By:  Smithee                                          H.B. No. 2834
       73R7443 CLG-D
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-1                                AN ACT
    1-2  relating to the authority of a court to conduct certain criminal
    1-3  proceedings by using a closed circuit television.
    1-4        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-5        SECTION 1.  Chapter 26, Code of Criminal Procedure, is
    1-6  amended by adding Article 26.16 to read as follows:
    1-7        Art. 26.16.  PROCEEDINGS CONDUCTED BY CLOSED CIRCUIT
    1-8  TELEVISION.  The court may use a closed circuit television system
    1-9  that provides a two-way communication of image and sound between
   1-10  the court and the defendant in a proceeding under this chapter in
   1-11  which the:
   1-12              (1)  defendant enters a plea; or
   1-13              (2)  identity of the defendant is fixed and the plea of
   1-14  the defendant is heard.
   1-15        SECTION 2.  The importance of this legislation and the
   1-16  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   1-17  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   1-18  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   1-19  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
   1-20  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
   1-21  passage, and it is so enacted.