Pen. Code, § 598c · Title 14. MALICIOUS MISCHIEF
Pen. Code, § 598c
Text — As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
(a) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, it is unlawful for any person to possess, to import into or export from the state, or to sell, buy, give away, hold, or accept any horse with the intent of killing, or having another kill, that horse, if that person knows or should have known that any part of that horse will be used for human consumption.
(b) For purposes of this section, “horse” means any equine, including any horse, pony, burro, or mule.
(c) Violation of this section is a felony punishable by imprisonment in the state prison for 16 months, or two or three years.
(d) It is not the intent of this section to affect any commonly accepted commercial, noncommercial, recreational, or sporting activity that relates to horses.
(e) It is not the intent of this section to affect any existing law that relates to horse taxation or zoning.
Notes and commentary — not statutory text
History
Amended (as amended by Stats. 2011, Ch. 15) by Stats. 2011, Ch. 39, Sec. 18. (AB 117) Effective June 30, 2011. Operative October 1, 2011, pursuant to Secs. 68 and 69 of Ch. 39. Note: This section was added on Nov. 3, 1998, by initiative Prop. 6.
Source of truth
- Edition
- As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
- Official file
- https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=PEN§ionNum=598c.
- Text hash
- sha256 941fd55ac08b6c973cd3b9039ca2615da43e2145923431747d8df443f9975130
- Composed by
- compose_ca.py 2026-10-22: the Legislative Counsel's CAML content files read by a tokenizer (caml_readers.reader_a); an independent xml.etree reading (caml_readers.reader_b) agrees on every section
Cited by 1 provision
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