Honorable Kelly Hancock, Chair, Senate Committee on Business & Commerce
FROM:
Ursula Parks, Director, Legislative Budget Board
IN RE:
SB1646 by Watson (Relating to the public information law; creating a criminal offense.), As Introduced
The provisions of the bill addressing felony sanctions are the subject of this analysis. The bill would amend the Government Code to create procedures for the surrender or return of public information to a governmental body. Certain individuals who fail to surrender or return public information within a certain period after a request for such information would commit a misdemeanor. Under the provisions of the bill, current or former governmental employees sued for the return of public information allegedly in their possession would be subject to prosecution for perjury, which includes aggravated perjury, a third degree felony, if they engaged in the relevant conduct of the offense in returning a sworn affidavit denying possession of the requested information.
A third degree felony is punishable by confinement in prison for a term from 2 to 10 years and, in addition to confinement, an optional fine not to exceed $10,000.
Expanding the list of behaviors for which a criminal penalty is applied and creating an offense are expected to result in increased demands on the correctional resources of counties or of the State due to potential increase in the number of individuals placed under supervision in the community or sentenced to a term of confinement within state correctional institutions. In fiscal year 2016, 53 individuals were arrested, 11 were placed under felony community supervision, and 10 were admitted into state correctional institutions for the offense of aggravated perjury under existing statute. This analysis assumes the provisions of the bill addressing felony sanctions would not result in a significant impact on the demand for state correctional resources.