The bill would amend the Government Code and Penal Code as it relates to the punishment for aggravated sexual assault.  Under current law aggravated sexual assault is punishable as a first degree felony and, under certain circumstances the minimum term of imprisonment is 25 years without the possibility of parole.  Under the provisions of the bill aggravated sexual assault would be punishable as a first degree felony with a minimum term of imprisonment of 25 years without the possibility of parole, and under certain circumstances the offense would be punishable by life in prison without the possibility of parole. 

A first-degree felony is punishable by confinement in prison for life or a term from 5 to 99 years and, in addition to confinement, an optional fine not to exceed $10,000. 

Among fiscal year 2012 prison releases, 701 offenders were incarcerated for aggravated sexual assault. For 688 of these prisoners, the bill's provisions would have increased their initial sentence and set their release date after the date of their actual release in fiscal year 2012. It is assumed that the bill would only affect these prisoners.  In this analysis, each of the 688 prisoners were assigned a new release date based on the bill's provisions.  The new length of stay was calculated for each prisoner and compared against their actual length of stay. The new length of stay for these prisoners would be 25 years while the actual average length of stay for these prisoners released in fiscal year 2012 was 6.9 years.  The bill's provisions would thereby increase the average length of stay by 18.1 years.

In order to estimate the future impact of the bill, the proposed conditions of the bill have been analyzed using recent trends observed in populations released from prison for these offenses. Assuming sentencing patterns and release policies not addressed in this bill remain constant, the probable impact of implementing the provisions of the bill during each of the first five years following passage, in terms of the number of additional people incarcerated in adult corrections agencies, is estimated as follows