All Roll Calls
Yes: 105 • No: 49
FloridaHB 9032025HouseWALLET
Corrections
Sponsored By: Berny Jacques (Republican)
Signed by Governor
AppropriationCriminal Justice SubcommitteeJustice Budget SubcommitteeJudiciary CommitteeHouse CalendarFiscal Policy
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Bill Overview
Analyzed Economic Effects
11 provisions identified: 2 benefits, 5 costs, 4 mixed.
More mental health care for inmates
The Department of Corrections must provide inmates with mental health evaluations and suitable inpatient or outpatient care. Care must match each person’s needs and use the least restrictive suitable option. Inmates must be offered a chance to help write a treatment plan and get a copy before it begins. The law also defines secure crisis care and allows emergency medical treatment when an inmate cannot consent and treatment is needed to save life or prevent serious bodily harm.
Longer terms for firearm felonies
Courts must make qualifying minimum prison terms for firearm or destructive-device felonies run one after another. For a listed felony committed alongside a felony not covered by that rule, a court may also order the terms to run consecutively.
Rules for forced mental health treatment
A clinician can refer an inmate for involuntary examination, and the warden must transfer the inmate to a mental health treatment facility. Two qualified professionals must examine the inmate, and proceedings must begin within 10 calendar days after arrival. Courts can order placement and treatment for up to 6 months at a time, with renewals when legal tests remain met; hearings must occur within 14 days after a petition is filed. A doctor can order emergency psychiatric medicine for up to 72 hours, excluding weekends and legal holidays; if the inmate still does not consent, transfer must occur within 48 hours, excluding those days. Courts can also approve narrowly tailored treatment for repeated self-injury, with an emergency hearing within 5 calendar days; staff may use force only as allowed by law.
Care planning for inmates leaving prison
For an inmate scheduled for release who faces an involuntary inpatient placement petition, there is no filing fee. If the inmate has no lawyer, the court must appoint one within 1 court working day. The Department of Corrections can transport a person being released to a facility for examination or placement. Mental health records can be shared with state agencies to arrange aftercare and with a possible receiving facility upon request.
Commission members lose travel payments
Beginning July 1, 2025, members of the Florida Commission on Offender Review no longer receive per diem or travel payments under this provision for commission duties. The law gives no payment amount.
Corrections staff may use tracking devices
Corrections and juvenile-justice staff may install, place, or use tracking devices on people in their care, custody, or control while doing their jobs. A person may also use a tracking device when a court order authorizes it.
More execution methods allowed
The law allows executions by electrocution, lethal injection, or another method not deemed unconstitutional. If a listed court ruling occurs or the Department of Corrections finds lethal-injection chemicals impossible or impractical to obtain, the state must use a method not deemed unconstitutional.
Changes to private prison contracts
Beginning July 1, 2025, the Department of Corrections may keep dental, medical, psychological, or dietary services out of private contracts when it finds state delivery is in the state’s best interests. Private correctional-services contracts no longer have to meet the minority-participation requirements removed by this law.
New limits on prisoner lawsuits
Prisoners generally have one year to bring claims about confinement, measured from when the issue happened or was, or should have been, discovered. They must first complete available prison complaint steps, and courts must dismiss cases that are frivolous, malicious, fail to state a claim, or seek money from an immune defendant. State-court claims for mental or emotional injury generally require proof of physical injury or a qualifying sexual act. Indigent prisoners can defer court costs for challenges to disciplinary reports, but not for other criminal or related proceedings.
One corrections law section repealed
The law repeals a section of Florida corrections law. The provided text does not explain what that section covered, so its practical effects are unclear.
Inmates gain health care decision safeguards
The Department of Corrections must offer inmates a chance to record their health care wishes in an advance directive. The law presumes inmates can make health care decisions and sets rules for choosing a proxy when they cannot, including appointing an ombudsman when no eligible proxy is available in a nonhospital setting. Proxies must follow an inmate’s known wishes or choose what is best for the inmate, and may receive relevant medical records. Staff may use reasonable force to carry out an authorized health care decision under clinical supervision; certain people are protected from legal penalties when they carry out such decisions as the law allows.
Sponsors & Cosponsors
Sponsor
Berny Jacques
Republican • House
Cosponsors
Criminal Justice Subcommittee
Affiliation unavailable
Judiciary Committee
Affiliation unavailable
Roll Call Votes
Senate vote • 4/29/2025
Senate Floor Vote
Yes: 22 • No: 16
House vote • 4/16/2025
House Floor Vote
Yes: 83 • No: 33
Actions Timeline
Chapter No. 2025-81
5/23/2025Approved by Governor
5/22/2025Signed by Officers and presented to Governor
5/19/2025Ordered enrolled
4/29/2025HouseIn Messages
4/29/2025HouseCS passed; YEAS 26 NAYS 11 -SJ 641
4/29/2025SenateAmendment(s) failed (894320) -SJ 641
4/29/2025SenateRead 3rd time -SJ 638
4/29/2025SenatePlaced on 3rd reading -SJ 594
4/28/2025SenateRetained on Special Order Calendar -SJ 553
4/24/2025SenateTemporarily postponed, on 2nd Reading -SJ 543
4/24/2025SenateRead 2nd time -SJ 543
4/24/2025SenateSubstituted for CS/CS/SB 1604 -SJ 543
4/24/2025SenatePlaced on Calendar, on 2nd reading
4/24/2025SenateWithdrawn from Fiscal Policy -SJ 542
4/24/2025SenateReceived
4/22/2025SenateReferred to Fiscal Policy
4/16/2025SenateIn Messages
4/16/2025SenateCS passed; YEAS 83, NAYS 33
4/16/2025HouseRead 3rd time
4/16/2025HouseAdded to Third Reading Calendar
4/16/2025HousePlaced on 3rd reading
4/16/2025HouseRead 2nd time
4/16/2025HouseBill added to Special Order Calendar (4/16/2025)
4/10/2025HouseAdded to Second Reading Calendar
4/3/2025House
Bill Text
er
7/1/2025
c2
4/2/2025
c1
3/27/2025
Filed
2/21/2025