Governor Signs Bills
April 25, 2005
by Bill Wakeland, District 1

Indiana Governor Daniels has recently signed three bills, Senate Bill 98, Senate Bill 101, and Senate Bill 175 which will have an impact on probation.

Senate Bill 98 amends Indiana Code 35-38-2-3 and now permits a Judge to order execution of all or part of a probationer’s suspended sentence if the probationer violates their conditions of probation. Since the law used to state that the Judge could order the execution of the sentence that was suspended at the time of the initial sentencing, the Indiana Appellate Court had recently ruled that the Judge could only impose the entire sentence. Senate Bill 98 now allows the Court to impose all or part of the sentence.

Senate Bill 101 permits the Court to hold a new probation hearing and modify a probationer’s conditions of probation at any time during the probationary period. A motion to modify may be filed by the Probation Department or the Court. The modification hearing may be held even if the probationer has not violated their probation and without a petition to revoke probation being filed. This does not apply to the modification of a user’s fee payment.

Senate Bill 175 pertains to home detention. It allows a Court to order an offender on home detention to wear a monitoring device that can reliably determine the location of the offender. It also requires a sex offender or violent offender on home detention to use a device that can determine the offender’s precise location. This bill allows the use of a global positioning system satellite service.
For a copy of the complete Senate Bill, go to the quick link Access to Indiana Bill Watch.