Joseph James Craver v. State

CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJanuary 17, 2020
Docket06-19-00101-CR
StatusPublished

This text of Joseph James Craver v. State (Joseph James Craver v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Joseph James Craver v. State, (Tex. Ct. App. 2020).

Opinion

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

No. 06-19-00101-CR

JOSEPH JAMES CRAVER, Appellant

V.

THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee

On Appeal from the 71st District Court Harrison County, Texas Trial Court No. 16-0317X

Before Morriss, C.J., Burgess and Stevens, JJ. Memorandum Opinion by Chief Justice Morriss MEMORANDUM OPINION Joseph James Craver appeals his convictions on three counts of aggravated sexual assault

of a child. 1 Here, he claims five errors: that the abstract portion of the charge failed, in defining

aggravated sexual assault, to include digital penetration of the victim’s sexual organ as a way to

commit the crime; that the State did not show the outcry witness was properly qualified; that the

outcry witness was not qualified to explain grooming to the jury; that the State’s detective was

allowed to explain certain DNA evidence when the detective was not qualified to do so; and that

it was improper to allow testimony that only two to eight percent of child sex-abuse victims lie

about their abuse.

We affirm the trial court’s judgments, 2 because (1) the failure to include digital penetration

in the offense definition in the abstract portion of the jury charge did not cause egregious harm,

(2) Craver preserved no complaint regarding the use of Halbrook as the outcry witness,

(3) allowing Black’s testimony about grooming was within the trial court’s discretion, (4) allowing

a detective’s testimony regarding DNA evidence was harmless, and (5) allowing testimony

regarding the percentage of untruthful allegations among child sex-abuse victims was harmless.

Cassandra, 3 the child complainant, was nine years old at the time of trial. She described

for the jury several instances of abuse both by Craver and Christopher McCartney. 4 Cassandra

1 See TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 22.021. 2 The trial court sentenced Craver, per the jury’s recommendation, to ninety-nine years’ confinement on each of the three counts. The court then ordered the sentences to run consecutively. 3 In this opinion, we refer to the child and her relatives by a pseudonym in order to protect the child’s identity. See TEX. R. APP. P. 9.10. 4 We affirmed McCartney’s convictions in McCartney v. State, No. 06-19-00053-CR, 2019 WL 6646380 (Tex. App.— Texarkana Dec. 6, 2019, no pet. h.) (mem. op., not designated for publication). 2 detailed for the jury how Craver “put his private part in [her] private part, put his finger in [her]

private part, and [put] his private part in [her] mouth.” These acts, Cassandra testified, took place

more than once when she was five to six years old. She described “white stuff,” which “didn’t

feel good at all,” coming out of Craver’s “private part” on these occasions. There was evidence

Cassandra had also been serially abused by McCartney. Cassandra, though, was able to

differentiate for the jury abuses by Craver and those by McCartney. 5 For example, she testified

that McCartney used lotion as a lubricant, while Craver used saliva for that purpose.

Cassandra’s descriptions of sexual assaults by Craver were supported by testimony from

Halbrook, the forensic interviewer. Halbrook told the jury that Cassandra told her Craver put his

“turtle,” Cassandra’s word for penis, and fingers in Cassandra’s “tutu” or vagina. Halbrook also

testified that Cassandra differentiated abuse by McCartney from abuse by Craver.

The sexual assault nurse examiner (SANE) who conducted a sexual-assault examination

of Cassandra testified that Cassandra described only abuses by McCartney. The nurse also

described Cassandra as having “hymenal remnants, which means that parts of her hymen were

missing.” In a child of Cassandra’s age, that could only be caused by “a penetrating injury” and

was “suggestive of sexual abuse.”

Savannah Quinn was a counselor at the Child Advocacy Center (CAC) where Cassandra

was interviewed. Quinn testified that she worked as a therapist with Cassandra for about a year,

holding twenty-three sessions. Quinn testified that it took seventeen or eighteen therapy sessions

5 For example, she said that, on one occasion, McCartney penetrated her anus, but she made no such allegation against Craver. 3 for Cassandra to begin to disclose the sexual abuse she endured. After her year of therapy with

Quinn, Cassandra moved to Mississippi 6 and continued therapy there for three more years. Quinn

described Cassandra as exhibiting multiple signs of post-traumatic stress disorder 7 and being

consistent in her descriptions of the “core details” of abuse by Craver.

