By: Jones, D. H.B. No. 1753
73R6482 GWK-F
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
1-1 AN ACT
1-2 relating to the admissibility of evidence at the punishment stage
1-3 of a criminal trial.
1-4 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-5 SECTION 1. Section 3(a), Article 37.07, Code of Criminal
1-6 Procedure, is amended to read as follows:
1-7 (a) Regardless of the plea and whether the punishment be
1-8 assessed by the judge or the jury, evidence may, in a manner
1-9 consistent with <as permitted by> the Rules of Evidence, be offered
1-10 by the state and the defendant as to any matter the court deems
1-11 relevant to any issue regarding punishment <sentencing>, including
1-12 the prior criminal record of the defendant, his general reputation,
1-13 <and> his character, and evidence of unadjudicated extraneous acts
1-14 of the defendant. <The term prior criminal record means a final
1-15 conviction in a court of record, or a probated or suspended
1-16 sentence that has occurred prior to trial, or any final conviction
1-17 material to the offense charged.> A court may consider as a factor
1-18 in mitigating punishment the conduct of a defendant while
1-19 participating in a program under Article 17.40 or 17.42(a) of this
1-20 code as a condition of release on bail. Additionally,
1-21 notwithstanding Rule 609(d), Texas Rules of Criminal Evidence,
1-22 evidence may be offered by the state and the defendant of an
1-23 adjudication of delinquency based on a violation by the defendant
1-24 of a penal law of the grade of felony unless:
2-1 (1) the adjudication is based on conduct committed
2-2 more than five years before the commission of the offense for which
2-3 the person is being tried; and
2-4 (2) in the five years preceding the date of the
2-5 commission of the offense for which the person is being tried, the
2-6 person did not engage in conduct for which the person has been
2-7 adjudicated as a delinquent child or a child in need of supervision
2-8 and did not commit an offense for which the person has been
2-9 convicted.
2-10 SECTION 2. The importance of this legislation and the
2-11 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
2-12 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
2-13 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
2-14 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
2-15 and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
2-16 passage, and it is so enacted.