1-1  By:  Place (Senate Sponsor - Wentworth)               H.B. No. 1204
    1-2        (In the Senate - Received from the House March 15, 1995;
    1-3  March 16, 1995, read first time and referred to Committee on
    1-4  Criminal Justice; May 11, 1995, reported favorably by the following
    1-5  vote:  Yeas 5, Nays 1; May 11, 1995, sent to printer.)
    1-6                         A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-7                                AN ACT
    1-8  relating to the punishment for contempt of certain persons who fail
    1-9  to respond to a jury summons.
   1-10        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
   1-11        SECTION 1.  Article 45.25, Code of Criminal Procedure, is
   1-12  amended to read as follows:
   1-13        Art. 45.25.  Jury summoned.  If the accused does not waive a
   1-14  trial by jury, the justice shall issue a writ commanding the proper
   1-15  officer to summon forthwith a venire from which six qualified
   1-16  persons shall be selected to serve as jurors in the case.  Said
   1-17  jurors when so summoned shall remain in attendance as jurors in all
   1-18  cases that may come up for hearing until discharged by the court.
   1-19  Any person so summoned who fails to attend may be fined not
   1-20  exceeding $100 <$20> for contempt.
   1-21        SECTION 2.  The change in law made by this Act applies only
   1-22  to a person who on or after the effective date of this Act fails to
   1-23  respond to a jury summons.  Failure to respond to a jury summons
   1-24  before the effective date of this Act is covered by the law in
   1-25  effect at the time of the failure, and the former law is continued
   1-26  in effect for that purpose.
   1-27        SECTION 3.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1995.
   1-28        SECTION 4.  The importance of this legislation and the
   1-29  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   1-30  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   1-31  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   1-32  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.
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