HBA-JRA C.S.H.B. 3243 76(R)BILL ANALYSIS


Office of House Bill AnalysisC.S.H.B. 3243
By: Green
Agriculture & Livestock
4/16/1999
Committee Report (Substituted)



BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE 

Currently, exotic livestock and exotic fowl are not included in the list of
animals which an owner can protect by killing or injuring an animal that
kills or injures the owner's exotic livestock or fowl. C.S.H.B. 3243
provides that killing or injuring an animal is defensible if that animal
injures or kills a person's livestock or exotic fowl. 

RULEMAKING AUTHORITY

It is the opinion of the Office of House Bill Analysis that this bill does
not expressly delegate any additional rulemaking authority to a state
officer, department, agency, or institution. 

SECTION BY SECTION ANALYSIS

SECTION 1.  Amends Section 42.09(e), Penal Code, to provide that it is a
defense to prosecution for killing, injuring, or administering poison to an
animal, other than cattle, horses, sheep, swine, or goats, belonging to
another without legal authority or the owner's effective consent, that the
animal was discovered on the person's property in the act of or immediately
after injuring or killing the person's exotic livestock or exotic fowl as
defined by Section 142.001 (Definitions), Agriculture Code. 

SECTION 2.  Makes application of this Act prospective.

SECTION 3.  Effective date: September 1, 1999.

SECTION 4.  Emergency clause.

COMPARISON OF ORIGINAL TO SUBSTITUTE

The substitute modifies the original in SECTION 1 by restoring the language
of the statute that in order to be a defense to prosecution, a person must
kill or injure an animal, which at the time of the discovery was in the act
or immediately after the act of killing the person's own livestock, exotic
livestock, or exotic fowl.