John Reid v. the State of Texas

• Court: Court of Appeals of Texas
• Decided: July 26, 2024
• Docket: 08-24-00139-CR
• Status: Published

Opinion

COURT OF APPEALS EIGHTH DISTRICT OF TEXAS EL PASO, TEXAS

JOHN REID, § No. 08-24-00139-CR

Appellant, § Appeal from the

v. § 346th Judicial District Court

THE STATE OF TEXAS, § of El Paso County, Texas

Appellee. § (TC#20210D03074)

MEMORANDUM OPINION

This appeal is before the Court on its own motion to determine whether it should be

dismissed for want of jurisdiction. Because there is no appealable order, we dismiss the appeal for

want of jurisdiction.

Appellate court jurisdiction is authorized by statute. See Galitz v. State, 617 S.W.2d 949,

951 (Tex. Crim. App. 1981) (en banc). In the absence of an authorizing statute, appellate courts

are without jurisdiction to consider an appeal. For criminal cases, the Texas Legislature authorizes

appeals from final, written judgments and certain specific interlocutory orders. See Gutierrez v.

State, 307 S.W. 3d 318, 321 (Tex. Crim. App. 2010). Appellant’s pro se notice of appeal, filed in

this Court on May 31, 2024, does not specify the order he is attempting to appeal. It includes only

a short statement that he desires to appeal from case number 20210D03074. The clerk of this Court sent Appellant a letter notifying him that it appeared there was no

appealable order at issue in this case. See Tex. R. App. P. 25.2(c)(2) (a notice of appeal is sufficient

if it shows the party’s desire to appeal from the judgement or other appealable order). The letter

gave notice of our intent to dismiss the appeal for want of jurisdiction, after 20 days, unless grounds

were shown for the Court to continue the appeal. The notice was returned to this Court marked

“Return to Sender Refused Unable to Forward” on June 5, 2024. The Clerk of this Court made a

second attempt on June 17, 2024 to send the notice to Appellant using a different address obtained

from the district court. The second notice was not returned to this Court, and as of the date of this

memorandum opinion, no response from Appellant has been received. 1 We dismiss this appeal for

JEFF ALLEY, Chief Justice

July 26, 2024

Before Alley, C.J., Palafox and Soto, JJ.

(Do Not Publish)

1 Additionally, the Court reviewed El Paso County’s publicly available case management system that contains docket sheets for civil and criminal lawsuits filed in El Paso County, Texas. The Court was able to locate Appellant’s cause number. However, the most recent activity does not indicate that the trial court has rendered a judgement or other appealable order.