Tuesday, June 13, 2006
The California Court of Appeals has held that if a police officer is off duty and at home and receives information from a minor acquaintance regarding the minor's sexual relationship with an adult, the officer has not received that information in the scope of his employment or in his professional capacity and therefore does not have a duty under the mandatory reporting statute to report the suspected child abuse involved. Thus, the court concluded that the city could not properly terminate his employment for failure to report the suspected abuse.
Pinto v. City of Visalia, 139 Cal. App. 4th 1170 (May 25, 2006)
Opinion on the web (last visited June 13, 2006 bgf)