By Janek H.B. No. 2672
75R5346 JMM-D
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
1-1 AN ACT
1-2 relating to the offense of criminal nonsupport.
1-3 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-4 SECTION 1. Sections 25.05(a) and (d), Penal Code, are
1-5 amended to read as follows:
1-6 (a) An individual commits an offense if the person [he]
1-7 intentionally or knowingly fails to provide support for the
1-8 person's [his] child younger than 18 years of age, or for the
1-9 person's [his] child who is the subject of a court order requiring
1-10 the individual to support the child.
1-11 (d) It is an affirmative defense to prosecution under this
1-12 section that the actor could not provide support for the actor's
1-13 [his] child.
1-14 SECTION 2. The importance of this legislation and the
1-15 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
1-16 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
1-17 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
1-18 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
1-19 and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
1-20 passage, and it is so enacted.