A lobbyist for personal injury lawyers opposed the governor signing a bill yesterday that protects property owners from being sued by criminals injured on their property.

Before the law, felons or their families could sue property owners if they were injured or killed while committing a crime on the property.

“;We're against immunity anyway, generally speaking, because there are laws that will protect you,”; said Robert Toyofuku, a lobbyist for the personal injury law group Hawaii Association for Justice.

But gun owners and other supporters praised the governor for signing Act 97, which is effective immediately.

Sen. Mike Gabbard, who introduced a similar bill in 2007, said the law was needed, citing the case of Ricky Bodine, an 18-year-old who fell through a skylight while trying to burglarize a California school in 1982. He was paralyzed and won a settlement of $260,000 plus a $1,200 monthly stipend, according to a paper by a student at the University of California at Berkeley law school.

Toyofuku called immunity an “;extreme measure”; and said the law isn't needed because it's uncommon for a felon to sue for compensation for injuries caused by the action of a property owner.

However, he supported provisions later put into the bill that protect the right of innocent people to sue for injuries.

“;I felt that at one point (if) it was going to pass, that we needed to make sure that there were certain provisions in there,”; he said.

An added provision says the perpetrator must be convicted of a crime for the property owner to be immune from liability.

That would protect the right to sue for people who had no criminal intention, such as a someone who mistakenly walks into the wrong house and gets shot.

Toyofuku said there are also questions about how the law would affect criminal cases.

In a criminal case, a property owner cannot use unreasonable force, such as shooting a person who is wielding only a magazine, he said.

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Array of new laws will affect prostitution, taxes and cigars

Over the past two days, Gov. Linda Lingle signed 14 bills into law that deal with prostitution, taxation and other issues.

One measure extends until 2012 a law making habitual solicitation of prostitution a criminal offense, the governor's office said.

New taxation laws standardize the definition of little cigars and prevent double taxation by extending general excise tax exemptions for condo managers, hotels and timeshare operators.

Three other laws allow counties to decide how to appoint and remove police chiefs, make permanent the powers of intermediate appellate court judges and require that government employee retirement payments be made by direct deposit, eliminating paper checks and saving nearly $1 million annually.

Three other laws stop authorities from seizing firearms or ammunition from lawful individuals during a disaster or emergency; require those sentenced for graffiti to remove it from the damaged property within 30 days of sentencing; and give the Hawaii Tourism Authority the power to keep competitively sensitive tourism information sealed from the public.

— Star-Bulletin staff and Associated Press