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CALIFORNIA Legislation
Cal. Pen. Code § 208
Punishment of Kidnapping
(a) Kidnapping is punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for three, five, or eight years.
(b) If the person kidnapped is under 14 years of age at the time of the commission of the crime, the kidnapping is punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for 5, 8, or 11 years. This subdivision is not applicable to the taking, detaining, or concealing, of a minor child by a biological parent, a natural father, as specified in Section 7611 of the Family Code, an adoptive parent, or a person who has been granted access to the minor child by a court order.
(c) In all cases in which probation is granted, the court shall, except in unusual cases where the interests of justice would best be served by a lesser penalty, require as a condition of the probation that the person be confined in the county jail for 12 months. If the court grants probation without requiring the defendant to be confined in the county jail for 12 months, it shall specify its reason or reasons for imposing a lesser penalty.
Amendment History:
1923 Amendment:
Substituted “twenty–five years” for “ten years” at the end.
1976 Amendment:
Substituted “for three, four or five years” for “not less than one nor more than twenty–five years”. 1978 Amendment:
Substituted “five, or seven years” for “four or five years”.
1985 Amendment:
Substituted “eight years” for “seven years”.
1986 Amendment:
(1) Designated the former section to be subd (a); and (2) added subd (b).
1989 Amendment:
Substituted the second sentence of subd (b) for the former second sentence which read: “This subdivision is not applicable to conduct proscribed by Section 227, 278, or 278.5.”
1990 Amendment:
Added subds (c) and (d). (As amended Stats 1990 ch 1560, compared to the section as it read prior to 1990. This section was also amended by an earlier chapter, ch 55. See Gov C § 9605.)
1992 Amendment:
Substituted “Section 7611 of the Family Code” for “subdivision (a) of Section 7004 of the Civil Code” in subd (b).
1997 Amendment:
Deleted former subd (d) which read: “(d) If the person is kidnapped with the intent to commit rape, oral copulation, sodomy, or rape by instrument, the kidnapping is punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for 5, 8, or 11 years.”
Source: LexisNexis