2008 House Bill 6564: Authorize penalties for state officials lying to legislative committees

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Introduced by Rep. Dudley Spade (D) on October 15, 2008, to authorize penalties of up to five years in prison and a $10,000 fine for an employee or official of the executive branch of state government who intentionally provides information to a legislative committee or subcommittee that he or she knows is false or misleading, or who falsifies, conceals, or covers up any material fact from the committee or subcommittee by any trick, scheme, or device.
- Referred to the House Government Operations Committee on October 15, 2008.

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1) Re: 2008 House Bill 6564 (Authorize penalties for state officials lying to legislative committees ) by crazycajun on January 25, 2009

now HERE is a bill that needs to pass.

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2) Awesome by Anonymous Citizen on November 4, 2008
you just fined about 90% of the dems/socialists in office. Keep up the good work.
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3) Where's the Mens Rea? by beverlytran on November 3, 2008
As I have recently made numerous references to the supplemental review of Michigan's Medicaid False Claims Act by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the state continues on a course of good intentions, but does so ineffectively.

In its current language, this bill would not make an effective deterrent of false testimony to the legislature because the terms "know" and "knowingly" are not defined. All one has to do is provide the excuse of "mistake" and/or "error", and there is no criminality in the actions or lack of actions of public officials or administrators.

Without establishing the elements of "know" or "knowingly", the legislature must pass some form of resolution that it possesses psychic powers to detect "mens rea" without any prong testing for "actus reus".

Acknowledging that one has "failed to rise to the occasion" by recognizing that "things could have been done better" is nothing more than a public admission of a mistake, leaving this bill impotent.

Beverly Tran
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