1-1 By: Shapleigh S.B. No. 857
1-2 (In the Senate - Filed February 27, 1997; March 5, 1997, read
1-3 first time and referred to Committee on Jurisprudence;
1-4 March 26, 1997, reported adversely, with favorable Committee
1-5 Substitute by the following vote: Yeas 7, Nays 0; March 26, 1997,
1-6 sent to printer.)
1-7 COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTE FOR S.B. No. 857 By: Ogden
1-8 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
1-9 AN ACT
1-10 relating to an application for issuance of a subpoena.
1-11 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-12 SECTION 1. Subsection (a), Article 24.03, Code of Criminal
1-13 Procedure, is amended to read as follows:
1-14 (a) Before the clerk or his deputy shall be required or
1-15 permitted to issue a subpoena in any felony case pending in any
1-16 district or criminal district court of this State of which he is
1-17 clerk or deputy, the defendant or his attorney or the State's
1-18 attorney shall make an [written, sworn] application in writing or
1-19 by electronic means to such clerk for each witness desired. Such
1-20 application shall state the name of each witness desired, the
1-21 location and vocation, if known, and that the testimony of said
1-22 witness is material to the State or to the defense. The
1-23 application must be filed with the clerk [and placed with the
1-24 papers in the cause] and made available to both the State and the
1-25 defendant. Except as provided by Subsection (b) [of this article],
1-26 as far as is practical such clerk shall include in one subpoena the
1-27 names of all witnesses for the State and for defendant, and such
1-28 process shall show that the witnesses are summoned for the State or
1-29 for the defendant. When a witness has been served with a subpoena,
1-30 attached or placed under bail at the instance of either party in a
1-31 particular case, such execution of process shall inure to the
1-32 benefit of the opposite party in such case in the event such
1-33 opposite party desires to use such witness on the trial of the
1-34 case, provided that when a witness has once been served with a
1-35 subpoena, no further subpoena shall be issued for said witness.
1-36 SECTION 2. The importance of this legislation and the
1-37 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
1-38 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
1-39 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
1-40 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
1-41 and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
1-42 passage, and it is so enacted.
1-43 * * * * *