Justia Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Opinion Summaries

Appellant, a member of the Houston-area SPPL street gang, gathered a group of gang members and entered the apartment of Rafael Sanchez Cantu and Abelardo Sanchez to attempt to steal money and drugs. In the course of the robbery, both Cantu and Sanchez were shot and killed. Appellant gave a fellow gang member, Jessica Perez, the T-shirt he had worn during the crime and asked her to wash it. She did not. Instead, she informed the police who then recovered the shirt from Perez and sent it to Identigene, a private forensic laboratory, for DNA testing. DNA testing of a bloodstain on appellant’s shirt matched one of the victims. At trial, the State called Robin Freeman, the forensic-laboratory director for Identigene, to testify about the DNA analyses in appellant’s case. The record was unclear about whether Freeman herself created a report based on her opinions, but even if she did, the State did not admit any such report into evidence. The State offered only Freeman’s opinion testimony. Appellant objected, arguing that he was entitled to cross-examine the people who actually conducted the testing on which the expert opinion was based. The trial judge overruled appellant’s objection, and appellant was ultimately convicted of capital murder and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. The issue raised on appeal to the Court of Criminal Appeals was whether the admission of a supervising DNA analyst’s opinion regarding a DNA match violated the Confrontation Clause when that opinion was based upon computer-generated data obtained through batch DNA testing. Neither the Texas Court nor the United States Supreme Court squarely answered this question. In this case, the Texas Court held that it did not. Consequently, the Court affirmed the court of appeals’ holding that the admission of the supervising analyst’s testimony did not violate the Confrontation Clause. View "Paderes v. Texas" on Justia Law

Appellant, Christopher Allen Phillips, was convicted of aggravated robbery. On appeal, Phillips argued that the trial court erred by failing to include an instruction in the jury charge pursuant to the jailhouse-witness corroboration statute. The appellate court held that the trial court did not err, concluding that Article 38.075(a) did not apply because the jailhouse witnesses did not testify to any statements made by Phillips that were “statements against [Phillips’] interest.” The Court of Criminal Appeals granted Phillips’ petition for review to examine that holding. Because the trial court should have included an article 38.075(a) instruction in the jury charge, the appellate court’s judgment was vacated and the case remanded for a harm analysis and to address the remaining issues raised on appeal. View "Phillips v. Texas" on Justia Law

Appellant Thomas Castillo was convicted of burglary and aggravated assault for his attack on his estranged wife and a man with whom she lived following separation. Appellant was charged in two separate indictments returned on the same day. All of the charges stemmed from the same incident. Before the capital-murder trial began, Appellant moved to consolidate the indictments and for the State to specify how the predicate burglary for the capital-murder charge was committed. The State objected, and the trial court 4 denied Appellant’s motions. At the charge conference, Appellant asked for lesser-included-offense instructions on murder and manslaughter, which the trial court denied. Appellant was subsequently acquitted of capital murder. After his acquittal, and before Appellant’s second trial for burglary and aggravated assault, Appellant filed a pretrial writ application arguing that the second prosecution was barred by double jeopardy. The trial court denied Appellant’s application, and he appealed. The San Antonio Court of Appeals reversed the decision of the trial court and remanded the cause for the second indictment to be dismissed. The State then filed a petition for discretionary review on three grounds, arguing that the court of appeals erred when it decided that the second prosecution of Appellant was jeopardy barred. Because we hold that the burglary charge is jeopardy barred, but the aggravated assault is not, we will affirm the judgment of the court of appeals in part and reverse it in part. View "Ex parte Thomas Castillo" on Justia Law

