Ex Parte Green

548 S.W.2d 914, 1977 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 1066
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Texas
DecidedApril 6, 1977
Docket53560
StatusPublished
Cited by54 cases

This text of 548 S.W.2d 914 (Ex Parte Green) 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
Ex Parte Green, 548 S.W.2d 914, 1977 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 1066 (Tex. 1977).

Opinions

[915]*915OPINION

DALLY, Commissioner.

This is a post conviction writ of habeas corpus proceeding. See Article 11.07, V.A. C.C.P.

On August 6, 1966, Kenneth McDuff and Petitioner kidnapped two young boys and a girl in Tarrant County. The two boys, Robert Brand and Marcus Dunnam, were locked in the trunk of one of the victims’ car. McDuff later opened the trunk and fired six shots from a pistol into the heads of the boys, killing them instantly.

Petitioner Green was charged in two separate indictments; one indictment charged him with the murder of Marcus Dunnam; the other charged him with the murder of Robert Brand. On June 10,1968, Petitioner was tried before a jury on the indictment charging him with the murder of Marcus Dunnam. The jury returned a verdict of guilty of murder without malice, and on June 13, 1968, the court assessed punishment and sentenced Petitioner to the maximum punishment of imprisonment for 5 years.

On March 20,1969, Petitioner filed a plea of prior conviction urging that the doctrine of carving as applied in this State estopped and precluded the State from prosecuting him on the indictment charging the murder of Robert Brand. This plea was overruled and on March 21, 1969, the Petitioner then plead guilty to the indictment charging him with the murder of Robert Brand. The State did not seek the death penalty, and the Petitioner was sentenced to imprisonment for 25 years.

On June 23, 1969, the Supreme Court of the United States held in Benton v. Maryland, 395 U.S. 784, 89 S.Ct. 2056, 23 L.Ed.2d 707 (1969), that the Double Jeopardy Clause of the United States Constitution was applicable to the states. In 1970 the Supreme Court held in Ashe v. Swenson, 397 U.S. 436, 90 S.Ct. 1189, 25 L.Ed.2d 469 (1970), that the doctrine of collateral estoppel is an embodiment of the Double Jeopardy Clause.

In 1974, Petitioner filed a writ of habeas corpus in the District Court of Tarrant County; relief was denied without written opinion. Petitioner then filed a writ of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas. The United States district court, without reaching the merits, rejected Petitioner’s writ in reliance upon Cox v. Crouse, 376 F.2d 824 (10th Cir. 1967), and Harris v. United States, 237 F.2d 274 (8th Cir. 1956), and held that Petitioner’s claim was foreclosed by his plea of guilty. While his appeal was pending in the Fifth Circuit, the United States Supreme Court announced its decision in Menna v. New York, 423 U.S. 61, 96 S.Ct. 241, 46 L.Ed.2d 195 (1975). Menna held that a plea of guilty does not waive a claim of double jeopardy under the United States Constitution. Thereafter, the Fifth Circuit remanded the case to the district court for consideration of Petitioner’s claim on the merits. Green v. Estelle, 524 F.2d 1243 (5th Cir. 1975). The federal district court, on February 26,1976, dismissed Petitioner’s application in order to allow the state courts an opportunity to consider his constitutional question on its merits in light of Menna v. New York, supra.

The federal district court order of February 26, 1976, states:

“In this Circuit, a strong policy exists to allow the state courts an initial opportunity to rule on a constitutional issue where the specific federal right was asserted at the state level in an ambiguous manner or where a subsequent Supreme Court ruling creates the possibility that the state might change its decisional law if given the opportunity. Comity requires that the state court be given the initial opportunity to assess the factual foundation of Green’s claims of double jeopardy and to address the issue to be resolved in its opinion. Donlavey v. Smith, 432 F.2d 940 (5th Cir. 1970). See McBride v. Estelle, 507 F.2d 903 (5th Cir. 1975); Alonzo v. Estelle, 500 F.2d 672 (5th Cir. 1974).”

Instead of either appealing this order to the Fifth Circuit or proceeding in the state court where the Petitioner was convicted, Petitioner appealed from the federal [916]*916court order and at the same time filed his application for writ of habeas corpus in the District Court of Falls County. On motion by the State, the cause was properly transferred from Falls County to Criminal District Court Number One of Tarrant County, the court in which Petitioner was convicted. This Court unambiguously stated in Ex parte Young, 418 S.W.2d 824 (Tex.Cr.App.1967) that:

“The primary responsibility now being cast upon the convicting court by the amendment of Art. 11.07, the Court of Criminal Appeals will no longer exercise its constitutional original jurisdiction to entertain petitions seeking post conviction relief from confinement under a felony case unless it be shown that the petition, or one containing like sworn allegations of fact, has been presented to the judge of the convicting court.”

An attempt at “forum shopping,” which is contrary to the provisions of Article 11.07, V.A.C.C.P., merely delays a speedy hearing on the merits of the petition.

Further delay was caused by prosecuting an appeal to the Fifth Circuit from the federal court order at the same time Petitioner proceeded on his application for writ of habeas corpus in the courts of this State. A petitioner must decide which forum he will proceed in, because this Court will not, and a trial court in this State should not, consider a petitioner’s application so long as the federal courts retain jurisdiction of the same matter. Ex parte Powers, 487 S.W.2d 101 (Tex.Cr.App.1972). The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has now dismissed Petitioner’s appeal from the federal district court order; therefore, we will now consider Petitioner’s application on its merits.

Petitioner contends that the doctrine of collateral estoppel as announced in Ashe v. Swenson, supra, precludes the State from relitigating the issue of his state of mind at the time the two boys were killed. He asserts that the evidence shows that both boys were killed virtually simultaneously by Kenneth McDuff. Petitioner argues that the jury’s verdict at his first trial, finding him guilty as a principal of the murder without malice of Marcus Dunnam, was an implied acquittal of the charge of murder with malice, therefore the State cannot convict him of an offense higher than murder without malice of Robert Brand at the subsequent trial.

In Ashe v. Swenson,

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Bluebook (online)
548 S.W.2d 914, 1977 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 1066, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ex-parte-green-texcrimapp-1977.