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. Under the provisions of the bill, current or former governmental employees sued for the return of public information would, under certain circumstances, be subject to prosecution for perjury, which includes aggravated perjury, a third degree felony.

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 additional demands on the correctional resources of counties or of the State due to longer terms of supervision in the community or longer terms of confinement within state correctional institutions.  In fiscal year 2018, 27 individuals were arrested, fewer than ten were placed under felony community supervision, and fewer than ten 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 state correctional populations or on the demand for state correctional resources.