A taco-stand operator was shot and killed in Austin. The police recovered a soft-drink bottle that a witness said had been handled by the shooter. The fingerprint was matched to an individual who was variously known as Jose Rodriguez, Jorge Negron, and Pablo Jaimes. This individual was, in fact, appellee Adelfo Cruz. Detective Jeff Greenwalt, the lead homicide investigator assigned to the murder case, secured an arrest warrant for the murder. He called the United States Marshals’ Office in Chicago and asked them to arrest appellee on a Illinois DUI warrant but also requested that no mention be made of the Texas warrant or the homicide investigation. Appellee was arrested on the DUI warrant and taken to a jail in Berwyn, a suburb of Chicago. Appellee was booked by local law enforcement, who asked appellee’s name, date of birth, phone number, and address. The answers to these questions were written on a standard form. Appellee gave his name as Jorge Negron and gave an address and date of birth. He did not give his phone number on initial book-in, but a phone number was later added to the form. Detective Greenwalt and partner Detective Frank Rodriguez, traveled from Texas to Illinois to the Berwyn jail. Appellee was placed in an interview room, and his interview with the Texas detectives was recorded. Before giving Miranda warnings, Detective Rodriguez introduced himself and asked appellee for his address and phone number and asked whether he had a cell phone. After asking these questions and receiving appellee’s responses, Detective Rodriguez read appellee the Miranda warnings. Appellee then asked to speak to an attorney, and the interview was terminated. Detective Greenwalt acknowledged at the motion-to-suppress hearing (and the trial court found) that he wanted to obtain appellee’s phone number to assist in determining appellee’s true identity, and to show through cell tower information where the phone (if it was a cell phone) was located on the date of the Austin murder. After the interview, Detectives Greenwalt and Rodriguez went to the address listed on the Berwyn booking form, and obtained permission from appellee’s girlfriend to search the residence. Detectives found a cell phone that appellee used and had a number that matched the number given in the interview. During the search, detectives discovered appellee’s birth certificate with his true name and date of birth. After returning to Austin, Detective Greenwalt obtained phone records that showed the phone was in Austin on the date of the murder and that phone calls hit cell towers close to the crime scene. Appellee moved to suppress information detectives discovered after the search in Berwyn. The State appealed the trial court’s ruling that the interview was inadmissible. The State argued that the questions during the interview, specifically, the questions relating to the cell-phone number, fell within the “booking” exception to the Miranda rule. The court of appeals reversed the trial court's suppression order, finding that the questions asked fell under a related but distinct exception to Miranda involving “routine inquiries normally attendant to arrest and custody.” The court found that the exception was satisfied because the questions were purely biographical and did not relate to an element of murder and because nothing in the record indicated that Detective Rodriguez should have known that the questions were likely to elicit an incriminating response. The Court of Criminal Appeals reversed, finding that there was no showing on this record that the questions were in any way connected with the filling out of an administrative form, since that information had been previously given to Berwyn authorities when appellee was initially booked. As such, the circumstances surrounding the interrogation showed that the questions were not reasonably related to an administrative purpose. View "Texas v. Cruz" on Justia Law

In two capital-murder cases, Tyrone Allen sought a pretrial hearing requesting the trial judge determine whether he was intellectually disabled and therefore exempt from the death penalty if convicted. Over the State’s objection, the judge granted the motions for a pretrial hearing. The court of appeals granted the State mandamus relief, finding that the judge acted outside his authority. The Court of Criminal Appeals conditionally granted Allen’s petitions for writ of mandamus to the court of appeals. Because the Court found that Allen’s request for a pretrial determination of intellectual disability did not call for the execution of a ministerial act, the Court ordered the court of appeals to rescind its judgment conditionally granting the State’s (as Relator below) petitions for writ of mandamus. The writs of mandamus would issue only in the event that the court of appeals fails to comply with this opinion. View "In re Allen" on Justia Law

The issue this case presented for Court of Criminal Appeals' review centered on what effect granting a new punishment hearing had on a stacking order. Applicant was convicted of aggravated robbery and sentenced to life in prison. He was also convicted of possession of heroin and sentenced to sixty years. The trial court ordered that the heroin sentence be “stacked” onto the aggravated-robbery sentence. Applicant subsequently appealed his aggravated-robbery conviction, and the case was reversed and remanded for a new punishment hearing. At the new punishment hearing, he again received a life sentence, but the trial court did not issue a new stacking order with respect to the heroin sentence. Applicant argued on appeal that that the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) was treating his heroin sentence as if it were stacked onto the aggravated-robbery sentence. He claimed that once the aggravated-robbery case was reversed, it vanished for stacking purposes. In addition, he argued that because the trial court did not issue a new stacking order with respect to the heroin sentence when he was re-sentenced for the aggravated robbery, the heroin and aggravated-robbery sentences should run concurrently. The Court of Criminal Appeals concluded that the granting of a new punishment hearing removed the sentence from the stacking order. Because the trial court did not issue a new order stacking the new sentence in the re-sentenced case onto the sentence for an existing conviction, applicant’s sentences ran concurrently. View "Ex parte Vela" on Justia Law

