Ted Poe: “I thank the gentleman for yielding time, and I thank him for having this Special Order regarding the dastardly crime of…”

“I thank the gentleman for yielding time, and I thank him for having this Special Order regarding the dastardly crime of sexual assault. I also want to thank my friend Mr. Costa from California for his work. We serve as cochairs on the Victims' Rights Caucus, and it is a caucus that does exactly what it says. We promote and advocate on behalf of crime victims throughout in the country here legislatively. Mr. Costa, as some of you may know his history from California and he was the author of the Three Strikes, You're Out law that many States now have adopted. It is good law, and I want to commend him for his work on the caucus and also his comments. Madam Speaker, I spent all my career before I came to Congress at the criminal courts building in Houston, first as a prosecutor and then about 22 years as a criminal court judge. I heard about 25,000 cases as a judge. I heard a lot as a prosecutor. All of those cases dealt with people, not just the defendant, but the victims of crime as well. I would like to talk about just one person. It happened a long time ago in a case I prosecuted. I am going to change the names to protect the privacy of the family of the victim. This young student went to one of our schools in Houston, Texas. She is working in the daytime, went to night school to get a second degree. She is driving home on one of our freeways at night. She had car trouble.…”