The state Assembly approved legislation on Tuesday that would require certain replica guns to be sold in bright colors or transparent to avoid deadly mix-ups with police officers.
SB199 advanced on a 41-34 vote, the minimum needed to pass, after Republican lawmakers and an influential Democrat blasted it as ineffective. It now returns to the Senate.
Democratic Sen. Kevin de Leon of Los Angeles introduced the bill after two California teenagers were shot by law enforcement officers confusing toy guns for real ones.
A similar bill failed in 2011, but SB199 advanced after the fatal October shooting of 13-year-old Andy Lopez in Santa Rosa, when a sheriff’s deputy mistook the boy’s toy rifle for a real AK-47.