Bradley Wayne Thomas v. the State of Texas

• Court: Court of Appeals of Texas
• Decided: November 27, 2024
• Docket: 02-24-00044-CR
• Status: Published

Opinion

In the Court of Appeals Second Appellate District of Texas at Fort Worth ___________________________

No. 02-24-00044-CR ___________________________

BRADLEY WAYNE THOMAS, Appellant

V.

THE STATE OF TEXAS

On Appeal from County Criminal Court No. 1 Denton County, Texas Trial Court No. CR-2020-01729-A

Before Sudderth, C.J.; Birdwell and Walker, JJ. Memorandum Opinion by Justice Birdwell MEMORANDUM OPINION

A jury convicted Appellant Bradley Wayne Thomas of Class A misdemeanor

assault against a family member.1 Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 22.01(a)(1), (b). In one

issue, Thomas asserts that the evidence is insufficient to support his conviction. We

disagree and affirm the trial court’s judgment.

I. BACKGROUND

In December 2019, Thomas lived with the complaining witness (C.W.) and her

children, as well as other members of Thomas’s family.2 Thomas and C.W. are the

parents of the youngest of C.W.’s children. She also has an older child, a son, who

lived with them.

On December 27, Thomas and C.W. began a text message argument that lasted

into the next day. After Thomas sent C.W. some text messages that she ignored, he

came into her bedroom where she was sitting on the bed and started screaming. The

argument escalated. Thomas called C.W. a “bitch,” and C.W. made an obscene

gesture at Thomas. Thomas raised a hand as if to hit C.W., and C.W. turned her head.

According to C.W., Thomas then struck or slapped her on the back of her head;

although she felt the “smack[]” she did not see it.

The court made a finding of family violence under Code of Criminal 1

Procedure Article 42.013. See Tex. Fam. Code Ann. §§ 71.003, .005 2 We use this pseudonym to protect the identity of C.W.’s and Thomas’s minor children. See Tex. R. App. P. 9.10.

2 C.W. tried to call the police, but she and Thomas began to wrestle over her

phone. She slid off the side of the bed, and Thomas left the room with her phone.

C.W. called out to her son, who was also in the house, for help; screamed for him to

call 911; and fled, eventually attempting to hide in a bathroom with her son.

While C.W. tried to lock the bathroom door, Thomas forced it open. The door

hit C.W. in the face and slammed her head against the wall, which chipped her tooth

and caused welts on the front and back of her head. Thomas charged into the

bathroom and took C.W.’s son’s phone away from him.

At some point in the fight, a call connected to 911, 3 transmitting the sound of

C.W. and Thomas loudly yelling at one another. C.W. can be heard on the recording

of the 911 call telling Thomas that he hit her and slammed her head against the door;

Thomas responds that he pushed the door open, but it did not hit her.

After Thomas came into the bathroom, C.W. started screaming as loudly as she

could, got between him and her son, and opened the window. C.W. helped her son

climb out of the window and attempted to follow him out. Thomas grabbed her wrist

and pulled her back in, but she then fled out the window. C.W. and her son left the

house in their car and flagged down an officer who was responding to the emergency

call at the residence.

3 C.W.’s child denied calling 911; he said that he put the numbers into his phone but was too scared to hit the send button. C.W. had also yelled for “Alexa,” the digital assistant application, to call 911.

3 During the investigation, Denton County Sheriff’s Deputy James Ward saw

marks on C.W. that he found were consistent with her description of the bathroom

door’s hitting her and causing bumps on the front and back of her head and chipping

her tooth. She also told him that Thomas had hit her on the back of her head with his

right hand while her head had been turned to the left, a maneuver Deputy Ward at the

time thought would be physically and logically impossible. Nevertheless, deputies

arrested Thomas because of C.W.’s observable injuries.

At trial, the jury heard testimony from the Denton County dispatcher who took

the 911 call, C.W., C.W.’s son, the four officers who responded to the 911 call, and

Thomas. Thomas denied hitting C.W. and denied raising his voice. Thomas claimed

that he had raised his hand in a dismissive “knock it off” motion, which he described

to investigating officers as a “faux hit.” He admitted wrestling the phone away from

C.W. after she said she would call 911 and testified that, by the time of trial, he knew

he had committed a crime4 by doing so. The State questioned him at length about

inconsistencies between his testimony at trial and his statements recorded on police

body cameras on the day.

II. DISCUSSION

Thomas raises a single issue challenging the sufficiency of the evidence to

prove that he struck C.W. with his hand; that C.W. suffered bodily injury from being

4 See Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 42.062. Thomas was not charged with the offense of interfering with a 911 call.

4 struck with the door; and that he intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly caused her

bodily injury by opening the door.

A. STANDARD OF REVIEW

In our evidentiary-sufficiency review, we view all the evidence in the light most

favorable to the verdict to determine whether any rational factfinder could have found

the crime’s essential elements beyond a reasonable doubt. Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S.

307, 319, 99 S. Ct. 2781, 2789 (1979); Queeman v. State, 520 S.W.3d 616, 622 (Tex.

Crim. App. 2017). This standard gives full play to the factfinder’s responsibility to

resolve conflicts in the testimony, to weigh the evidence, and to draw reasonable

inferences from basic facts to ultimate facts. See Jackson, 443 U.S. at 319, 99 S. Ct. at

2789; Harrell v. State, 620 S.W.3d 910, 914 (Tex. Crim. App. 2021).

The factfinder alone judges the evidence’s weight and credibility. See Tex. Code

Crim. Proc. Ann. art. 38.04; Martin v. State, 635 S.W.3d 672, 679 (Tex. Crim. App.

