Emenhiser v. State

196 S.W.3d 915, 2006 Tex. App. LEXIS 6627, 2006 WL 2076556
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJuly 27, 2006
Docket2-04-248-CR
StatusPublished
Cited by78 cases

This text of 196 S.W.3d 915 (Emenhiser v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Emenhiser v. State, 196 S.W.3d 915, 2006 Tex. App. LEXIS 6627, 2006 WL 2076556 (Tex. Ct. App. 2006).

Opinion

OPINION ON PETITION FOR DISCRETIONARY REVIEW

ANNE GARDNER, Justice.

After reviewing Appellant’s petition for discretionary review, we modify our opinion and judgment in this appeal. See Tex. R.App. P. 50. We withdraw our opinion and judgment of April 6, 2006, and substitute the following.

I. Introduction

A jury convicted Appellant John Paul Emenhiser of two counts of indecency with a child, one count of aggravated sexual assault of a child, and one count of sexual performance by a child and assessed punishment at a total of 149 years’ confinement. In six points, Appellant argues that the trial court erred by quashing a subpoena, by barring a witness who violated “the Rule” from testifying, by failing to suppress certain evidence, and by refusing *920 Appellant’s challenge to a venireperson. Appellant also challenges the legal and factual sufficiency of the evidence to support his convictions for sexual performance by a child and indecency with a child. We affirm.

II. Factual and procedural background

The complainant in this case is K.R., who was thirteen years old at the time of trial. K.R. testified as follows: Appellant was her school bus driver when she was in the fourth and fifth grades. Appellant photographed K.R. and other children on the bus with disposable cameras and, later, a digital camera that she described as “small and silver.” On one occasion, Appellant told KR. to sit on his lap on the school bus. She sat on his lap for five to ten minutes while Appellant “would push up his private part up toward me.... It was hard.... And then later on, he, like, whispered, ‘Touch it,’ I guess, and he, like, touched my hand ... and put it on there ... [o]n top of his clothes.” On a later occasion, 1 K.R. was walking home from a friend’s house when she saw Appellant sitting on his motorcycle alone in a parking lot. Appellant gave K.R. a ride to her home on his motorcycle. When they reached her house, K.R. offered Appellant a glass of water or lemonade. Appellant went into the house with K.R. and sat on a couch while drinking the glass of water. K.R. sat at the opposite end of the couch, and the two conversed and watched television. After some time passed, Appellant moved to KR.’s end of the couch and put his hand on her leg. Eventually, K.R. testified, Appellant removed her clothes and his clothes, penetrated her vagina with his fingers, and had sexual intercourse with her. During the sexual assault, Appellant stopped to photograph KR.’s face, breasts, and genitals with a digital camera. After the assault, Appellant told K.R. not to tell anyone what had happened or he would “make sure [her friend’s] family pays.”

When Appellant was evicted from his apartment in August 2003, police found child pornography in the form of conventional and digital photographs among his possessions. They also found over a hundred photographs of K.R. in Appellant’s apartment and during a later search of a storage unit leased for Appellant by his sister. They did not, however, find any photographs of K.R. nude. Police interviewed K.R. several times; and she eventually related the incidents described above.

A grand jury indicted Appellant for indecency with a child arising out of the school bus incident and indecency with a child, aggravated sexual assault, and sexual performance by a child arising from the later incident. A jury convicted him on all counts and assessed punishment of imprisonment for ten years for the first indecency count, twenty years for the second indecency count, ninety-nine years for the aggravated-sexual-assault count, and twenty years for the sexual-performanee-by-a-child count. The trial court entered judgment accordingly and ordered Appellant to serve his sentences consecutively. Appellant filed this appeal.

*921 III. Discussion

A. Subpoena for student names and addresses

In his first point, Appellant argues that the trial court violated his Sixth Amendment right to compulsory process when it quashed a subpoena that directed the Den-ton ISD to provide Appellant with the names and addresses of every student in KR.’s middle school class at the time of trial. Appellant argues that the information requested by the subpoena would have allowed him to interview KR.’s classmates, some of whom might have been able to testify about K.R.’s truthfulness.

Criminal defendants have a right to compulsory process for obtaining witnesses. U.S. Const, amend. VI; Tex. Const, art. I, § 10. But the right to compulsory process is not absolute. Defendants have the right to secure the attendance of witnesses whose testimony would be both material and favorable to the defense. See Coleman v. State, 966 S.W.2d 525, 527-28 (Tex.Crim.App.1998). To exercise this right, the defendant must make a plausible showing to the trial court, by sworn evidence or agreed facts, that the witness’s testimony would be both material and favorable to the defense. Id. at 528. Counsel’s mere belief that a witness would support the defense’s case is insufficient to establish materiality. Castillo v. State, 901 S.W.2d 550, 553 (Tex.App.-El Paso 1995, pet. refd) (citing Hardin v. State, 471 S.W.2d 60, 62 (Tex.Crim.App.1971)). Moreover, the right to compulsory process is dependent upon an accused’s initiative, and the nature of the right requires that its effective use be preceded by “deliberate planning and affirmative conduct” by the defendant. Rodriguez v. State, 90 S.W.3d 340, 358 (Tex.App.-El Paso 2001, pet. ref'd) (quoting Taylor v. Illinois, 484 U.S. 400, 410, 108 S.Ct. 646, 653-54, 98 L.Ed.2d 798 (1988)).

We review a complaint that the trial court improperly quashed a subpoena for an abuse of discretion. Drew v. State, 743 S.W.2d 207, 225 n. 11 (Tex.Crim.App.1987). Likewise, questions regarding limitations on the right to compulsory process are within the trial court’s discretion. Rodriguez, 90 S.W.3d at 358.

The subpoena in question requested the names and addresses of “all students currently in the same class as” K.R. The subpoena was issued on May 14, 2004, and served on Barbara Fischer, the principal of K.R.’s middle school, on the morning of May 18 — the day the jury began to hear evidence — and required Fischer to appear with the records at 1:30 p.m. that same day.

Denton ISD filed a motion to quash the subpoena, citing federal law that protects education records from disclosure absent permission from the parents of the affected students and noting that there was not enough time to comply with the subpoena. The trial court briefly recessed the trial to conduct a hearing on the motion to quash on May 18. Fischer testified that collecting the information requested by Appellant would take about four days because the information would have to be compiled by hand.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
196 S.W.3d 915, 2006 Tex. App. LEXIS 6627, 2006 WL 2076556, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/emenhiser-v-state-texapp-2006.