Jason Shane Moses v. the State of Texas

• Court: Court of Appeals of Texas
• Decided: February 11, 2025
• Docket: 06-24-00111-CR
• Status: Published

Opinion

In the Court of Appeals Sixth Appellate District of Texas at Texarkana

No. 06-24-00111-CR

JASON SHANE MOSES, Appellant

V.

THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee

On Appeal from the 115th District Court Upshur County, Texas Trial Court No. 19274

Before Stevens, C.J., van Cleef and Rambin, JJ. Memorandum Opinion by Justice van Cleef MEMORANDUM OPINION

An Upshur County jury found Jason Shane Moses guilty of evading arrest or detention

with a motor vehicle, a third-degree felony. See TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 38.04 (Supp.). After

Moses pled true to the State’s habitual-offender allegations, the jury assessed a punishment of

twenty-five years’ imprisonment. In his sole point of error on appeal, Moses argues that the

evidence is legally insufficient to support the jury’s verdict.

We conclude that legally sufficient evidence supported the jury’s verdict of guilt.

Accordingly, we affirm the trial court’s judgment.

I. Standard of Review

“In evaluating legal sufficiency, we review all the evidence in the light most favorable to

the trial court’s judgment to determine whether any rational jury could have found the essential

elements of the offense beyond a reasonable doubt.” Williamson v. State, 589 S.W.3d 292, 297

(Tex. App.—Texarkana 2019, pet. ref’d) (citing Brooks v. State, 323 S.W.3d 893, 912 (Tex.

Crim. App. 2010) (plurality op.); Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979); Hartsfield v.

State, 305 S.W.3d 859, 863 (Tex. App.—Texarkana 2010, pet. ref’d)). “Our rigorous [legal

sufficiency] review focuses on the quality of the evidence presented.” Id. (citing Brooks, 323

S.W.3d at 917–18 (Cochran, J., concurring)). “We examine legal sufficiency under the direction

of the Brooks opinion, while giving deference to the responsibility of the jury ‘to fairly resolve

conflicts in testimony, to weigh the evidence, and to draw reasonable inferences from basic facts

to ultimate facts.’” Id. (quoting Hooper v. State, 214 S.W.3d 9, 13 (Tex. Crim. App. 2007)

2 (citing Jackson, 443 U.S. at 318–19; Clayton v. State, 235 S.W.3d 772, 778 (Tex. Crim. App.

2007))).

“Legal sufficiency of the evidence is measured by the elements of the offense as defined

by a hypothetically correct jury charge.” Id. at 298 (citing Malik v. State, 953 S.W.2d 234, 240

(Tex. Crim. App. 1997)). “The ‘hypothetically correct’ jury charge is ‘one that accurately sets

out the law, is authorized by the indictment, does not unnecessarily increase the State’s burden of

proof or unnecessarily restrict the State’s theories of liability, and adequately describes the

particular offense for which the defendant was tried.’” Id. (quoting Malik, 953 S.W.2d at 240).

Here, the State alleged that Moses used a motor vehicle to intentionally flee from Heath

Littlejohn, “a person the defendant knew was a peace officer who was attempting lawfully to

arrest or detain the defendant.”

II. The Evidence at Trial

At trial, Littlejohn, a deputy with the Upshur County Sheriff’s Office, testified that he

was on patrol on a Friday night when he spotted a Ford Mustang, driven by Moses and occupied

by one passenger, going fifteen miles per hour less than the speed limit. Littlejohn noted that the

Mustang was on the inside left lane, which he described as “the fast lane.” Littlejohn said he

drove his patrol unit, a “department-issued Explorer,” behind Moses, who pulled into “the slow

lane.” At that point, Littlejohn discovered that the Mustang’s “license plate lights were out” and

decided to stop it.

Littlejohn testified that he activated the marked patrol unit’s overhead and front “red and

blue lights.” According to Littlejohn, Moses did not apply his brakes or attempt to pull over.

