Honorable Richard Pena Raymond, Chair, House Committee on Human Services
FROM:
John S O'Brien, Director, Legislative Budget Board
IN RE:
HB2573 by Bonnen (Relating to the protection of children from abuse or neglect; providing penalties.), As Introduced
The provisions of the bill that are the subject of this analysis are the provisions that would deal with criminal sanctions. The bill would amend the Family Code to provide that a person commits an offense if the person suspects that a child has been abused or neglected, rather than has cause to believe that a child’s physical or mental health or welfare has been or may be adversely affected by abuse or neglect, and fails to report. Under current law and policy, and under the proposed bill, the failure to report abuse or neglect is punishable as a Class A Misdemeanor or a state jail felony. The bill would amend the Government Code to include conditions related to an offense involving the mandatory evidence collection for certain sexual offenses by a physician who performs an abortion on certain child victims, punishable as a Class A Misdemeanor.
A Class A Misdemeanor is punishable by confinement in county jail for a term not to exceed one year and/or a fine not to exceed $4,000. A state jail felony is punishable by confinement in a state jail for a term from 180 days to 2 years and, in addition to confinement, an optional fine not to exceed $10,000 or Class A Misdemeanor punishment (mandatory post conviction community supervision).
Broadening the definition of the types of behavior punishable is expected to result in increased demands upon the correctional resources of counties or of the State due to an increase in offenses. For this analysis, it is assumed implementing the provisions of the bill would not result in a significant impact on the programs and workload of state corrections agencies or on the demand for resources of those agencies.