Alix Henry Sanders v. the State of Texas

• Court: Court of Appeals of Texas
• Decided: October 17, 2023
• Docket: 05-22-00599-CR
• Status: Published

Opinion

AFFIRMED and Opinion Filed October 17, 2023

In the Court of Appeals Fifth District of Texas at Dallas No. 05-22-00599-CR

ALIX HENRY SANDERS, Appellant V. THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee

On Appeal from the County Criminal Court No. 3 Dallas County, Texas Trial Court Cause No. MB17-34875

MEMORANDUM OPINION Before Justices Carlyle, Smith, and Kennedy Opinion by Justice Carlyle Alix Henry Sanders appeals from his conviction for driving while intoxicated.

We affirm in this memorandum opinion. See TEX. R. APP. P. 47.4.

Officers Brandon Bridge and Kyle Chaisson observed Mr. Sanders pull his

car over to the shoulder of southbound Loop 12 in Irving at 1:47 a.m. on September

14, 2017. According to Officer Bridge, Mr. Sanders remained on the shoulder “for

an inordinate amount of time with no hazards on.” Officer Bridge said the officers

pulled up behind the car and turned on their emergency lights so “no one smashe[d]

into the back of [the car], as intoxicated drivers often do.” As Officer Bridge approached the car, he smelled alcohol and noticed that the

driver’s window was down. Body camera footage showed Mr. Sanders asleep behind

the wheel, and Officer Bridge woke him by asking if he was alright and by knocking

on the car. Officer Bridge had to ask multiple times if Mr. Sanders was alright and

also asked if he knew where he was. Mr. Sanders did not know where he was when

he awoke, and Officer Bridge testified his “eyes were very bloodshot and glassy.”

Officer Bridge asked if Mr. Sanders had been drinking at all that night, and he

testified Mr. Sanders said, “yes,” although the response is not audible in the video.

Mr. Sanders asked if he was on 635, and Officer Bridge told him he was actually on

Loop 12. Mr. Sanders then stepped out of the car, as requested.

Once Mr. Sanders was outside the car, Officer Bridge again asked if he had

been drinking, and Mr. Sanders acknowledged he had two liquor drinks that night in

North Plano. Officer Bridge ran Mr. Sanders’s identification for warrants and then

administered standard field-sobriety tests (SFSTs), all of which Officer Bridge

testified Mr. Sanders failed. The body camera footage showed Mr. Sanders had

difficulty following Officer Bridge’s instructions, and had difficulty maintaining his

balance during the SFSTs.

Following the SFSTs, the officers asked Mr. Sanders a few more questions,

including why he was asleep on the side of the highway. Mr. Sanders replied that he

pulled over to urinate. Only a few minutes later, however, Mr. Sanders said he did

–2– not remember telling officers that he pulled over to urinate. At that point, the officers

arrested Mr. Sanders for driving while intoxicated.

Based on the evidence at trial, including testimony from Officers Bridge and

Chaisson, as well as their body camera footage, the jury convicted Mr. Sanders of

driving while intoxicated. The trial court sentenced him to 120 days’ confinement,

suspended for one year with community supervision, and fined him $200.

On appeal, Mr. Sanders first argues the trial court erred by denying his motion

to suppress all evidence because the officers lacked reasonable suspicion to approach

and detain him to investigate an offense. The State counters that the officers were

serving a community-caretaking function when they approached Mr. Sanders and

thus did not need reasonable suspicion to initiate contact with him.

Police officers “have multiple responsibilities, only one of which is the

enforcement of criminal law.” Byram v. State, 510 S.W.3d 918, 920 (Tex. Crim.

App. 2017) (quoting Debra Livingston, Police, Community Caretaking, and the

Fourth Amendment, 1998 U. CHI. LEGAL F. 261, 261). The law contemplates that

officers will, among other things, “aid individuals who are in danger of physical

harm,” “facilitate the movement of people and vehicles,” and “assist people who

cannot care for themselves.” Id. To that end, officers “may stop and assist an

individual whom a reasonable person—given the totality of the circumstances—

would believe is in need of help.” Id. at 922. When acting “in this community-

–3– caretaking role, they are not engaged in the often competitive enterprise of ferreting

out crime.” Id. at 920 (cleaned up).

But officers “may encounter crime while engaged in their community-

caretaking functions, and when they do, we expect them to take” appropriate action.

Id. If an officer seizes a person in the process of exercising community-caretaking

functions, the reasonableness of the “seizure sprouts from its dissociation from the

competitive enterprise of ferreting out crime.” Id. at 922. Consequently, “a police

officer may not properly invoke his community-caretaking function if he is primarily

motivated by a non-community caretaking purpose.” Id. (quoting Corbin v. State, 85

S.W.3d 272, 276–77 (Tex. Crim. App. 2002)).

