Carl Edward Brewer v. the State of Texas

• Court: Court of Appeals of Texas
• Decided: August 29, 2025
• Docket: 02-24-00197-CR
• Status: Published

Opinion

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

No. 02-24-00197-CR ___________________________

CARL EDWARD BREWER, Appellant

V.

THE STATE OF TEXAS

On Appeal from the 485th District Court Tarrant County, Texas Trial Court No. 1478949

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

Appellant Carl Edward Brewer appeals his conviction for murder.1 See Tex.

Penal Code Ann. § 19.02. He raises a single complaint on appeal: he asserts that the

trial court “failed to satisfy the mandatory requirements imposed by Texas Code of

Criminal Procedure, Article 38.22, § 6 by neglecting to enter written findings of fact

and conclusions of law” 2 on his motion to suppress his videotaped police interview.

See Tex. Code Crim. Proc. Ann. art. 38.22, § 6.

The motion to suppress came just after trial began, and in it, Brewer argued

that his videotaped statements to the police had been involuntary. Because this

“raised [a question] as to the voluntariness of a statement of [the] accused,” Article

38.22 required the trial court to “make an independent finding” outside the jury’s

presence and to “enter an order stating [the trial court’s] conclusion as to whether or

not the statement was voluntarily made, along with the specific finding of facts upon

which the conclusion was based.” Id.; see Urias v. State, 155 S.W.3d 141, 142 (Tex.

Crim. App. 2004) (noting that “Article 38.22, § 6, is mandatory” and “requires a trial

court to file its findings of fact and conclusions of law . . . whether or not the

1 Brewer was indicted on three counts—one count of capital murder and two lesser-included counts of murder—but the jury found him guilty of one instance of murder, and it assessed his punishment at 60 years’ confinement. 2 For readability, this quotation’s formatting has been altered.

2 defendant objects” (internal quotation marks omitted)). According to Brewer, this did

not happen.

Brewer asserts that—even though his suppression motion raised the

voluntariness issue, even though the trial court held a hearing on the issue outside the

jury’s presence, and even though he repeatedly requested findings—the trial court

failed to enter any written Article 38.22 findings or conclusions. While Brewer

acknowledges the longstanding rule that “[a] trial court satisfies the requirements of

Article 38.22 when it dictates its findings and conclusions to the court reporter[] and

they are transcribed and made a part of the statement of facts [i.e., the reporter’s

record],” Murphy v. State, 112 S.W.3d 592, 601 (Tex. Crim. App. 2003); accord Alford v.

State, 358 S.W.3d 647, 651 n.6 (Tex. Crim. App. 2012); Busby v. State, 253 S.W.3d 661,

669 (Tex. Crim. App. 2008); Parr v. State, 658 S.W.2d 620, 623 (Tex. Crim. App. 1983);

Arriaga v. State, No. 02-19-00099-CR, 2019 WL 6904299, at *10 (Tex. App.—Fort

Worth Dec. 19, 2019, pet. ref’d) (mem. op., not designated for publication), he insists

that “[n]o such dictation and finding occurred in the case at bar.”3 But such dictation

did, in fact, occur in the case at bar.

Brewer asks the court to “abate the appeal” for the trial court’s entry of the 3

“neglect[ed]” findings.

3 At the end of the suppression hearing,4 the trial court dictated its findings and

conclusions on the record:

The Court is going to, number one, observe that [in the video], it appears the defendant was provided water . . . during the [custodial] interview. There is a water bottle in front of him. The Court sees nothing to show that the statements made were the result of coercion or involuntary, and the Court is not going to deny [the video exhibit] or the contents of this interview. The Court . . . has no basis to find that it is an involuntary statement.

The trial court went on to expressly clarify that it intended for its above-quoted

statements to constitute its Article 38.22 findings and conclusions on the

voluntariness issue—when Brewer asked for written findings, the court responded

that “it [had already] satisfied the request and given its conclusions of fact and law,

statement of facts and conclusions of law, as reflected in this record.”

Then, the next day, the trial court supplemented its oral findings, noting that

“there was one finding [it had] not put on the record” and adding that it “also f[ound]

that [Article] 38.23 [of the Code of Criminal Procedure] was complied with with the

custodial interrogation video and the recitation of rights” and that this “[wa]s another

reason for [its] denial of [the] motion to suppress.” When Brewer again asked for the

trial court’s findings to be reduced to writing, the trial court again clarified that “[its]

4 At the hearing, the State offered Brewer’s videotaped interview into evidence, and Brewer asked the trial court to take judicial notice of his age at the time of the interview and of the fact that, at one point between the interview and trial, he had gone to a mental health hospital and been found to be incompetent.

4 statements on the record, which will be written, will constitute the findings of fact and

conclusions.”

Brewer makes no mention of these dictated findings and conclusions. He does

not challenge them as lacking in evidentiary support or claim that they were

insufficient to satisfy Article 38.22 in some manner. Nor does he address the merits

of the underlying voluntariness issue. Rather, as the State points out, Brewer “has

apparently misread the record, and it directly contradicts his complaint.”

Because Brewer’s sole appellate complaint is that the trial court failed to enter

Article 38.22 findings when the trial court did, in fact, enter such findings—and

repeatedly clarified on the record that it had done so—we overrule Brewer’s

complaint and affirm the trial court’s judgment.5 See Tex. R. App. P. 43.2(a).

/s/ Bonnie Sudderth

Bonnie Sudderth Chief Justice

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

Delivered: August 29, 2025

5 The State urges us to reform the judgment to correct a clerical error. It notes that the judgment purports to pertain to count 1 of the indictment—capital murder— rather than count 3 of the indictment—murder as found by the jury. However, count 3 was a lesser-included offense of count 1. The jury was charged accordingly, and the judgment accurately reflects that it resolves count 1 based on the “Lesser[-]Included Offense” of murder. Reformation is not necessary.