When Chloe Sharp took over as Mississippi chapter president of the national group Youth Against Sexual Violence last fall, her priority was to complete some unfinished business.
“Last year, our lobbying team leader read an article about how Mississippi is one of only two states that doesn’t have a law against intimate assault,” said Sharp, a senior at Mississippi School for Math and Science from Oxford. “Because this is the kind of thing our organization focuses on, we thought we needed to do something. We put a team together to draft legislation last year, but unfortunately, it wasn’t ready in time for last year’s session. So we’ve been working on it to have it ready for this year’s session.”
Working with Rep. Tommy Reyonlds (D, Charleston) and Rep. Rob Roberson (R, Starkville), Sharp’s group has prepared two bills, both of which were assigned to the House Judiciary B Committee last week.
The bills will address a form of sexually abuse/harassment not currently included in Mississippi law.
“Currently, unwanted sexual touching is a criminal offense only if the victim is a minor or is physically or mentally disabled,” Sharp said. “But we know from several studies that many women, and sometimes men, too, have been sexually harassed and abused in some way, shape or form. It’s not OK.”
House Bill 701, authored by Reynolds, would amend the Simple Assault statute to include, “intentionally touches an intimate part of another person for the purpose of sexual arousal, sexual gratification or sexual abuse, while the person is unlawfully restrained by another person against his or her will while he or she is unconscious, incapacitated or unlawfully coerced.”
The bipartisan HB-605, authored by Reynolds and Roberson, would create a new statute to criminalize that conduct.
“Both bills would add language that covers the issue, but we’re especially excited about the bipartisan bill because we want the support of all the legislators,” Sharp said.
Roberson, who is a member of the Judiciary B committee, said he was approached by Reynold’s to be a co-author of HB-605.
“Tommy knows that Mississippi State is in my district and this bill covers the kind of things we often see with young people,” Roberson said. “At first, I was concerned about legislation that might affect younger kids who maybe didn’t fully realize the harm of this sort of conduct, but as we talked it over and discussed what would be in the bill, I felt like it was something I could put my name on.”
While the bill is under discussion in committee, Sharp said her group will focus on building support for the bills outside the legislature.
“Our plan right now is to get everybody in the state on board as much as we can,” Sharp said. “We’re using social media, calling our legislators and those in Judiciary B, printing flyers, and telling schools about it. Our lobbying team is also trying to get us a meeting with members of Judiciary B so a few of us can go and talk to them in person about why this is so important.”
Roberson said there is another aspect of the situation he finds encouraging.
“I think it’s absolutely brilliant to see young people get involved,” Roberson said. “I love it. To have a group of young people that have a real interest in what is going on in the legislature and getting involved with us over an issue they care about, it’s amazing. It makes me feel really good about the young people in our state.”
Sharp said she’s enjoyed what for her has been a new experience.
“It’s definitely new for me,” she said. “I’ve been interested in politics for a really long time, but I had never done anything like this. I’m really enjoying it.”
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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