Joshua Wilson v. the State of Texas

• Court: Court of Appeals of Texas
• Decided: January 18, 2023
• Docket: 05-22-00311-CR
• Status: Published

Opinion

AFFIRMED and Opinion Filed January 18, 2023

S In The Court of Appeals Fifth District of Texas at Dallas No. 05-22-00311-CR

JOSHUA WILSON, Appellant V. THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee

On Appeal from the 397th Judicial District Court Grayson County, Texas Trial Court Cause No. 069937

MEMORANDUM OPINION Before Justices Partida-Kipness, Nowell, and Kennedy Opinion by Justice Nowell A jury convicted Joshua Wilson of burglary of a habitation. In a single issue,

appellant argues the evidence is insufficient to sustain the conviction. We affirm the

trial court’s judgment.

When reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence to support a conviction, we

consider the evidence in the light most favorable to the verdict. Edward v. State, 635

S.W.3d 649, 655 (Tex. Crim. App. 2021). The verdict will be upheld if any rational

trier of fact could have found all the essential elements of the offense proven beyond

a reasonable doubt. Id. “This familiar standard gives full play to the responsibility of the trier of fact fairly to resolve conflicts in the testimony, to weigh the evidence,

and to draw reasonable inferences from basic facts to ultimate facts.” Jackson v.

Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979). The jury is the sole judge of the weight and

credibility of the evidence. Edward, 635 S.W.3d at 655. When considering a claim

of evidentiary insufficiency, we must keep in mind that a juror may choose to believe

or disbelieve all, some, or none of the evidence presented. Id. Further, while jurors

may not base their decision on mere speculation or unsupported inferences, they may

draw reasonable inferences from the evidence. Id. The evidence is sufficient to

support a conviction, and thus the jury’s verdict is not irrational, if “the inferences

necessary to establish guilt are reasonable based upon the cumulative force of all the

evidence when considered in the light most favorable to the verdict.” Id. at 655-56

(quoting Wise v. State, 364 S.W.3d 900, 903 (Tex. Crim. App. 2012)). When faced

with conflicts in the evidence, a reviewing court shall presume that the fact finder

resolved those conflicts in favor of the verdict and defer to that determination. Id.

As applicable here, a person commits an offense if, without the effective

consent of the owner, the person enters a habitation with intent to commit theft. TEX.

PEN. CODE ANN. § 30.02(a)(1).

Debbie Judkins and her husband live in a rural area of Grayson County. On

January 31, 2018, Judkins received a call from a neighbor who believed Judkins’s

house had been burglarized. When she arrived home, Judkins saw the door between

the garage and the home had been broken, the glass in the back door was broken,

–2– and another door was kicked in. Her bedroom and closet were in disarray. She

testified: “You could tell somebody had been through it all.” Items missing from her

home included a TV, Blu-ray player, pocket watch, and old wallet. The jury saw

pictures of her home after the burglary and heard a recording of her call to 911.

The same day, Teresa Monk, one of Judkins’s neighbors, was in the car with

her husband, and her husband commented about a small gold or tan SUV that was

parked at the Judkins’s house. A man was standing on the sidewalk leading to the

front door. As their car approached the house, Monk noticed the man look down at

the phone in his hand “like he doesn’t want me to see his face.” Monk testified: “That

really kind of set off a lot of alarm bells because it looked like he purposely was

hiding his face.” She testified the man was wearing a dark purple sweatshirt.

Monk called Gary Bennett, another neighbor, and told him about the man and

vehicle on Judkins’s property, and she provided physical descriptions of both.

Bennett, who was in his car and near Judkins’s property, then encountered the SUV

driving the opposite direction. Bennett turned around, began following the SUV, and

called 911. The jury heard the 911 recording.

Bennett followed the SUV until it stopped at a local business, Alpha

Transmissions. The driver went into the shop. The jury saw surveillance video

provided by Alpha Transmissions, which shows the man wearing a purple sweatshirt

walking into the transmission shop. Bennett identified appellant as the man.

–3– The owner of Alpha Transmissions testified that on January 31, 2018, a man

walked into his offices, stood in the reception area for about a minute without saying

anything, and then left. A second man then walked in and asked about the first man,

explaining: “he had seen this gentleman at a house that was being burglarized and

he was following him.” Testifying about the same encounter, Bennett said he asked

the shop owner to save his surveillance video footage because, Bennett explained,

appellant “has broke [sic] into a neighbor’s house.”

The gold SUV was registered to appellant’s girlfriend.

Jessey Grissom, a sergeant at the Grayson county Sheriff’s Office, identified

appellant on the surveillance video from Alpha Transmissions. Grissom testified he

was “[a] hundred percent sure” appellant was the person in the video; “I mean, it’s

him. It’s his face.” During the investigation, Grissom went into appellant’s home

and took pictures. One of the pictures shows a Blu-ray player, and Judkins identified

the Blu-ray player as hers.

Appellant testified in his defense. On January31, 2018, appellant became lost

while driving to the transmission shop. He pulled into the Judkins’ driveway to try

to determine where he needed to go. When he eventually arrived at the transmission

shop, he noticed the business was busy. “[S]o I sat there and waited. A guy came in

from the side bay door and said somebody will be right with you to help you. I stood

there maybe two minutes, and I just left. I got tired of waiting.” Appellant testified

he did not burglarize Judkins’ home. Appellant acknowledged that, when Grissom

–4– came to his house, Grissom found stolen property. However, appellant maintained

he purchased the Blu-ray player.

On appeal, appellant argues the evidence is insufficient because there is no

evidence “that anyone placed the Defendant anywhere on the Judkins’s property

other than in the front yard in plain view.” The uncontested evidence shows the

Judkins’s house was burglarized on the same day appellant parked in their driveway.

While no witness testified to seeing appellant burglarize the Judkins’s house, the

jury could have reached the conclusion he did so based on reasonable inferences

drawn from the evidence, particularly the testimony from Monk and Bennett.

Additionally, Debbie Judkins identified the Blu-ray player found in appellant’s room

as hers; Grissom found other stolen items in appellant’s house.

Having reviewed the record, we conclude there is sufficient evidence for a

jury to reasonably conclude appellant entered the Judkins’s home and committed

theft. See Edward, 635 S.W.3d at 655; see also TEX. PEN. CODE ANN. § 30.02(a)(1).

We overrule appellant’s sole issue.

We affirm the trial court’s judgment.

/Erin A. Nowell/ ERIN A. NOWELL JUSTICE

Do Not Publish TEX. R. APP. P. 47.2(b) 220311F.U05

–5– S Court of Appeals Fifth District of Texas at Dallas JUDGMENT

JOSHUA WILSON, Appellant On Appeal from the 397th Judicial District Court, Grayson County, No. 05-22-00311-CR V. Texas Trial Court Cause No. 069937. THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee Opinion delivered by Justice Nowell. Justices Partida-Kipness and Kennedy participating.

Based on the Court’s opinion of this date, the judgment of the trial court is AFFIRMED.

Judgment entered January 18, 2023

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