(1) The Failure to Include Digital Penetration in the Offense Definition in the Abstract Portion of the Jury Charge Did Not Cause Egregious Harm

Craver was charged with three counts of aggravated sexual assault of a child. The

indictment alleged that Craver, on separate occasions, caused his sexual organ to penetrate

Cassandra’s mouth and sexual organ and that Craver caused his finger to penetrate Cassandra’s

sexual organ. However, in the trial court’s charge to the jury, the abstract section defined

aggravated sexual assault only as “intentionally or knowingly caus[ing]” “[t]he penetration of the

mouth, anus, or sexual organ of a child younger than 14 years of age by the sexual organ of the

actor.” Craver points out that there was no definition instructing the jury that digital penetration

of Cassandra’s sexual organ by Craver was also aggravated sexual assault of a child. 8 Craver

claims error in the trial court’s failure to define, in the abstract paragraph, each of the offenses for

which he was charged and convicted.

We employ a two-step process in our review of alleged jury charge error. See Abdnor v.

State, 871 S.W.2d 726, 731 (Tex. Crim. App. 1994). “Initially, we determine whether error

6 Cassandra’s family members testified that Cassandra and her siblings had all been removed from the home when the sexual abuse was reported. 7 Quinn testified that Cassandra “met seven of the eight criteria” for post-traumatic stress disorder, as defined by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Counseling. 8 See TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 22.021(a)(1)(A)(i). 4 occurred and then evaluate whether sufficient harm resulted from the error to require reversal.”

Wilson v. State, 391 S.W.3d 131, 138 (Tex. App.—Texarkana 2012, no pet.) (citing Abdnor, 871

S.W.2d at 731–32).

“[T]he jury is the exclusive judge of the facts, but it is bound to receive the law from the

court and be governed thereby.” TEX. CODE CRIM. PROC. ANN. art. 36.13. “A trial court must

submit a charge setting forth the ‘law applicable to the case.’” Lee v. State, 415 S.W.3d 915, 917

(Tex. App.—Texarkana 2013, pet. ref’d) (quoting TEX. CODE CRIM. PROC. ANN. art. 36.14). “The

purpose of the jury charge . . . is to inform the jury of the applicable law and guide them in its

application. It is not the function of the charge merely to avoid misleading or confusing the jury:

it is the function of the charge to lead and prevent confusion.” Id. (quoting Delgado v. State, 235

S.W.3d 244, 249 (Tex. Crim. App. 2007)).

The level of harm necessary to require reversal due to jury-charge error is dependent on

whether the appellant properly objected to the error. Abdnor, 871 S.W.2d at 732. Here, because

Craver did not object to the charge, we will not reverse unless the record shows the error resulted

in egregious harm, Ngo v.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Ngo v. State
175 S.W.3d 738 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 2005)
Vela v. State
209 S.W.3d 128 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 2006)
Delgado v. State
235 S.W.3d 244 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 2007)
Sessums v. State
129 S.W.3d 242 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2004)
Taylor v. State
268 S.W.3d 571 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 2008)
Wilson v. State
90 S.W.3d 391 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2002)
Abdnor v. State
871 S.W.2d 726 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 1994)
Lane v. State
257 S.W.3d 22 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2008)
Lopez v. State
288 S.W.3d 148 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2009)
Edwards v. State
107 S.W.3d 107 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2003)
Atkinson v. State
923 S.W.2d 21 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 1996)
Motilla v. State
78 S.W.3d 352 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 2002)
Medina v. State
7 S.W.3d 633 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 1999)
Moses v. State
105 S.W.3d 622 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 2003)
Rodgers v. State
205 S.W.3d 525 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 2006)
Villarreal v. State
205 S.W.3d 103 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2006)
Loun v. State
273 S.W.3d 406 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2008)
Martinez v. State
327 S.W.3d 727 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 2010)
Ex Parte Napper
322 S.W.3d 202 (Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, 2010)
Barshaw v. State
320 S.W.3d 625 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2010)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
Joseph James Craver v. State, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/joseph-james-craver-v-state-texapp-2020.