By:  Brown                                            S.B. No. 1288
       73R6395 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<, as permitted by
    1-9  the Rules of Evidence,> be offered by the state and the defendant
   1-10  as to any matter the court deems relevant to sentencing, including
   1-11  but not limited to the prior criminal record of the defendant, his
   1-12  general reputation, <and> his character, an opinion regarding his
   1-13  character, the circumstances of the offense for which he is being
   1-14  tried, and, notwithstanding Rules 404 and 405, Texas Rules of
   1-15  Criminal Evidence, any other evidence of an extraneous crime or bad
   1-16  act that is shown by clear and convincing evidence to have been
   1-17  committed by the defendant or for which he could be held criminally
   1-18  responsible, regardless of whether he has previously been charged
   1-19  with or finally convicted of the crime or act.  <The term prior
   1-20  criminal record means a final conviction in a court of record, or a
   1-21  probated or suspended sentence that has occurred prior to trial, or
   1-22  any final conviction material to the offense charged.>  A court may
   1-23  consider as a factor in mitigating punishment the conduct of a
   1-24  defendant while participating in a program under Article 17.40 or
    2-1  17.42(a) of this code as a condition of release on bail.
    2-2  Additionally, notwithstanding Rule 609(d), Texas Rules of Criminal
    2-3  Evidence, evidence may be offered by the state and the defendant of
    2-4  an adjudication of delinquency based on a violation by the
    2-5  defendant of a penal law of the grade of felony unless:
    2-6              (1)  the adjudication is based on conduct committed
    2-7  more than five years before the commission of the offense for which
    2-8  the person is being tried; and
    2-9              (2)  in the five years preceding the date of the
   2-10  commission of the offense for which the person is being tried, the
   2-11  person did not engage in conduct for which the person has been
   2-12  adjudicated as a delinquent child or a child in need of supervision
   2-13  and did not commit an offense for which the person has been
   2-14  convicted.
   2-15        SECTION 2.  The importance of this legislation and the
   2-16  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   2-17  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   2-18  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   2-19  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
   2-20  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
   2-21  passage, and it is so enacted.