2021). We may not re-evaluate the evidence’s weight and credibility and substitute our

judgment for the factfinder’s. Queeman, 520 S.W.3d at 622. Instead, we determine

whether the necessary inferences are reasonable based on the evidence’s cumulative

force when viewed in the light most favorable to the verdict. Braughton v. State, 569

S.W.3d 592, 608 (Tex. Crim. App. 2018); see Villa v. State, 514 S.W.3d 227, 232 (Tex.

Crim. App. 2017) (“The court conducting a sufficiency review must not engage in a

‘divide and conquer’ strategy but must consider the cumulative force of all the

evidence.”). We must presume that the factfinder resolved any conflicting inferences

5 in favor of the verdict, and we must defer to that resolution. Braughton, 569 S.W.3d at

608.

To determine whether the State has met its burden to prove a defendant’s guilt

beyond a reasonable doubt, we compare the crime’s elements as defined by a

hypothetically correct jury charge to the evidence adduced at trial. Hammack v. State,

622 S.W.3d 910, 914 (Tex. Crim. App. 2021); see also Febus v. State, 542 S.W.3d 568,

572 (Tex. Crim. App. 2018) (“The essential elements of an offense are determined by

state law.”). Such a charge is one that accurately sets out the law, is authorized by the

indictment, does not unnecessarily increase the State’s burden of proof or restrict the

State’s theories of liability, and adequately describes the particular offense for which

the defendant was tried. Hammack, 622 S.W.3d at 914. The law as authorized by the

indictment means the statutory elements of the offense as modified by the charging

instrument’s allegations. Curlee v. State, 620 S.W.3d 767, 778 (Tex. Crim. App. 2021);

see Rabb v. State, 434 S.W.3d 613, 616 (Tex. Crim. App. 2014) (“When the State pleads

a specific element of a penal offense that has statutory alternatives for that element,

the sufficiency of the evidence will be measured by the element that was actually

pleaded, and not any alternative statutory elements.”).

Here, to convict Thomas of Class A misdemeanor assault, the jury had to

determine beyond a reasonable doubt that Thomas intentionally, knowingly, or

recklessly caused bodily injury to C.W. by striking her with his hand or by striking her

with a door. Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 22.01(a)(1).

6 B. ANALYSIS

Thomas argues that the evidence was insufficient to prove that he hit C.W.

with his hand; that he caused injury to C.W. by hitting her with the bathroom door;

and that he intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly caused C.W. injury.

Thomas argues that C.W.’s claim that he hit her in the bedroom is “factually

impossible” because (1) Deputy Ward stated on his body camera recording that he did

not think that Thomas could have hit C.W. on the back of the head with his right

hand while she was facing her left and (2) while Deputy Ward was talking to C.W., she

said she was not feeling pain “right now.”

C.W. testified that Thomas had rushed toward her with his hand raised and

smacked her with an open hand on the back of her head, and the hit stung. Thomas

testified that he did not hit C.W. on the back of the head; he testified that when he

entered the room, he was standing more than five feet away from her, and when he

raised his hand as if to say “knock it off,” she said, “you hit me.”

Deputy Ward testified at trial that, although C.W.’s story that she gave at the

scene about the head slap did not make sense to him at the time, it could have

happened that way if she had not remembered which hand Thomas had used. That

Deputy Ward questioned C.W.’s contemporaneous account of the head slap does not

change this conclusion. Deputy Ward testified that although C.W.’s explanation about

the head slap did not make sense to him at the time, he conceded that Thomas

nevertheless could have hit C.W. the way she had described if she had been mistaken

7 in telling Deputy Ward that Thomas had used his right hand to hit her. According to

Deputy Ward, C.W. had told him that she did not remember “exactly” which hand

Thomas used to hit her. Deputy Ward agreed that victims of domestic violence

“might not always remember exactly the way things happened” because of the stress

and speed of events.5 When asked if C.W.’s “not remembering which hand [Thomas]

hit her with [was] inconsistent with her story,” Deputy Ward answered, “No.” He

agreed that he had found C.W. credible and would not have arrested Thomas

otherwise.

The jury, as factfinder, was free to judge the weight and credibility of C.W.’s,

Deputy Ward’s, and Thomas’s testimonies and to resolve any conflicting inferences

therefrom. Even if C.W. had turned her head to the left and thereby presented

Thomas with the back of her head, the jury still could have believed that he landed

that blow with his right hand as she originally described. The jury could also have

believed that the blow occurred in another manner based upon its evaluation of the

credibility of the testimony and other evidence presented.

Viewing all the evidence admitted at trial in the light most favorable to the

verdict, we conclude that a rational jury could have found that Thomas struck C.W.

with an open hand, causing pain. See id.; Jackson, 443 U.S. at 319, 99 S. Ct. at 2789;

Ellis v. State, No. 05-15-00950-CR, 2017 WL 343592, at *3 (Tex. App.—Dallas Jan. 18,

5 The testifying officers described C.W.’s demeanor as “[d]istraught,” “upset,” “fearful,” and “timid.” They thought she looked like she had been crying.

8 2017, no pet.) (mem. op., not designated for publication). Because the evidence was

sufficient to prove this manner and means of assault, we need not address the parts of

Thomas’s issue challenging the alternative manner and means alleged. See Tex. R.

App. P. 47.1; Rosales v. State, 4 S.W.3d 228, 231 (Tex. Crim. App. 1999) (noting that

when alternate manner and means are charged, sufficient evidence of just one

supports the verdict).

We overrule Thomas’s sole issue.

III. CONCLUSION

Having overruled Thomas’s sole issue, we affirm the trial court’s judgment.

/s/ Wade Birdwell

Wade Birdwell Justice

Do Not Publish Tex. R. App. P. 47.2(b)

Delivered: November 27, 2024