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Cal. PEN § 17.2

This is the official text of Cal. PEN § 17.2, part of California’s Penal Code — defines crimes and sets criminal procedure in California.

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Official statutory text

(a) It is the intent of the Legislature that the disposition of any criminal case use the least restrictive means available.

(b) The court presiding over a criminal matter shall consider alternatives to incarceration, including, without limitation, collaborative justice court programs, diversion, restorative justice, and probation.

(c) The court shall have the discretion to determine the appropriate sentence according to relevant statutes and the sentencing rules of the Judicial Council.

Status: in_force · Read it on the official government site

About this page: Statute text is reproduced from official government publishers via the Open US Law dataset (Vaquill AI, snapshot v2026.08, CC BY 4.0). Primary legislative text like this is public domain under the government-edicts doctrine (Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, 2020). We link every section back to its official source so you can verify it independently.