SACRAMENTO, Calif. (KNX) – A bill that restricts the usage of rap lyrics as evidence in criminal proceedings has found its way to Gov. Gavin Newsom's desk.
Assembly Bill 2799 would “would require a court, in a criminal proceeding where a party seeks to admit as evidence a form of creative expression, to consider specified factors when balancing the probative value of that evidence against the substantial danger of undue prejudice.”
It also looks to “ensure that the use of an accused person’s creative expression will not be used to introduce stereotypes or activate bias against the defendant, nor as character or propensity evidence.”
The bill, sponsored by Assemblymember Reggie Jones-Sawyer (D-Los Angeles), passed California state Senate on Monday.
Last week, the Recording Industry Association of America voiced its support of the bill in a letter to Toni Atkins, the California Senate president pro tempore, arguing that “hyperbole and fantastical imagery” are part of creative expression.
“Bob Marley and Eric Clapton understood this when they sang about shooting the sheriff. Johnny Cash understood it when he claimed to have ‘shot a man in Reno just to watch him die.’ The Beatles weren’t ones to truly subscribe to the notion that ‘Happiness is a Warm Gun.’ And no one truly believed that Freddie Mercury ‘just killed a man’ in Queen’s ‘Bohemian Rhapsody,’” the RIAA wrote.
“Yet, when rap and hip hop artists adhere to this time-honored tradition of make-believe, their lyrics are too often – and unfairly – taken literally, stripped of the poetic license afforded other genres.”
The New York state Senate passed a similar legislation in May.
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