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The Indiana General Assembly is making its way to the halfway point of the 2025 legislative session, with lawmakers attempting to move several proposed bills before Feb. 20.
That’s the last day for either legislative chamber to vote on a bill on third reading.
Several bills have already passed one chamber and are headed across the hall for consideration.
House
House Bill 1144 unanimously passed the House Tuesday and is now headed to the Senate for consideration.
The bill would add two superior courts in Hamilton County and allow judges to appoint two magistrates. Additionally, it allows for the judges of Elkhart County to appoint five full-time magistrates and Vigo County judges to appoint one magistrate.
“All three of those counties were in the top five on the severity of needs,” the bill’s author Rep. Chris Jeter, R-Fishers, said during session.
Sens. Liz Brown, R-Fort Wayne, and Eric Koch, R-Bedford, are sponsoring the bill.
The lawmakers have said early on in the session that they are not actually adding to the trial courts, but rather taking a balanced approach. They plan to sunset some courts, but have not mentioned which ones.
The state’s weighted caseload management system could provide some clues.
It shows that Blackford, Franklin, Brown and Union counties have the least utilized judicial capacity. But Union only has one judge, so it would be difficult to cut there.
The other three counties each have two judicial officers and show a need for slightly less than one.
Marion County also could be a target. It has 84 judicial officers but only needs 73, according to the state’s caseload management system.
House Bill 1413 also passed unanimously out of the House Tuesday.
The bill would establish a rape kit backlog fund to provide funding for assisting law enforcement agencies and testing labs in eliminating the backlog of untested rape kits.
Rep. Becky Cash, R-Zionsville, said there are approximately 600 untested rape kits in the state.
“Based on conversations with the Indiana crime labs, this is approximately a six to eight-month backlog,” Cash said during session.
She said she talked with a woman who works with vulnerable youth who said they have been waiting since last fall for a rape kit to be processed.
The backlog means people cannot move forward in pressing charges until they get DNA evidence.
“If the suspect is guilty, this means that not only is this young person awaiting justice, others may also be in danger,” Cash said. “It’s important that we’re able to process all of these kits as quickly as possible.”
Indianapolis Republican Senators Aaron Freeman and Cyndi Carrasco are sponsoring the bill.
Senate
Another bill that addresses statute of limitations for certain sex crimes passed out of the Senate 48-1 Tuesday.
Sen. Lonnie Randolph, D-East Chicago, cast the lone vote against passage of the bill.
Senate Bill 151 would eliminate the statute of limitations for Level 3 felony rape and Level 3 and 4 felony child molestation offenses.
Currently, the statute of limitation in Indiana for most sex crimes is five years, with exceptions in cases with newly discovered DNA evidence, a recording or a confession. Child victims have until the age 31 to report an alleged crime.
Additionally, the Senate bill establishes a defense of laches if the state unreasonably delayed in filing charges.
This bill was discussed during the interim study committee in September, where lawmakers heard from survivors of rape and child molestation.
Senate Bill 151 was introduced in the 2024 legislative session for the first time and received strong support from the Senate.
The bill had three authors and 33 co-authors along with four House sponsors. It passed out of the Senate on third reading unanimously.
It was then referred to the House Court and Criminal Code Committee, but never made it out of committee.
“I’m grateful to be here before you to present Senate Bill 151 it’s been on a bit of a journey,” Sen. Scott Alexander, R-Muncie, the bill’s author, said during Tuesday’s hearing.
Indiana is among 37 states plus the District of Columbia that have a statute of limitations for rape and child molestation cases that are level 3 felonies. Thirteen states do not have a statute of limitations. There is no statute of limitations on level 1 and 2 felonies.
Reps. Alex Zimmerman, R-North Vernon, J.D. Prescott, R-Union City, and Joanna King, R-Middlebury, are co-sponsoring the bill.
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