Taylor v. Texas

Appellant Henry Taylor, Jr. was convicted of theft following a contract dispute he had over the installation of some commercial signs. Jeff Reich owned a construction company in Longview, and he also owned certain commercial properties in Longview and Kilgore. For several years, Reich had done business with the appellant and appellant’s father, who ran several commercial sign businesses, and Reich had been satisfied with their work. The father stepped down from the business and turned over operations to appellant. Through Reich’s office manager, Vicki Yocum, appellant negotiated a deal by which he agreed to order four LED signs and install them at two of Reich’s commercial properties. When a significant time had passed and Yocum continued to hear nothing from appellant, she began to “hound” him, mostly via text messages, but appellant remained evasive. Frustrated that the LED signs had still not been installed at his properties, Reich contacted the police. Appellant discovered that a warrant had been issued for his arrest, and he turned himself in. Appellant argued that he was convicted of theft solely because his apparent “ineptitude” prevented him from adequately fulfilling his contractual obligations. In a published split decision, the Court of Appeals affirmed appellant’s conviction for theft in an amount between $1,500 and $20,000, a state-jail felony. The majority found that the evidence would support a rational inference that, by the time the appellant took a second installment payment on the contract in the amount of $10,000, on a false premise, he had formulated the requisite intent to deprive his customer of that amount. The dissent argued that the evidence, while certainly sufficient to support the inference that the money was taken under false pretenses, was insufficient to show that the appellant ever intended to renege on the contract. In light of this disagreement among the appellate justices, the Court of Criminal Appeals granted the appellant’s petition for discretionary review and, finding no error with the outcome, affirmed the court of appeals’ judgment. View "Taylor v. Texas" on Justia Law