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Tex. Local Government Code § 85.005

This is the official text of Tex. Local Government Code § 85.005, part of Texas’s Local Government Code — governs the powers and operations of Texas cities and counties.

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§ 85.005. GUARDS; PENALTY.

Official statutory text

(a) The sheriff may, with the approval of the commissioners court or, in the case of an emergency, with the approval of the county judge, employ a sufficient number of guards to ensure the safekeeping of prisoners and the security of a jail.

(b) In case of an emergency, a guard is subject to being called to duty by the sheriff.

(c) A person charged with the responsibility of enforcing this section commits an offense if the person violates the section. An offense under this section is a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of not less than $50 or more than $200.

Status: in_force · Read it on the official government site

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About this page: Statute text is reproduced from official government publishers via the Open US Law dataset (Vaquill AI, snapshot v2026.08, CC BY 4.0). Primary legislative text like this is public domain under the government-edicts doctrine (Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, 2020). We link every section back to its official source so you can verify it independently.