3 While he admitted there was no shoulder on that portion of the road, Littlejohn believed Moses

would pull into one of two entrances to a nearby church, but Moses did not stop. After Moses

passed a county road without braking, signaling, or otherwise indicating submission to

Littlejohn’s lights, Littlejohn activated the patrol unit’s siren. According to Littlejohn, Moses

still did not apply any brakes or attempt to stop. This prompted Littlejohn to radio Sergeant Josh

Davis to ask him to deploy “stop sticks” at the Gilmer city limits while Littlejohn continued to

follow Moses.

Littlejohn testified that he followed Moses approximately four and one-half miles after

the siren was activated at a speed of forty-five to fifty miles per hour before the Mustang’s tires

hit the stop sticks deployed by Davis and came to a halt. Littlejohn arrested Moses for evading

arrest.

When asked if Moses could have been confused by who was driving “behind him

wanting him to pull over,” Littlejohn responded, “Absolutely not.” Littlejohn added that Moses

could have stopped at the “numerous county roads” that they had passed, as well as two

churches, a factory, and a historical marker before the Mustang hit the stop sticks.

Davis testified that Littlejohn’s lights and sirens were activated as Moses approached the

stop sticks. Davis’s body-camera footage was admitted into evidence and confirmed his

testimony.

III. Analysis

“A person commits an offense if he intentionally flees from a person he knows is a peace

officer . . . attempting lawfully to arrest or detain him.” TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 38.04(a). On

4 appeal, Moses does not contest that Littlejohn was attempting to lawfully arrest or detain him.

Instead, he simply argues that he was “unaware of law enforcement’s efforts to stop him.”

“A defendant’s knowledge that a police officer is trying to arrest or detain him or her is

an essential element of the offense of evading arrest.” Duvall v. State, 367 S.W.3d 509, 511

(Tex. App.—Texarkana 2012, pet. ref’d) (citing Rodriguez v. State, 799 S.W.2d 301, 302 (Tex.

Crim. App. 1990)). “Proof that an officer in a vehicle is attempting to arrest or detain a person

generally consists of the officer displaying authority by the use of overhead/emergency lights

and siren.” Id. at 513.

The question here is whether Moses intentionally failed to stop after Littlejohn attempted

to lawfully detain him. “Intent is a fact question to be determined from all the circumstances.”

Elizondo v. State, 487 S.W.3d 185, 201 (Tex. Crim. App. 2016). Here, the evidence shows that

it was dark when Littlejohn activated his lights while driving behind Moses. Absent from

Moses’s argument is any indication that he did not see the marked patrol unit or its lights.

Further, Littlejohn activated his siren after Moses failed to stop, despite having several

opportunities to do so during the four-and-one-half-mile, low-speed chase. Moses does not

argue that he did not hear the siren. Instead, Moses argues that his speed was well below the

speed limit, but we have previously explained that, while “it may seem incongruous to think that

someone proceeding slowly, or even crawling, away from an officer is ‘fleeing,’ . . . ‘fleeing’ is

anything less than prompt compliance with an officer’s direction to stop.” Horne v. State, 228

S.W.3d 442, 446 (Tex. App.—Texarkana 2007, no pet.).

5 Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, we find that it was

well within a rational jury’s purview to determine that Moses saw the lights of the marked patrol

car in the dark and heard its siren but chose not to stop. As a result, we conclude that legally

sufficient evidence supported the jury’s finding that Moses intentionally fled from Littlejohn,

whom he knew was a peace officer lawfully trying to detain him. We will not sit as the

thirteenth juror by rejecting a fact-finding on intent where legally sufficient evidence supports it.

See Thornton v. State, 425 S.W.3d 289, 303 (Tex. Crim. App. 2014). Accordingly, we overrule

Moses’s sole point of error.

IV. Conclusion

We affirm the trial court’s judgment.

Charles van Cleef Justice

Date Submitted: February 3, 2025 Date Decided: February 11, 2025

Do Not Publish