Grammer v. State

294 S.W.3d 182, 2009 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 1389, 2009 WL 3103777
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Texas
DecidedSeptember 30, 2009
DocketPD-1508-08
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 294 S.W.3d 182 (Grammer 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
Grammer v. State, 294 S.W.3d 182, 2009 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 1389, 2009 WL 3103777 (Tex. 2009).

Opinion

OPINION

HERVEY, J.,

delivered the opinion of the Court

in which KELLER, P.J., MEYERS, WOMACK, JOHNSON, KEASLER, and COCHRAN, JJ., joined.

Pursuant to a plea-bargain with the State, appellant was placed on deferred-adjudication community supervision (“probation”) for ten years after pleading guilty to a nine-count indictment charging him with the offenses of aggravated sexual assault (three counts) and indecency (six counts) against an eleven-year-old girl. A condition of appellant’s probation required him to pay $250 in court costs within 120 days after being placed on probation, and another condition required him to “avoid association with persons having criminal records and having disreputable or harmful character.” The trial court (not the same judge who had placed appellant on probation) later found that appellant violated these two conditions and sentenced him to lengthy concurrent prison terms (60 years on the three aggravated sexual-assault counts and 20 years on the six indecency counts) immediately after adjudicating his guilt. We exercised our discretionary authority to review the Waco Court of Appeals’s decision that the trial court did not have to hold “a separate punishment hearing” before sentencing appellant. 1 Finding that appellant had the opportunity to, and did, present punishment evidence at the adjudication hearing, we will affirm.

The record from the adjudication hearing reflects that appellant’s lawyer indicated that he had no witnesses when the trial court asked the witnesses to come forward *184 for purposes of invoking the rule before the hearing began.

[TRIAL COURT]: Does State have any witnesses?
[STATE]: This is the State’s witness, Your Honor.
[TRIAL COURT]: Does Defense have any witnesses?
[DEFENSE]: Your Honor, we may have witnesses in terms of character witnesses 2 but none fact based as far as the violation. I don’t know if you want to invoke the rule for them.
$ * *
[TRIAL COURT]: The rule has been invoked so any witnesses you have that are going to testify in any part of this hearing need to come forward and be sworn in.
[DEFENSE]: We don’t have any witnesses, Your Honor.

The record also reflects that appellant’s ten-year probationary period began on January 6, 2006. On January 16th appellant began serving 180 days in jail as another condition of his probation. 3 While in jail serving this time, appellant began an association with Kristi Turner, who was incarcerated in the same jail. On May 11th Turner was convicted of the state-jail-felony offenses of possession of a forged instrument and of fraudulent use or possession of identifying information and placed on probation for five years. Turner was released from jail at about this time.

Appellant was released from jail about two months later on July 16th. Appellant’s probation officer (Friedmann) testified that appellant told her during their first meeting on July 19th that he “wanted to date a woman [Turner] who had a bad check charge.” Friedmann testified that she told appellant that he could date Turner because appellant “presented the information along the lines that [Turner] was done with her time, it was just a bad check, and there was nothing further going on with her case.” Appellant did not inform Friedmann at this time, or at any other time, that Turner was a convicted felon who was on probation. Friedmann testified that she would consider a person to have a criminal record if that person “had a probation or had been convicted of a hot check case.” Friedmann also testified that she would not consider a person to have a criminal record if that person “had just gone to jail ... and maybe hadn’t been adjudicated guilty of anything, had just got arrested.”

Q. [STATE]: Tell the Court, if you would, when the first time you became aware of Mr. Grammer seeing this woman, Kristi Turner.
A. [FRIEDMANN]: On July 19, 2006 was the first report that I took on him after he was released from jail, and he mentioned he had wanted to date a woman who had a bad check charge.
Q. Okay. Now, according to the probation papers which the Court has taken judicial notice of, this specific order would say you’re supposed to avoid associations with persons who have criminal records and those of disreputable or harmful character; is that correct?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Okay. Now, if somebody, as an example, if somebody had a probation or *185 had been convicted of a hot check case, would that be a criminal record?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Okay. If somebody had just gone to jail, for instance, and maybe hadn’t been adjudicated guilty of anything, had just got arrested, would you consider that a criminal record?
A. No, sir, not if they had not been convicted.
Q. Okay. So when Mr. Grammer went in and basically told you, “Hey, I’m thinking about dating this girl or I’m dating this girl, is it okay?”, what did he lead you to believe was her criminal situation?
A. He presented the information along the lines that she was done with her time, it was just a bad check, and there was nothing further going on with her case.
Q. Did he indicate to you at that time that she was a convicted felon?
A. No, sir.
Q. Did he indicate to you that she was on felony probation out of Johnson County?
A. No, sir.
Q. This would have been in [sic] July 19th of '06; is that correct?
A. That’s correct, sir.
Q. Okay. All right. So he didn’t say these things to you. What did you say to him about whether it was okay or not to do this?
A. I told him — that’s why I further questioned him and told him, okay, if there’s no further charges, there’s no further anything going on with the case, then that would be fíne at that time to date her.

Friedmann testified that she discovered that appellant and Turner were living together when she visited appellant’s residence on August 2nd. Friedmann also learned during this home visit that Turner was a convicted felon on probation. Fried-mann testified that appellant was violating his probation by living with Turner. She also testified that, in addition to not informing her that Turner was a convicted felon, appellant also did not inform her that he and Turner were living together.

Q. [STATE]: And did [appellant] indicate to you that they were going to live together or what did he indicate to you about what that meant?

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
294 S.W.3d 182, 2009 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 1389, 2009 WL 3103777, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/grammer-v-state-texcrimapp-2009.