1-1  By:  Wentworth                                         S.B. No. 342
    1-2        (In the Senate - Filed January 27, 1995; January 30, 1995,
    1-3  read first time and referred to Committee on Criminal Justice;
    1-4  April 5, 1995, reported favorably by the following vote:  Yeas 7,
    1-5  Nays 0; April 5, 1995, sent to printer.)
    1-6                         A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-7                                AN ACT
    1-8  relating to the offense of unauthorized absence from a community
    1-9  corrections facility, county correctional center, or correctional
   1-10  assignment site.
   1-11        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
   1-12        SECTION 1.  Section 38.113, Penal Code, is amended to read as
   1-13  follows:
   1-14        Sec. 38.113.  Unauthorized Absence From Community Corrections
   1-15  Facility, County Correctional Center, or Assignment Site.  (a)  A
   1-16  person commits an offense if the person:
   1-17              (1)  is sentenced to or is required as a condition of
   1-18  community supervision or correctional programming <probation> to
   1-19  submit to a period of detention or treatment in a community
   1-20  corrections facility or county correctional center;
   1-21              (2)  <and the person> fails to report to or leaves the
   1-22  facility, the center, or a community service or programmatic
   1-23  assignment site as directed by the court, community supervision and
   1-24  corrections department supervising the person, or director of the
   1-25  facility or center in which the person is detained or treated, as
   1-26  appropriate; and
   1-27              (3)  in failing to report or leaving acts without the
   1-28  approval of the court, the community supervision and corrections
   1-29  department supervising the person, or the director of the facility
   1-30  or center in which the person is detained or treated.
   1-31        (b)  An offense under this section is a state jail felony.
   1-32        SECTION 2.  (a)  The change in law made by this Act applies
   1-33  only to an offense committed on or after the effective date of this
   1-34  Act.  For purposes of this section, an offense is committed before
   1-35  the effective date of this Act if any element of the offense occurs
   1-36  before the effective date.
   1-37        (b)  An offense committed before the effective date of this
   1-38  Act is covered by the law in effect when the offense was committed,
   1-39  and the former law is continued in effect for that purpose.
   1-40        SECTION 3.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1995.
   1-41        SECTION 4.  The importance of this legislation and the
   1-42  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   1-43  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   1-44  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   1-45  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.
   1-46                               * * * * *