Martin Armijo, Jr v. State

Court of Appeals of Texas·Decided December 18, 2019·No. 05-18-00489-CR·Published

Opinion

AFFIRMED and Opinion Filed December 18, 2019

S In The Court of Appeals Fifth District of Texas at Dallas No. 05-18-00489-CR

MARTIN ARMIJO, JR, Appellant V. THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee

On Appeal from the 283rd Judicial District Court Dallas County, Texas Trial Court Cause No. F-1676053-T

MEMORANDUM OPINION Before Justices Myers, Osborne, and Nowell Opinion by Justice Osborne Appellant, Martin Armijo, Jr., was convicted of capital murder. Because the State did not

seek the death penalty, appellant was sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of

parole. On appeal, appellant claims that the trial court erred by excluding several letters written to

him while he was in jail awaiting trial by a former girlfriend who was also a witness to the offense.

Appellant claims that exclusion of these letters violated his rights to due process by preventing

him from presenting a defense and that he was harmed by this error. We affirm.

Background

Appellant does not challenge the sufficiency of the evidence to support his conviction for

capital murder. Consequently, and because the background facts are known to the parties, we recite

only those facts relevant to the disposition of this appeal. TEX. R. APP. P. 47.1. On the evening of July 1, 2016, Dallas Police officers responded to a caller1 who claimed

he had witnessed a murder at 755 Elwayne Avenue in Dallas, Texas. Once at that location, officers

could hear yelling coming from a backyard shed. Officers set up a perimeter around the shed.

After dark, officers saw appellant coming out of the shed holding a couple of items. The

police told appellant to drop the items. Appellant did so, but then ran behind the shed and out of

the yard. The police followed him and he was taken into custody shortly afterwards.

Video footage taken by the police showed a woman, Avigail Villanueva, leaving the shed.

She was bleeding from the head and saying “He tried to kill me.”

The body of Jonathan Gutierrez was discovered in the shed. He died as a result of multiple

blunt and sharp force injuries. There was evidence that appellant had beaten, stabbed, and

otherwise tortured Gutierrez for hours before Gutierrez died.

The Letters

Appellant claims that the trial court erred by excluding several letters written to him by

Villanueva while he was in jail awaiting trial. Appellant claims that exclusion of these letters

violated his rights to due process and that he was harmed by this error. The State responds that

appellant’s constitutional claims were not preserved because he failed to object at trial on due

process grounds. The State further responds that the trial court correctly excluded the letters

because they were not relevant or, in the alternative, that any error is harmless. We agree with the

State.

1 The caller proved to be Ricky Moreno, who was later prosecuted for aggravated kidnapping due to his participation in this offense. Moreno v. State, 05-18-00271-CR, 2019 WL 4071993 (Tex. App.—Dallas Aug. 29, 2019, pet. granted) (not yet published).

–2– Avigail Villanueva’s testimony

Villanueva testified that she met Gutierrez when she was thirteen years old and started

dating him when she was eighteen years old. The pair ultimately had five children together. They

broke up in 2015.

Villanueva also testified that she began using drugs, specifically methamphetamine, when

she was twenty years old. She was arrested and convicted three times for drug possession,

manufacturing, and delivering. The drug usage and offenses caused her to lose custody of her

children. Her four oldest children went into her mother’s custody while Gutierrez’s mother took

custody of her youngest child.

Within days of her breakup with Gutierrez, Villanueva began dating appellant. Villanueva

met appellant at Thomas Johnson’s house at 755 Elwayne Avenue. Johnson was dealing drugs.

People would come to his house and use drugs in some of the outside structures on that property.

In particular, Villanueva and appellant would use drugs, heroin and methamphetamine, together

and get high at Johnson’s house.

Appellant became aware that Villanueva used to date Gutierrez. Appellant told Villanueva

that when he saw Gutierrez he was going to beat him up. Appellant told Villanueva that when he

beat up Gutierrez she was not to cry or show any remorse.

On July 1, 2016, Villanueva made contact with appellant; she wanted to “score some dope”

but did not want to run into him in the neighborhood. Appellant sent her a text saying that he had

Gutierrez with him. Two of these texts read as follows: “I’ve been flicking ur bd for like two

hours;” “I fucked him up d homies holding for me.” Villanueva responded as follows: “Already

daddy thank u im not at d house im wl my mom and d kids as soon as we done ill tell my mom 2

take me on that side.” Appellant then sent texts saying “I’m gonna hold him for 2” and “Get over

here.” Villanueva stopped replying to these texts.

–3– Appellant later called Villanueva, said he had Gutierrez, and had been beating Gutierrez

for a few hours. Villanueva testified that she heard appellant hit Gutierrez; she heard Gutierrez

scream and tell appellant to stop. Villanueva testified that she felt guilty and wished she had not

told appellant about Gutierrez.

When appellant asked Villanueva where she was, she lied and told him she was at her

mother’s house. Appellant told her that he was on his way to pick her up. Villanueva then called

her mother and told her to look around when she got home to make sure there were no cars that

she did not recognize because appellant was at the house.

Appellant called Villanueva again and told her to come outside. Villanueva lied to

appellant again and told him that she was not at her mother’s house but was with her mother.

Villanueva told him that when her mother “was done with what she was doing” her mother would

drop her off at appellant’s location. Villanueva later called appellant back and told him that her

mother had dropped her at a gas station. Appellant told “Ricky,” i.e., Ricky Moreno, to go and get

Villanueva.

Moreno picked Villanueva up and they went to Johnson’s house. When she walked into

the room where Gutierrez was, Villanueva noticed that the “whole room was tore up,” Gutierrez

was on the floor, his arms were “taped up,” and there was blood on the walls. Gutierrez was alive

at this point. Appellant tried to hand her a wooden bat and told her to hit Gutierrez with it. When

Villanueva refused, appellant began hitting Gutierrez with the bat. Gutierrez was telling appellant

to stop, screaming, and holding up his arms. Villanueva claimed that while this was going on she

was just sitting down; she did not try to stop appellant because she was scared. Appellant stopped

hitting Gutierrez with the bat and poured bleach on him. She also saw appellant throw a knife at

Gutierrez repeatedly and hit Gutierrez with the knife. When appellant told Gutierrez to get up and

he did not respond, Villanueva knew that Gutierrez was dead.

–4– Villanueva admitted that she told appellant a lot of stories about Gutierrez in the few

months that she and appellant were together. She was angry at Gutierrez because his mother had

her youngest child and she was not getting to see that child as much as she would like. She was

also angry that she could not see her other children who were with her parents because they did

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