By: Wilson H.B. No. 1222
73R5623 GWK-D
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
1-1 AN ACT
1-2 relating to capital murder by a peace officer, jailer, or guard of
1-3 a person in custody.
1-4 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-5 SECTION 1. Section 19.03(a), Penal Code, is amended to read
1-6 as follows:
1-7 (a) A person commits an offense if he commits murder as
1-8 defined under Section 19.02(a)(1) of this code and:
1-9 (1) the person murders a peace officer or fireman who
1-10 is acting in the lawful discharge of an official duty and who the
1-11 person knows is a peace officer or fireman;
1-12 (2) the person intentionally commits the murder in the
1-13 course of committing or attempting to commit kidnapping, burglary,
1-14 robbery, aggravated sexual assault, or arson;
1-15 (3) the person commits the murder for remuneration or
1-16 the promise of remuneration or employs another to commit the murder
1-17 for remuneration or the promise of remuneration;
1-18 (4) the person commits the murder while escaping or
1-19 attempting to escape from a penal institution;
1-20 (5) the person, while incarcerated in a penal
1-21 institution, murders another who is employed in the operation of
1-22 the penal institution; <or>
1-23 (6) the person murders more than one person:
1-24 (A) during the same criminal transaction; or
2-1 (B) during different criminal transactions but
2-2 the murders are committed pursuant to the same scheme or course of
2-3 conduct; or
2-4 (7) the person:
2-5 (A) is a jailer or guard employed at a municipal
2-6 or county jail, by the institutional division of the Texas
2-7 Department of Criminal Justice, or by a correctional facility
2-8 authorized by Subchapter F, Chapter 351, Local Government Code, or
2-9 Chapter 495, Government Code, or is a peace officer; and
2-10 (B) murders another who at the time of the
2-11 offense is in the peace officer's, jailer's, or guard's custody.
2-12 SECTION 2. (a) The change in law made by this Act applies
2-13 only to an offense committed on or after the effective date of this
2-14 Act. For the purposes of this section, an offense is committed
2-15 before the effective date of this Act if any element of the offense
2-16 occurs before the effective date.
2-17 (b) An offense committed before the effective date of this
2-18 Act is covered by the law in effect when the offense was committed,
2-19 and the former law is continued in effect for this purpose.
2-20 SECTION 3. This Act takes effect September 1, 1993.
2-21 SECTION 4. The importance of this legislation and the
2-22 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
2-23 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
2-24 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
2-25 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.