Honorable Joe Moody, Chair, House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence
FROM:
Jerry McGinty, Director, Legislative Budget Board
IN RE:
HB513 by Metcalf (Relating to the manufacture or delivery of a controlled substance or marihuana causing death or serious bodily injury; creating a criminal offense; increasing a criminal penalty.), As Introduced
The bill would create the criminal offense of manufacturing or delivering a controlled substance in violation of the Texas Controlled Substances Act causing serious bodily injury or death. The offense would be a third degree felony for serious bodily injury and a second-degree felony for death, and an individual would not be allowed to serve the sentence concurrently with any other sentence. Current law includes penalty enhancements for certain felony manufacture and delivery of controlled substances offenses when the offense causes serious bodily injury or death, but the bill would increase the penalties for those and all manufacturing or delivering a controlled substance in violation of the Texas Controlled Substances Act causing serious bodily injury or death.
Increasing the penalty for an existing criminal offense may result in increased demands upon state and local correctional resources due to a possible increase in the number of individuals placed under supervision in the community or sentenced to a term of confinement.
In fiscal year 2022, there were 10,485 individuals arrested, 2,019 individuals placed on adult community supervision, 2,880 individuals admitted into adult state correctional institutions, and 1 individual admitted into juvenile state correctional institutions for an offense of manufacturing or delivering a controlled substance in violation of the Texas Controlled Substances Act.
The impact on state correctional populations or on the demand for state correctional resources cannot be determined due to the lack of data to identify the number of cases where the manufacture or delivery of a controlled substance resulted in serious bodily injury or death.