On two separate occasions appellant was brought before the trial court on motions to revoke deferred adjudication community supervision and adjudicate guilt. The Court of Criminal Appeals granted discretionary review to determine whether the court of appeals properly held that due process prohibited the trial court from revoking appellant’s probation after the second revocation hearing, based on grounds that the trial court was aware of, but did not consider, at the first revocation hearing. Because the Court did not think appellant’s due process rights were violated under the facts of this case, it reversed the court of appeals. View "Tapia v. Texas" on Justia Law

Appellant Anthony Maldonado was convicted of twelve counts of aggravated sexual assault of a child and indecency with a child and sentenced to life in prison. The court of appeals vacated two of the convictions for indecency with a child on double jeopardy grounds and modified the judgment of the trial court. The State filed a petition for discretionary review, which the Court of Criminal Appeals granted to consider whether the subsumption theory of "Patterson v. Texas," (152 S.W.3d 88 (Tex. Crim. App. 2004)) was still valid and if so, whether a single count alleging sexual contact was subsumed by a count alleging penetration when there was evidence of multiple incidents of penetration which could have formed the basis for each count. The Court of Criminal Appeals concluded that the appellate court erred in following "Patterson," and instead should have followed "Loving v. Texas," (401 S. W.3d 642 (Tex. Crim. App. 2013)), "Patterson is properly applied when, under the facts of the case, the jury could not have found separate offenses or separate acts. [. . .] While it is true that penetration cannot physically occur in the absence of contact, the contact offenses here are not factually subsumed because there was evidence that separate and distinct indecency-by-contact offenses occurred at other times in addition to the contact associated with the penetration offenses. Thus, subsumption does not apply in this case. Here, there were many separate acts of both contact and penetration. Because the focus of sex offenses is the prohibited conduct and the legislature intended to allow separate punishments for each prohibited act, the multiple convictions do not violate the Double Jeopardy Clause." View "Maldonado v. Texas" on Justia Law

In November 2012, a sergeant from Harris County Sheriff’s Department received a tip from a "concerned citizen" that suspicious activity was taking place in a two-story house at 8603 Jubilee Drive in Houston. Police conducted covert surveillance of the house. A black Toyota SUV was parked outside; police found appellee driving the car after a subsequent traffic stop of the vehicle. Officers observed a strong odor of raw marijuana emanating from the car. At that point, the officer called for a narcotics-detection canine. After the dog alerted to the smell of raw marijuana at the front door of the suspected house, the magistrate issued a search warrant for 8603 Jubilee. Police executed the warrant and seized 358 marijuana plants from inside. Appellee was indicted for felony possession of marijuana in January 2013. After the execution of the search warrant, but before a hearing on the motion to suppress, the United States Supreme Court held in "Florida v. Jardines" that law-enforcement officers’ use of a drug-sniffing dog on the front porch of a home without a search warrant violated the Fourth Amendment. Consequently, the issue before the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals was whether the search-warrant affidavit–minus the drug-dog’s alert–clearly established probable cause. The trial judge held that it did not, and the court of appeals agreed. The Court of Criminal Appeals reversed because it found that, when looking at the warrant affidavit as a whole, the independently and lawfully acquired information stated in the affidavit clearly established probable cause. View "Texas v. Le" on Justia Law

In 2012, Appellant was convicted of the 1984 murder of Ginger Hayden. During Appellant’s trial, several people who had participated in substance-abuse treatment with him were permitted to testify that he had confessed to them that he had committed the murder. Appellant had filed a pretrial motion to suppress the testimony on the ground that, because his statements were made during the course of voluntary substance-abuse treatment, Article 38.101 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure and Rule of Evidence 509(b) made them inadmissible. The trial court, however, denied his motion because his participation was part of a court-ordered condition of probation and, therefore, not voluntary. The court of appeals affirmed. After review, the Court of Criminal Appeals concluded Appellant's participation in the substance-abuse program was not voluntary, and therefore it was not error to admit the testimony of the other participants in the program. View "Absalon v. Texas" on Justia Law