a society do not condone and we appreciate as serious conduct DUI's vehicular homicide battery, shoplifting $499 worth of goods from a store. These are a few misdemeanors that nobody condones and are serious.

To the extent it was just mentioned briefly that, the current version maybe is only contemplating images trained, AI generated images that are trained off of actual people. So to the extent that a substitute does incorporate images that don't resemble recognizable actual people, the last thing that I would note is that consent of the minor won't be possible if the AI generated image is not prompted to create a deep fake of an actual minor. So for instance, is that if a 15 year old boy prompts an AI tool to generate an explicit image of a 15 year old girl with features x, y, z. So they're not feeding the tool an image of an actual minor, but are fitting it with a text based description. That teenager it would be impossible for that teenager to get someone's consent because a natural human being is not being depicted.

So we believe that that teenager should also benefit from the carve out. For these reasons, we had urged line 69, and that's all that I'm discussing is line 69, the requirement that the image be generated with the consent of the minor, that that be removed. Thank you, and we'd welcome any questions and the opportunity to work with the author, moving forward.

Any questions from the committee? Thank you for your testimony. Thank you. Two more speakers, or presenters. Mason Rainey from Technology Association of Georgia.

Mason, welcome back.

Thank you, mister chairman and members of the committee. I'm Mason Rainey with the Technology Association of Georgia or TAG. TAG is a membership trade association representing a little over 1,200 technology enabled companies and organizations throughout the state. First, I wanna start out by thanking leader Hatchett for bringing this important piece of legislation and for his collaboration on this piece and working with us. We've heard from a broad cross section of members around some language concerns as outlined by the chairman, and our goal is to synthesize that input into one singular constructive set of recommendations.

Protecting children is obviously paramount, and we agree that it is vital that this bill passes. Our feedback is focused on ensuring that the bill targets bad actors while preserving the ability of platforms to prevent, detect, and remove the harmful content generated by the CSAM. So we look forward to the continued dialogue and partnership, and thank you all for taking up this important measure.

Any questions from Mason? Thanks, Mason. Thank you. And last, Brian Hines with the Gaktuk. Gaktuk.

I can't

help it.

Sorry. I've

got some copies for everybody. Gotcha. What's the best way to handle it?

If you'd

like to present it to the committee, however, as best you can hear, we'll present we'll pass them down. Appreciate it. Thank you, Brian.

Hi. Well, those are getting passed out. I would I always like to come prepared with something actually to suggest so it's not just empty words and because I appreciate this process is difficult. I'm Brian Hines, with the Georgia Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. First, I wanna say it's, as somewhat an it's an attorney who's worked with the house, for the past five years.

It's a pleasure to actually get a chance to work with you all too. I know I've met a I've met you guys quite a few times throughout the years and, especially leader Hatchett as well. And I will first wanna say thank you for taking the time to meet with us, earlier about this bill and for the suggestions you've made, that, you know, what you're thinking about changing. I think that'll help and, you know, it's very much appreciated in good faith. So the first two prongs in these recommendations were gonna be exactly what, leader Hatchett already said, so you can ignore those for right now.

The other ones are gonna be fairly pragmatic, and then there's an option at the end. So I would just suggest just to give you the exact look again, the lawyer and me, The technical change, obviously, moving the Romeo and Juliet to encompass all of the the deep fakes regarding the minors, I think would be number prong number three would be important. Just as a practice guide too, I think it would be helpful on number four to actually name the separate crimes. So for example, rather than making this entire statute virtual beeping, have the one individual crime be virtual beeping against an adult, virtual beeping against a minor. Just makes life practicing either, I think, easier for people.

Next would be revised subsection of in the crimes. It's simple enough. Now number six is where I wanna draw your attention, though. So as it stands right now, a if a probation is offered, right now, anyone who was vi or convicted of violating this code, code section is essentially allowed to have what's generally referred as to sex offender light, provisions, under forty two eight thirty five b. Now I think that's a well meaning provision in this, but I do wanna point out too that that also encompasses the misdemeanor crime that would have so if somebody were, within that Romeo and Juliet prong, for example, then they would also be swept up in this potentially, which I don't think is the intent, and I think that's something that could be addressed and just make them so for example, the language is before felony violation of this code section.

Then you're not getting the people who are a little bit more in the innocent capacity with the Romeo and Juliet that we're trying to carve out already. And the last one just is really more of a question, I suppose, too, and it's really up to the committee. You all wanna do this and leader Hatchett, but we were just a little curious as to provisions, lines 94 to 96, that say provisions of subsections b and d, this code section shall not apply to activities of law law enforcement and prosecution agencies in the investigation and prosecution of criminal offenses. And I think what's going on is I think this was probably mirrored off of existing statute, and the goal was probably to protect law enforcement prosecution if they're going to, be possessing us for purposes of that. But this crime is broader than that.

It encompass encompasses causing the generation of the through the artificial intelligence of these images. So I don't I mean, maybe it could be more specific and also ideally include defense attorneys for their clients as well. Because I don't I don't think we want well, that's up to you all, but I don't necessarily need, law enforcement prosecution being able to generate these types of materials either. And, again, I don't think that's the intent. So maybe just put, put these on your radar and, obviously, just wanna thank you all for your time and it's my pleasure to be, you know, be able to testify first time with you all.

Thanks. Any questions for Brian? Thank you a lot. Thank you. Mister chairman, do you have any closing comments you'd like to make on this bill?

Briefly. K.

Thank you, mister chairman. Yeah. So, I appreciate all the testimony. And like I said earlier, I look forward to working in a collaborative effort to reach a goal that achieves the policy, which is essentially you shouldn't be afraid that your image is gonna be used in the way that these images are being used now. And I'm, open to continuing to work with those in the audience and hopefully bring you a good, substitute in the next week.

Thank you, chairman. Any questions for the bill sponsor? Hand it back to you or if you want me to

You can adjourn it.

Motion to adjourn.

So moved.

Is there a second? All in favor, aye. Opposed? Thank you. Stay adjourned.