1-1     By:  Keel, Hinjosa (Senate Sponsor - Wentworth)        H.B. No. 234
 1-2           (In the Senate - Received from the House April 26, 1999;
 1-3     April 27, 1999, read first time and referred to Committee on
 1-4     Criminal Justice; April 30, 1999, reported favorably by the
 1-5     following vote:  Yeas 7, Nays 0; April 30, 1999, sent to printer.)
 1-6                            A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
 1-7                                   AN ACT
 1-8     relating to making certain affidavits required for the issuance of
 1-9     search warrants available for public inspection.
1-10           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-11           SECTION 1.  Article 18.01(b), Code of Criminal Procedure, is
1-12     amended to read as follows:            
1-13           (b)  No search warrant shall issue for any purpose in this
1-14     state unless sufficient facts are first presented to satisfy the
1-15     issuing magistrate that probable cause does in fact exist for its
1-16     issuance.  A sworn affidavit setting forth substantial facts
1-17     establishing probable cause shall be filed in every instance in
1-18     which a search warrant is requested.  The affidavit is public
1-19     information if executed, and the magistrate's clerk shall make a
1-20     copy of the affidavit available for public inspection in the
1-21     clerk's office during  normal business hours.
1-22           SECTION 2.  The importance of this legislation and the
1-23     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
1-24     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
1-25     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
1-26     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
1-27     and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
1-28     passage, and it is so enacted.
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