Legislation

In June, the House and Senate approved legislation requiring law enforcement to obtain a warrant before requesting location information, except in emergencies dealing with the threat of death or serious physical injury.

In March, the ACLU testified before the House Corporations committee in opposition to legislation sanctioning the use of automated license plate readers (ALPRs) by the Department of Public Safety.

Legislation sought to make Rhode Island the fifth state to adopt “death with dignity” legislation, allowing terminal patients to seek medication to end their lives.

The ACLU testified in support of legislation regulating the collection of cell phone location information by law enforcement. This legislation would have required law enforcement to obtain a warrant before requesting location information, except in emergency circumstances.

In June, the House passed legislation requiring health care providers to report alleged incidents of elder abuse to law enforcement, furthering a trend in recent years of the General Assembly approving legislation weakening the state’s health care confidentiality laws.

Legislation creating a task force on employee misclassification and the underground economy contained one of the more dangerous anti-privacy provisions of the year.

In June, the House passed legislation governing the transmission of mental health civil certification records to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), the database used to determine who is eligible to purchase a weapon under state and federal laws.

Part of a comprehensive package of legislation by the ACLU aimed at protecting privacy, this legislation would have barred law enforcement from obtaining cell phone location information from telecommunications companies without a warrant, except in certain emergency situations.

Legislation hoped to clarify the acceptable use of ALPR technology, including for locating missing persons and identifying vehicles belonging to individuals with outstanding felony warrants, and place limits on the retention of data collected by ALPRs.