By Mike Ward
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Legislative leaders are quietly looking to eliminate deferred judgment
and to allow judges to better tailor criminals' community supervision as part of sweeping reforms of the Texas probation system,
officials confirmed Wednesday.
Senate Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John Whitmire, D-Houston,
said he expects to announce details of the overhaul plan in about two weeks, after members of a Senate working group of judges,
prosecutors, probation officials and others finalize them. In the House, Corrections Committee Chairman Jerry Madden, R-Richardson,
said he plans to form a separate working group next week to study similar changes, plus facilities issues.
"We're looking at everything, top to bottom," Whitmire said. "If we're
going to expand the system like we've been talking about, we've got to make sure the system has all the components it needs
to work. We're looking at everything."
Added Madden: "Where we are right now, I think the final changes may
be greater than we thought earlier."
The first piece of the Senate's reform package was unanimously approved
Wednesday by Whitmire's committee. That bill would require county probation programs to adopt progressive sanctions, under
which criminals who commit new crimes or break probation rules get increasingly strict supervision each time they go off track.
Among the changes under discussion in the Senate or House are:
• Abolishing deferred adjudication, or judgment, in which offenders
are given probation with the understanding that they can avoid a criminal record if they don't break the law again. Instead,
probation would become the single alternative for a criminal conviction that does not include prison time.
• Allowing for shorter probation periods. Whitmire and other officials
suggest that offenders who obey the rules and have been rehabilitated are serving too many uneeded and expensive years on
probation.
• Streamlining the current state restrictions on probationers from
more than 60 to about a dozen. Doing so, legislative leaders argue, could give judges greater flexibility in tailoring probation
plans to individual offenders.
• Allowing for new ways to terminate probation early for Texans
who comply with the rules and remain law-abiding. Disagreement remains over whether judges should sign off on each early termination
or whether it could occur automatically when there are no infractions or issues with an offender's behavior.
"I like having the probationers initiate it so they can show what they've
done," Madden said.
Since January, lawmakers have been looking for ways to slow the increasing
flow of convicts into an already-full prison system. By expanding and enhancing probation programs with more than $62 million
in additional money for community-based supervision and treatment programs, they hope to avoid building hundreds of millions
of dollars worth of new prisons.
Whitmire and Madden said Wednesday that the more sweeping probation changes
being considered are an outgrowth of budget considerations. "But they're also a desire to make our system better, rather than
just putting more money into it," Whitmire said.
Deferred judgment was enacted less than 30 years ago as a way for judges
to entice first-time offenders and those who committed less serious crimes to do right, officials said. Instead, say some
judges and probation officials, it has become another form of probation that is plagued by many of the same problems: failure
to report as required; continued drug use; new crimes; and other rules infractions.
During testimony Wednesday, Sen. Royce West, D-Dallas, said his sanctions
bill is designed to curb those types of violations with a pilot program.
"Progressive sanctions have worked well in several counties," West said.
"We're taking what's working and taking it statewide."
State District Judge John Creuzot of Dallas said progressive sanctions
and other changes would improve probation programs by allowing judges to tailor the supervision of offenders.
In Fort Bend County, outside of Houston, a special sanctions program
has reduced the number of revocations for rules violations — not new crimes — by 62 percent since last fall.
"There were 10,000 technical violators revoked last year to prison,"
Whitmire said. "We need to focus the resources we have on the people who need it the most, and that's going to require some
changes in the current system."
Though details of the Senate plan need to be firmed up, judges in past
weeks have generally expressed support for many of the changes that would give them more flexibility in sentencing and supervision.
Some prosecutors have been supportive, but others are wary of changes
that might give criminals the chance to commit new crimes after they had avoided prison.
