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Senate Bill 1636 |
Senate Author: Davis et al. |
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Effective: 9-1-11 |
House Sponsor: McClendon |
Senate Bill 1636 amends the Government Code to make changes in the Sexual Assault Prevention and Crisis Services Act relating to evidence collection. The bill prohibits evidence collected under that act using the evidence collection protocol and kit from being released unless a signed, written consent to release the evidence is obtained, requires personnel who handle sexual assault evidence collected in accordance with law to maintain the chain of custody of the evidence, and sets out provisions governing procedures relating to the analysis of sexual assault evidence. The Department of Public Safety (DPS) and other applicable public accredited crime laboratories may contract with private accredited crime laboratories as appropriate to perform those analyses. The bill establishes that the failure of a law enforcement agency to submit sexual assault evidence within the required period does not affect the authority of the agency to submit the evidence to an accredited crime laboratory for analysis or the authority of an accredited crime laboratory to analyze the evidence or provide the results of that analysis to appropriate persons.
Senate Bill 1636 requires DPS, on request, to compare the DNA profile obtained from the biological evidence with DNA profiles maintained in certain databases if the amount and quality of the analyzed sample meet the requirements of the respective database's comparison policies. The bill requires consent for the release of evidence contained in an evidence collection kit to be in writing and signed by the survivor under certain conditions, sets out provisions governing such consent, and sets out procedures relating to the withdrawal and disclosure of such consent.
Senate Bill 1636 amends the Code of Criminal Procedure to require DPS procedures relating to the submission or collection of additional evidence of an alleged sexual assault and the transfer and preservation of evidence collected by a health care facility from certain sexual assault victims to be consistent with the Sexual Assault Prevention and Crisis Services Act. The bill establishes requirements for DPS and law enforcement agencies relating to the analysis of certain unanalyzed sexual assault evidence and requires DPS to submit to the governor and the appropriate standing committees of the senate and the house of representatives a report containing a projected timeline for the completion of laboratory analyses of all unanalyzed sexual assault evidence relating to active criminal cases submitted by law enforcement agencies not yet submitted for laboratory analysis; a request for any necessary funding to accomplish the analyses for such unanalyzed evidence, including a request for a grant of money from the criminal justice planning fund, if money is available; as appropriate, application materials for the required requests made by DPS; a proposal for determining which evidence should be outsourced; and a list of laboratories DPS determines are capable of completing the outsourced analyses.
Senate Bill 1636 requires DPS, to the extent that funding is available, to analyze or contract for the analysis of, and complete the required database comparison regarding, all sexual assault evidence not yet submitted for laboratory analysis that is submitted to DPS by law enforcement agencies. The bill exempts DPS from a requirement to use in a state fiscal year any amount of money from the state highway fund that exceeds the amount DPS has historically used in a state fiscal year to fund laboratory analyses of sexual assault evidence. The bill authorizes DPS to solicit and receive grants, gifts, or donations of money. In addition, the bill makes its provisions inapplicable to sexual assault evidence collected before September 1, 1996.