Criminal?Justice?Training?Commission. The Criminal Justice Training Commission (CJTC) offers an annual intensive, integrated training session on investigating and prosecuting sexual assault cases for prosecutors, law enforcement, public defenders, and victim advocates. The training is self-supporting through fees charged to the participants of the training.

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The CJTC also provides advanced training and educational programming for law enforcement officers, including the following:

• training for officers on a victim-centered, trauma-informed approach to interacting with victims and responding to calls involving gender-based violence, which applicable officers must complete once every three years; and
• specialized training for officers who are responsible for investigating sexual assault and other gender-based violence involving adult victims, which applicable officers must complete within one year of being assigned. The training must be based on a victim-centered, trauma-informed approach to responding to sexual assault and include content on the neurobiology of trauma and trauma-informed interviewing, counseling, and investigative techniques.

The annual intensive, integrated training session on investigating and prosecuting sexual assault cases, and the specialized sexual assault and gender-based violence investigative training involving adult victims for law enforcement officers, are expanded to include persons responsible for regularly investigating prohibited conduct under Title IX. The CJTC will consult with the Washington Student Achievement Council regarding such training.?

Peace officers working on patrol are also required to complete training on a victim-centered, trauma-informed approach to interacting with victims and responding to calls involving sexual violence once every three years.

PRO: We have tried hard in our state to have a trauma-informed system that supports survivors. Training was enacted for people doing this work, including for law enforcement and prosecutors. Three to four years ago, when changes were made to the trainings for law enforcement, a component was accidentally removed. This bill puts back that requirement to ensure that an officer interacting with a survivor has the skillset to support the survivor and encourage the survivor if they decide to move forward in the process. Title IX investigators would also benefit from the training, since high rates of sexual assault happen in higher education institutions and we have heard from students that they often do not get the resources they need.

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OTHER: The Title IX investigator training would be a little better as a standalone training. This way, the criminal justice investigation training and materials for law enforcement and Title IX investigators can be more tailored. The other parts of this bill will help clarify training requirements around gender-based violence and sexual assault for patrol office.