Elliott v. State

858 S.W.2d 478, 1993 WL 109394
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Texas
DecidedApril 14, 1993
Docket69760
StatusPublished
Cited by74 cases

This text of 858 S.W.2d 478 (Elliott 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
Elliott v. State, 858 S.W.2d 478, 1993 WL 109394 (Tex. 1993).

Opinions

OPINION

MEYERS, Judge.

Appellant was indicted for the offense of murder committed in the course of kidnapping and aggravated sexual assault. [480]*480Tex.Penal Code Ann. § 19.03(a)(2). The trial court authorized the jury to convict appellant under either theory, and submitted alternative verdict forms. On January 13, 1987, the jury found appellant guilty of murder in the course of aggravated sexual assault. At the punishment phase of trial the jury gave affirmative answers to special issues enumerated in Tex.Code Crim. Proc.Ann. art. 37.071 § (b), and appellant’s punishment was assessed accordingly at death. Id,., § (e). Appeal is automatic to this Court. Id., § (h).

I

In his first point of error appellant contends the evidence is insufficient to establish the State’s theory of lack of consent to the sexual intercourse between appellant and the victim, Joyce Munguia. The State proceeded upon a theory of lack of consent, and the trial court defined the issue in the jury charge, exclusively in terms found in the sexual assault statute, Tex.Penal Code Ann. § 22.011(b)(3): “[a] sexual assault is without consent of the other person if the other person has not consented and the actor knows the other person is physically unable to resist.” 1 Appellant alleges the evidence failed to show Munguia was “physically unable to resist” at the time of the purported sexual assault.

The record shows that in the early evening of Friday, June 13, 1986, at about 6:30 p.m., Munguia was on her way to a bus stop when she was beckoned over to join a group of young men gathered around the tailgate of a pickup truck parked in the driveway of the Elizondo residence, at 2808 Gonzales, in Austin. Among those in the group were Ricky Elizondo, Pete Ramirez, Danny Hanson and appellant. Over the course of the next three hours Munguia drank anywhere from three to six beers, took “a big drink” of Everclear from a shared bottle, and ingested an undisclosed quantity of cocaine.

Both Hanson and Elizondo testified for the State. Their accounts are somewhat different, and we will summarize them separately. According to Hanson, Munguia was upset because, as she reported, her boyfriend was seeing his ex-wife again behind her back. Hanson consoled her in the backyard. Elizondo came back and asked Munguia if she would like to wash her face inside, and they went in the house. A short time later, appellant and Ramirez followed them inside, with Hanson close behind. There they found the bathroom door locked. Back outside, appellant and Hanson could see through the bathroom window that Elizondo “was kissing” Munguia. Elizondo’s brother got a coat hanger, and appellant opened the door to the bathroom. Hanson related that “when we opened the door, [Munguia] was on her knees in front of [Elizondo] and [Elizondo] was zipping his pants up.” Hanson thought that Elizondo and Munguia had been engaging in “probably oral sex[,]” but speculated that “maybe [Elizondo] tried to get her to do something but she — maybe she didn’t want to.”

[481]*481All the men then went back outside, followed shortly by Munguia, who asked Hanson to walk her home. Hanson could tell Munguia was drunk “[b]ecause she was crying and her words were slurred, couldn’t understand her that good, and she was kind of walking like she couldn’t walk too good.” Hanson testified:

A ... we started walking on Gonzales, headed east.
Q Okay, and were you by yourself, just the two of you?
A Yes.
Q Did she have trouble walking at that time?
A Yes.
Q So where were — what did ya’ll do?
A We were walking, and then she — she told me that [Elizondo] wouldn’t leave her alone when they were in the house, and then we were walking along on the street and she was crying.
And then [appellant] caught up to us and told me he was going to help me walk her home, and I told him just to go back, that I could do it, and then he told me that I just wanted her all for myself, and I told him, no, that I was just going to walk her home because she was drunk.
Q And then what happened?
A And then she almost passed out. It seemed like she was going to fall down and [appellant] picked her up, and I kept telling him to put her down, to let me walk her home, and he took her under the bridge.
Q Now, you say that she almost passed out. How could you tell?
A Because she — it was like she was going to fall down and [appellant] caught her.
Q And how did he pick her up?
A He put his legs under her — I mean his arms under her legs and picked her up.
Q Did you help him do this?
A No.
Q Now, where were you on Gonzales Street?
A We were about three or four houses down from the Elizondo’s house.
Q And where did you go? Or where did he take her?
A Under the bridge, into some wooded area.
Q Was it dark under there?
A Yes.

Appellant stood Munguia up and began to remove her shorts and panties. Hanson asked appellant to “let her go, to let me take her home, and that’s when he said that he was going to kick my ass or he was going to hit me or something.” At about this moment Elizondo and Ramirez arrived. Munguia was “crying, she was asking me to help her, to take her home.” Appellant laid her down on her back in the grass and began to have sex with her. Munguia “was telling him to stop, to leave her alone. She was — she kept yelling my name to help her, to get her out of there.” Hanson watched as, after appellant, first Ramirez and then Elizondo had sex with Munguia, and all the while “she kept on calling me to help her[.]”

Q And then what happened?
A And then she yelled out that she was going to go straight to the police when they were done.
Q And what — as best you can remember what was it that she said?
A She said — she said, I’m going to go straight to the police when ya’ll get through.
Q And what condition was she in at that time?
A She was still a little drunk. When they were raping her, she couldn’t fight them off. It was like she couldn’t even move.
Q Was she still crying?
A Yes.
Q Did she ever stop crying?
A No.
Q Did she ever stop calling you, your name, and asking you for help?
A No.
Q So what happened then after she said she was going to call the police?

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Bluebook (online)
858 S.W.2d 478, 1993 WL 109394, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/elliott-v-state-texcrimapp-1993.