Determining whether an officer properly invoked a community-caretaking

function involves a two-step inquiry: “(1) whether the officer was primarily

motivated by a community-caretaking purpose; and (2) whether the officer’s belief

that the individual needed help was reasonable.” Id. (quoting Gonzales v. State, 369

S.W.3d 851, 854–55 (Tex. Crim. App. 2012)). The initial inquiry is subjective and

presents a factual question that turns on the credibility and demeanor of the officer

testifying at the suppression hearing. Id. The second inquiry is an application-of-

law-to-fact question. Id. at 923.

When, as here, the trial court has not issued written findings of fact, we

assume “the trial court implicitly resolved all issues of historical fact and witness

credibility in the light most favorable to its ultimate ruling.” Id. at 922 (quoting State

–4– v. Saenz, 411 S.W.3d 488, 495 n.4 (Tex. Crim. App. 2013)). And [w]e give ‘almost

total deference’ to those findings of fact and credibility determinations.” Id. (quoting

State v. Mazuca, 375 S.W.3d 294, 307 (Tex. Crim. App. 2012)). We then review de

novo the trial court’s application of the law to those facts. Id.

Mr. Sanders argues the officers were not fulfilling a community-caretaking

function when they approached him because their primary intent was to investigate

a potential driving while intoxicated offense. But Officer Bridge testified at the

suppression hearing that he approached Mr. Sanders’s car because it presented a

traffic hazard, noting that “[i]t’s a vehicle on the side of the road with no hazards

on,” and because pulling over in that manner was suspicious under the

circumstances, explaining that he wanted to “make sure that everyone -- everything

was okay inside the car.” “Either way,” he said, “it’s a vehicle and it’s somewhere it

really shouldn’t be, and we’re just making sure the public is safe.”

Officer Bridge’s body camera footage shows that when he initially

approached Mr. Sanders, Mr. Sanders appeared unconscious, and Officer Bridge

asked him multiple times whether he was alright before asking any questions

concerning whether he had been drinking. And Officer Bridge testified

unequivocally that he did not “contact the vehicle thinking that anybody was drunk.”

Officer Bridge’s testimony that the car pulling over was “suspicious” and the

implication that there was a component of non-community-caretaking to his actions

does not sufficiently detract from the record evidence demonstrating that the primary

–5– motivation for contacting Mr. Sanders was community caretaking. Officer Bridge

explained his concern was that someone in the car might be deceased or in distress,

given that the driver pulled over onto the shoulder of a highway at almost 2:00 a.m.

without engaging the car’s hazards.

The trial court assessed Officer Bridge’s credibility and demeanor, and it

implicitly determined that the officers’ contact with Mr. Sanders was primarily

motivated by a community-caretaking purpose—a determination to which we owe

“almost total deference.” Id. And the evidence sufficiently supports the trial court’s

implicit determination in that regard. We thus turn to the second inquiry—whether

it was objectively reasonable for Officer Bridge to believe someone in Mr. Sanders’s

car needed assistance. See id. at 923.

The court of criminal appeals has provided a non-exclusive list of

considerations relevant to this determination, including: (1) “the nature and level of

distress exhibited by the individual”; (2) the individual’s location; (3) whether the

individual was alone or had access to independent assistance; and (4) the extent to

which the individual—if not assisted—presented a danger to himself or others. Id.

Here, Officer Bridge observed Mr. Sanders pull onto the shoulder of a highway at

nearly 2:00 a.m., staying there for “an inordinate amount of time” without engaging

the car’s hazards. It was objectively reasonable for Officer Bridge to believe an

individual in the car needed assistance—whether medical or mechanical. And it was

objectively reasonable for Officer Bridge to believe that, absent the officers’

–6– intervention, the car would present a danger both to any individuals inside the car

and to other motorists. It was thus objectively reasonable for the officers to approach

the car, engage their emergency lights, and offer assistance.

As Officer Bridge approached the car, he noticed Mr. Sanders was

unconscious behind the wheel. See Jones v. State, No. 05-16-00201-CR, 2017 WL

1549232, at *4–5 (Tex. App.—Dallas Apr. 28, 2017, pet. ref’d) (mem. op., not

designated for publication) (concluding it was objectively reasonable for officer to

check on parked vehicle and intervene after finding defendant asleep behind the

wheel); see also Velazquez v. State, No. 02-22-00041-CR, 2023 WL 1860002, at *4

(Tex. App.—Fort Worth Feb. 9, 2023, no pet.) (mem. op., not designated for

publication) (“An officer who . . . observes a person asleep or unconscious in a

parked vehicle . . . has an objectively reasonable basis for believing that the person

is in distress and needs help.”). Officer Bridge asked multiple times if Mr. Sanders

was alright, and Mr. Sanders did not know where he was when he awoke. Officer

Bridge testified at the suppression hearing that he smelled alcohol and that Mr.

