The 81st legislative session has drawn to a close. In this installment, Rep. Allen Vaught updates constituents with the fourth in a series of articles detailing the bills that passed the Texas House and Senate during the session.

June 21, 2009 was the final day for the Governor to sign, veto, or a allow a bill to become law without his signature.

The Governor signed 1,413 bills into law, let another 10 become law without his signature and vetoed 35 bills.


Online Harassment

With the advent of social networking sites and text messaging over the past several years, a new wave of crime has popped up dealing with identity theft and the intent to harm. House Bill 2003 establishes a range of punishments for individuals who assume someone else's identity and use it maliciously. The bill creates a Class A misdemeanor offense for those who send an email, text message, instant message, or other electronic communication in someone else's name (and without their permission) and have the intent to harm, defraud, intimidate or threaten someone. The bill bumps it up to a third degree felony if the person creates a webpage in someone else's name with the same malicious intent or if they intended to solicit a response from emergency personnel.

Illegal Firearm Smuggling

Along with the recent increase of transnational gang activity along the border, there has been a parallel increase of firearm smuggling from Texas to Mexico . Both the United States and Texas government have put pressure on Mexico to curtail this violence; however, the difficulty in decreasing violence stems from the seemingly free flow of firearms into Mexico . In 2007, half of the 14,111 firearms seized in Mexico originated from Texas cities. This stream of illegal weapons has contributed to the violence, yet until this legislative session, no state statute addressed this situation. Senate Bill 2225 creates a third degree felony offense for transporting an illegally acquired firearm and will go into effect on September 1, 2009.

Street Gang Intelligence Database

An additional effort to curb gang violence led to the passage of Senate Bill 418, which requires local law enforcement agencies, in cities with a population over 50,000, to compile and maintain information related to criminal street gangs. Currently, there is a statewide database maintained by the Texas Department of Public Safety, but it will now include any information gathered at the local level. Since there are thousands of different street gangs, having a centralized database with information available to local authorities will allow law enforcement to better equip and prepare themselves for combating this activity.

GPS for Domestic Violence

In cases of domestic violence, more often than not, a victim does not know the physical location of their attacker. Even if the victim obtains a protective order, there is still nothing that prohibits the attacker from returning, and the victim has no way of knowing if that order has been violated until it is too late. House Bill 1506 grants a judge authority to require a defendant to wear a global positioning monitoring system device (GPS) and pay the associated fines as a condition of release on bond. The corresponding receptor would be given to the victim. The judge can order this GPS device for anyone charged with family violence, sexual assault, aggravated sexual assault, or stalking. The purpose of this legislation is to give victims enough time to alert law enforcement should their attacker violate the protective order and allow them the opportunity to escape to safety.

Stay tuned to LH Today for the next legislative update from Representative Vaught. Future articles will continue to highlight major legislation that passed during the 2009 legislative session.

If you have any questions regarding state matters, please feel free to contact Rep. Vaught's district office at (214) 370-8305 or his capitol office at (512) 463-0244.