Johnson v. State

737 S.W.2d 901, 1987 Tex. App. LEXIS 8624
Court of Appeals of Texas·Decided September 16, 1987·No. 09 86 050 CR·Published·Cited by 7 cases

Opinions

OPINION

BROOKSHIRE, Justice.

The grand jury of Montgomery County indicted Calvin Lee Johnson on the charge of attempted capital murder under the terms of section 19.03 of the Texas Penal [903]*903Code. The indictment, in capsule form, charged that the Appellant:

“[W]ith specific intent to commit the offense of capital murder of Barbara Brown, attempt to intentionally cause the death of Barbara Brown by shooting her with a firearm in the course of committing and attempting to commit robbery of Barbara Brown and Riley Tomlin;....”

The next paragraph charged that the Appellant:

“[W]ith specific intent to commit the offense of capital murder of Riley Tomlin, attempt to intentionally cause the death of Riley Tomlin by shooting him with a firearm in the course of committing and attempting to commit robbery of Barbara Brown and Riley Tomlin;....”

There were three enhancement paragraphs. In sequence, these paragraphs charged that the accused was convicted of aggravated robbery in the District Court of Harris County, Texas, in December, 1982; that he was convicted of robbery by assault in Harris County in October, 1973; and that, in a separate cause, in October, 1973, the Appellant was again convicted of robbery by assault. The offense in the instant case was alleged to have occurred on or about March 8, 1985. The case was submitted to the jury on November 21, 1985. On the same date, the jury returned a verdict finding the Appellant guilty of both counts of attempted capital murder as charged in the grand jury indictment. The next day, punishment was set at 99 years on each count. The jury made findings of “true” for each of the enhancement paragraphs. There was an affirmative finding made by the jury that Appellant used a firearm in each offense. The district judge ordered that the two sentences were to run consecutively.

Barbara Brown testified that she had been a resident of Montgomery County for seven years and that in March of 1985 she was engaged in the nursery business, describing herself as a person who “watches plants, grows them and things.” At the time of the offense, she had been in this business for a year to the day. The nursery was known as the Lost Pines Nursery. She testified that Riley Tomlin came in on the morning of March 8, 1985, at about 10:15, to purchase some tomato plants and that they discussed the various types of plants. At about 10:30 a.m., a yellow mustang automobile pulled into the yard and a black male got out. At that particular time, Mrs. Brown was talking on the telephone. When she hung up the phone and turned around, Mr. Tomlin was facing her with his back to the door of the nursery. As she turned around, Mrs. Brown saw the black man running toward her with a gun that she described as a revolver. The assailant ran about 25 feet, stopped 4 feet directly in front of Mrs. Brown and looked her straight in the face. At this point, Mr. Tomlin turned around, but the assailant told him: “Don’t look at me, lay down.” The assailant shoved Tomlin down; Brown laid down on her stomach. The black man then demanded to know where the money was and Brown replied that it was in a cash box sitting on the counter. The black man took the money out of the cash box and then took Tomlin’s billfold out of his pocket.

The assailant continued to demand: “Where’s the money?” Mrs. Brown replied that there was no more money since it was a small nursery. Only seconds later, according to Brown, the black male stepped over her and put his hand between her legs in a most inappropriate manner. She testified that this angered her and she moved her body away but, at that point, the assailant kicked her in the ribs and grabbed her neck. The assailant then began digging under her collar and demanded that she take off her wedding ring. She tried to remove the ring but she was unable. The black male then demanded to know where her purse was. She replied it was in the truck and the keys were in the truck. Mrs. Brown said that, from the sounds made by his footsteps, the assailant ran to the truck, which took about thirty seconds, and ran back. She did not get up or try to run [904]*904away because she was “scared of dying.” By this point, she had seen the black man’s face and had seen the gun. In fact, she looked at him several times as he forced her to lie down. She also looked at him as she was trying to get the ring off, testifying at trial: “I really looked square at him again.” At trial, Brown swore she had the picture of his appearance and facial features in her mind very clearly and she made an in-court identification of Appellant as the assailant. According to Mrs. Brown, after Appellant returned from the truck, he walked to the far end of the greenhouse. She estimated that this was about a hundred-foot walk. It was when he returned from this walk that he shot Riley Tomlin. Brown thought Tomlin was dead and assumed she would be the next to die.

“Q What happened next?
“A Then he shot me.
“Q Where did he shoot—
“A My head was down on the cement this way, and from the angle that he was standing, which was basically in front of me, I got shot right here, and then he walked behind me, and shot here, behind my ear. So, there was a period of time between this shot and this shot.
“Q You mean he walked around?
“A Walked, yeah, walked behind me.
“Q And, the first shot hit you in the left ear of your head?
“A Right up here.
“Q Did that cause pain?
“A Yeah, it really hurt, but it didn’t knock me out, I never, ever, lost consciousness at any point, I tried to be dead at that point.
“Q You tried to play dead?
“A Right, but I guess I breathed too much or I moved again, or I don’t know, and this — when I got shot here, it really kind of picked my body up and kind of slammed it down.
“Q Did you feel yourself move?
“A Yeah, I really did, and that one hurt a lot. And, after I got shot on this side, I really couldn’t get up at that point, because it took my equilibrium away.”

The record shows that, before shooting Brown, the Appellant shot Riley Tomlin twice in the head as he lay face down. She then heard Appellant speed away. The .22 caliber bullets used had not actually penetrated the skulls of the victims. They both remained conscious. Tomlin was able to arise and call the Sheriff’s Department. Tomlin also made an in-court identification of the Appellant. Tomlin said he got a “good look” at the person and, further, that he still held an image of his assailant. Tomlin made a positive in-court identification of the Appellant, describing him as a black male with a green suit, maroon shirt, and white socks, sitting there at the defense table. Tomlin said his assailant was seated two persons to the left of the district attorney. The court agreed and the record reflected that the witness had identified the Appellant. Tomlin swore that the accused — our Appellant — forcibly and without his consent, took Tomlin’s wallet from his left rear pocket. It contained various credit cards, a social security card, a driver’s license and approximately forty dollars in United States currency.

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Johnson v. State, 737 S.W.2d 901, 1987 Tex. App. LEXIS 8624 (Tex. Ct. App. 1987).

737 S.W.2d 901 (Johnson v. State) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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