Sanders’s “eyes were very bloodshot and glassy.” The trial court did not err by

concluding the officers, while properly invoking their community-caretaking

functions, developed reasonable suspicion to detain Mr. Sanders and investigate a

possible driving while intoxicated offense. See id.

Mr. Sanders next contends the trial court erred by failing to exclude certain

statements he made after Officer Bridge administered the SFSTs, arguing that he

–7– was in custody at that point and made the statements without receiving the required

warnings under Miranda1 and code of criminal procedure article 38.22. It is

undisputed that the officers did not provide the warnings. But the only statements

Mr. Sanders identifies as necessitating exclusion are his statements that he pulled

over to urinate and then that he did not remember telling officers he had pulled over

to urinate.2 We need not decide whether Mr. Sanders was in custody when he made

those statements because if the trial court erred by failing to exclude them, we are

convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that any error did not affect Mr. Sanders’s

conviction or punishment. See TEX. R. APP. P. 44.2(a).

The key inquiry in determining whether constitutional error is harmless is

whether “there was a reasonable possibility that the error . . . moved the jury from a

state of nonpersuasion to one of persuasion” on the relevant issue. See Wesbrook v.

State, 29 S.W.3d 103, 119 (Tex. Crim. App. 2000). We consider several non-

exclusive factors including the error’s nature, the extent to which the State

emphasized the error, the error’s probable implications, the weight the jury would

likely give the error in its deliberations, and the presence of “overwhelming

evidence.” Snowden v. State, 353 S.W.3d 815, 818 (Tex. Crim. App. 2011). In the

1 See Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966). 2 Mr. Sanders also appears to complain generally that Officer Bridge testified Mr. Sanders “lost track of his thoughts” after the SFSTs and that Officer Bridge used Officer Chiasson’s post-SFST questioning to “bolster” his own testimony. But Mr. Sanders did not timely object to Officer Bridge’s testimony on these grounds and has thus failed to preserve any issue as to whether the testimony violated his Fifth Amendment or statutory rights. See TEX. R. APP. P. 33.1(a). –8– Miranda context, we must “judge the magnitude of the error in light of the evidence

as a whole to determine the degree of prejudice to the defendant resulting from that

error.” Jones v. State, 119 S.W.3d 766, 777 (Tex. Crim. App. 2003).

Here, apart from Mr. Sanders’s conflicting statements about pulling over to

urinate, the jury received evidence that the officers saw Mr. Sanders pull his car over

to the side of the highway, that he was asleep behind the wheel with his window

open, and that he was confused about where he was when he was awakened. Officer

Bridge testified that he “smelled a very large amount of alcohol inside the interior

of the cabin,” that Mr. Sanders slurred his speech, and that he “seemed dehydrated,

lethargic, and his eyes were very bloodshot and glassy.” Video evidence shows that

Mr. Sanders admitted that he had two liquor drinks that night in Plano; notably he

was stopped at 2:00 a.m. on the shoulder of Loop 12 in Irving on his way to

Mansfield. And Officer Bridge testified that Mr. Sanders failed all three field

sobriety tests—testimony corroborated to varying extents by the video evidence.

Indeed, the video shows Mr. Sanders had difficulty following basic instructions and

that he could not maintain his balance during the tests.

With respect to Mr. Sanders’s conflicting statements about pulling over to

urinate, the State mentioned them only once during closing, arguing they were

evidence that Mr. Sanders drove the car—a fact for which there was significant

additional evidence. The State did not argue that Mr. Sanders’s statements were

evidence of intoxication. Considering the evidence as a whole, we see no reasonable

–9– possibility that Mr. Sanders’s conflicting statements about pulling the car over to

urinate “moved the jury from a state of nonpersuasion to one of persuasion” as to

whether he drove the car while intoxicated. See Wesbrook, 29 S.W.3d at 119; see

also Funes v. State, 630 S.W.3d 175, 183 (Tex. App.—El Paso 2020, no pet.)

(assuming Miranda violation but concluding any error was harmless given the

minimal emphasis by the State and the other “significant” evidence establishing

defendant’s guilt for driving while intoxicated). Nor do we see any reasonable

possibility that the statements adversely affected Mr. Sanders’s punishment, which

was limited to community supervision. See TEX. R. APP. P. 44.2(a).

We affirm the trial court’s judgment.

/Cory L. Carlyle/ 220599f.u05 CORY L. CARLYLE Do Not Publish JUSTICE TEX. R. APP. P. 47.2(b)

–10– Court of Appeals Fifth District of Texas at Dallas JUDGMENT

ALIX HENRY SANDERS, On Appeal from the County Criminal Appellant Court No. 3, Dallas County, Texas Trial Court Cause No. MB17-34875. No. 05-22-00599-CR V. Opinion delivered by Justice Carlyle. Justices Smith and Kennedy THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee participating.

Based on the Court’s opinion of this date, the judgment of the trial court is AFFIRMED.

Judgment entered this 17th day of October, 2023.

–11–