Make Texas Schools and Communities SaferThanks to tougher sentencing laws, more prisons, and increased community involvement in crime prevention, Texas is safer than it was at the beginning of the decade. Nevertheless, too many Texans still feel unsafe.
This report provides a series of recommendations designed to safeguard the lives and property of Texans, ease the difficulties faced by crime victims, improve the safety of our roads, and whenever possible, control the costs of criminal justice.
1. Stand Up for Crime Victims
Since the late 1970s, Texas has been in the vanguard of a national movement to provide greater legal protection and
assistance to crime victims and their families. In 1997, Texas voters capped 20 years of legislative action by passing a constitutional amendment that dedicates the state's Crime Victim's Compensation Fund to such assistance. Even so, victim's advocates complain that excessive paperwork, red tape, and other administrative burdens delay and often prevent the money from reaching those who need it.
Victim's advocates complain that excessive paperwork, red tape, and other administrative burdens delay and often prevent the money from reaching those who need it. Action: Provide state grants to local communities to provide services to victims of crime. By channeling dollars directly to local law enforcement and prosecutors' offices, the state could ensure more services reach individuals who need assistance more quickly. (See PS 1, Volume II.)
2. Make Our Streets Safer
Texas has one of the nation's worst records on drunk driving, and led the nation in alcohol-related traffic fatalities in 1997, with nearly 1,800 alcohol-related deaths. A drunk driver kills someone in Texas every seven hours and causes an injury every 17 minutes. This carnage entails staggering costs for health care and rehabilitation, police and judicial services, lost wages and productivity, and insurance payments.
Legislators have tightened restrictions on teenage drivers who have consumed alcohol and have revoked the licenses of drivers who fail or refuse to take chemical tests to measure their alcohol consumption. But the bar can and should be set higher.
Action: Deploy sobriety checkpoints, lower the blood alcohol legal limit to .08, and institute a one-year driver's license suspension for repeat DWI offenders. (See PS 2, Volume II.)
3. Create a Database to Track Juvenile Gangs
The state's Office of the
Attorney General estimates that Texas may have as many as 145,000 youth gang members. Studies have shown that these gangs are closely associated with violent and criminal activity. Particularly disturbing is the fact that gangs are spilling over into Texas public schools, where nearly 9,000 incidents of gang-related violence were reported in the 1997 school year.
"One of the most important goals of any government--perhaps the most important--is to ensure the safety and well-being of our citizens." Carole Keeton Rylander
Action: Authorize the Texas Department of Public Safety to create a statewide electronic database on known gang members to be used by local police forces. This database also would allow Texas to participate in the federal government's National Crime Information Database and share information on convicted criminals with other law enforcement agencies around the nation. (See PS 4, Volume II.)
4. Toughen Penalties for Spousal Abuse
National studies have found that persons who repeatedly assault their spouses seldom go to jail. Texas is no exception to this pattern. In fact, the state is particularly lenient toward spousal violence. Unlike many other states, Texas does not even require minimum jail time for repeat offenders.
Action: Require first-time offenders of spousal abuse to take part in a battering intervention program; subsequent violations should result in mandatory jail time. (See PS 6, Volume II.)
5. Enhance Penalties for Sex Offenders
Sex offenders are considered to be among the most dangerous of all criminals because they are particularly likely to repeat their crimes. Surprisingly often, sex offenders in Texas receive deferred adjudication and continue to live in their communities. Even more shocking is the fact that they are more likely to receive deferred adjudication if their victim is a child, despite the public horror over such acts.[3]
Action: Enhance penalties for offenders who repeatedly commit misdemeanor sex offenses or who "graduate" to felony offenses after a previous history of misdemeanors. These enhancements would increase the gravity of felony charges and upgrade a third misdemeanor offense to a state jail felony, thus moving predators off our streets and away from our children. (See PS 7, Volume II.)
State law also should require regular treatment and monitoring for any sex offender placed on deferred adjudication. In the case of the most hardened and sexually violent criminals, Texas should follow the lead of recent Kansas legislation by creating a civil commitment procedure by which felons can be monitored after their sentences are completed, until they no longer represent a threat to society. (See PS 8, Volume II.)
Endnotes
3 According to 1997 Office of Court Administration data, sex offenders whose victims were adults received deferred adjudication in 29 percent of all cases, while those who victimized children were granted deferred adjudication in 38 percent of all cases.
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