Bohannan v. State

546 S.W.3d 166
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Texas
DecidedNovember 22, 2017
DocketNO. PD-0347-15
StatusPublished
Cited by69 cases

This text of 546 S.W.3d 166 (Bohannan v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Bohannan v. State, 546 S.W.3d 166 (Tex. 2017).

Opinion

Walker, J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court.

Pursuant to Chapter 841 of the Health and Safety Code, a jury found Appellant Michael Wayne Bohannan to be a sexually violent predator. The trial court in that case adjudicated Appellant as a sexually violent predator and ordered him to be civilly committed for treatment.1 Appellant appealed the judgment of civil commitment, and while the appeal was pending he violated the civil commitment order. The *169court of appeals eventually reversed the judgment of civil commitment. Appellant was charged and convicted of violating the civil commitment order, and he was sentenced to life in prison. Because Appellant was required to follow the terms of the civil commitment order while the appeal of the judgment of civil commitment was pending, the court of appeals correctly affirmed his conviction. We affirm the judgment of the court of appeals.

Background

In 1982, Appellant rode his bicycle past K.C.'s home several times. Bohannan II , 388 S.W.3d at 299. Through a window, he watched her inside. Id. One evening, donning a ski mask and carrying a large knife, Appellant entered K.C.'s home through the rear door. Id. He walked down the hallway past a room in which a child was sleeping and entered K.C.'s bedroom, where she was lying on the bed and reading a newspaper. Id. Appellant orally and vaginally raped her and then left. Id. Appellant would later testify in his civil commitment case that he thought he would get some satisfaction or self-fulfillment out of raping K.C. Id. In some way, he also expected K.C. to "like being raped." Id.

Some three weeks later, Appellant was driving around on his lunch break when he saw P.H. enter her home. Id. He stopped, put on his ski mask, picked up his knife, and walked through the front door. Id. Inside, P.H. was with a group of children. Id. Appellant forced P.H. to move the children to another room, and then he orally and vaginally raped P.H. in her bedroom. Id. As with the earlier rape of K.C., Appellant thought he would get some satisfaction from raping P.H. and "maybe ... feel more of a man." Id.

Appellant was apprehended, and in 1983, he pleaded guilty to two counts of aggravated rape with a deadly weapon and was sentenced to twenty years imprisonment.2 Id. In 1991, Appellant was released on mandatory supervision. Id. In April 1992, he was charged with attempting to kidnap a nine year old girl in a K-Mart store. Id. at 299-300. He pleaded guilty to the new charge in February 1993, his mandatory supervision was revoked, and he returned to prison. Id.

In 1998, Appellant was again released on mandatory supervision, and in 2000, he moved to South Carolina to live with his mother. Id. at 300. While there, he was convicted of exposing his genitals to an eight year old girl in a toy store, and he was sentenced to three years imprisonment. Id. In 2002, Appellant's mandatory supervision was again revoked, and he returned to prison in Texas. Id.

In 2004, Appellant was released on mandatory supervision for a third time. Id. Two years later in 2006, he was caught viewing child pornography on a county law library computer, even though he was enrolled in sex offender therapy at the time, and his mandatory supervision was again revoked. Id. After a psychologist reported that Appellant was a sexually violent predator, the State petitioned for him to be civilly committed. Id. A civil commitment trial was held in which the State had two experts testify. Id. at 301. However, Appellant's designated expert was not permitted to testify. Id. The jury determined that Appellant suffered from a behavioral abnormality, as defined in the sexually violent *170predator statute, and the trial court accordingly adjudicated Appellant as a sexually violent predator and ordered Appellant to be civilly committed. Id. at 302. Appellant appealed this decision. See In re Commitment of Bohannan , 379 S.W.3d 293 (Tex. App.-Beaumont 2010) (mem. op.) ( Bohannan I ).

Meanwhile, he was transferred to the supervision of the Council on Sex Offender Treatment. Bohannan v. State , No. 09-13-00090-CR, 2014 WL 5490936 (Tex. App.-Beaumont Oct. 29, 2014) (mem. op., not designated for publication) ( Bohannan III ).3 Under the civil commitment order, Appellant was required to reside in a secured residential facility and to comply with the written requirements of the Council of Sex Offender Treatment and the case manager assigned to his case. Id. , at *1. The written requirements instructed Appellant to comply with the rules of the residential facility. Id. , at *2. The civil commitment order also required Appellant to wear a GPS monitor, be subject to monitoring, and comply with the written instructions for the monitoring system, which required Appellant to be tracked twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Id. Appellant's tracking device consisted of three parts: an ankle bracelet, a miniature tracking device (MTD) that Appellant would carry with him throughout the day, and a charging station for the MTD. Rep. R. vol. 3, 45-46, vol. 4, 15. The MTD itself reported Appellant's GPS location information, and the bracelet was simply a means of ensuring that the MTD was with Appellant at all times and that Appellant's tracking data was accurate. Rep. R. vol. 4, 17-18. If the bracelet and the MTD were too far apart, a bracelet gone alert would be sent by the MTD to Appellant's case manager, indicating that the bracelet and Appellant, who would be wearing the bracelet, were no longer near the MTD and were not being tracked. Rep. R. vol. 4, 18-19. Bracelet gone alerts were considered to be violations of the monitoring system requirements, which themselves would be violations of the civil commitment order. Rep. R. vol. 3, 46. The MTD regularly needed to be recharged in the base charging station, and while it was charging Appellant would have to stay close to the MTD or else trigger a bracelet gone alert. Rep. R. vol. 3, 43.

On February 14, 2009, the MTD generated a "bracelet gone" alert. Bohannan III , 2014 WL 5490936, at *2. Further alerts were generated on March 2, 8, 18, and 27, 2009. Rep. R. vol. 3, 47. Most of the alerts were for a couple of minutes, and Appellant claimed that he was asleep during those alerts or that the MTD was malfunctioning. Rep. R. vol. 3, 49-57. However, the March 18 alert lasted for seventeen minutes, and Appellant's explanation was that he left the MTD in his room and went to another part of the facility. Bohannan III

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Bluebook (online)
546 S.W.3d 166, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bohannan-v-state-texcrimapp-2017.