Railroad Carriers and Mass Transportation Protection Act of 2005

The Railroad Carriers and Mass Transportation Protection Act of 2005 (S. 629) proposes to strengthen federal criminal penalties for acts of violence or destruction directed at trains, mass transit systems, and passenger vessels. The bill expands existing laws to include "knowing" acts of sabotage—rather than just "willful" ones—and introduces harsher "aggravated offense" penalties for attacks involving vehicles carrying hazardous materials or nuclear waste. For citizens, this legislation aims to increase public safety by deterring attacks on critical transportation infrastructure, while establishing the death penalty as a potential sentence in cases where such acts result in a loss of life.