New Texas Bill Would Prevent Violent Offenders from Getting Bond

The bill is expected to be signed this morning by Governor Abbott and is a massive change to the bail system in our state.

Back in 2017, Texas Trooper Damon Allen was shot and killed by Debrett Black who was able to get out on a $15,000 bond. Many people thought this was wrong since Debrett had previously been convicted for assaulting a public servant and had been arrested for evading arrest and aggravated assault on a public servant. The Justice of the Peace who released Black on bond said he had no information on his long history of violence against law-enforcement.

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For the past few years, politicians have been working to prevent something like this from ever happening again in Texas. Senate Bill 6 is also known as the Damon Allen Act. The law would prohibit people charged with violent offenses from getting bond to be released on bail. The bill also requires a defendant to be granted or denied bail within 48 hours of their arrest and that the defendants criminal history be examined before setting bail.

Governor Abbott says this going to help fix what he believes is Texas broken bail system. As of this writing, Greg Abbott is currently talking about the bill and is in the process of signing it. If you want to tune in live and watch, you can do so here. Hopefully this keeps truly violent offenders behind bars in Texas.