Martins v. State

52 S.W.3d 459, 2001 Tex. App. LEXIS 5096, 2001 WL 848455
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedJuly 26, 2001
Docket13-99-00638-CR
StatusPublished
Cited by51 cases

This text of 52 S.W.3d 459 (Martins 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
Martins v. State, 52 S.W.3d 459, 2001 Tex. App. LEXIS 5096, 2001 WL 848455 (Tex. Ct. App. 2001).

Opinion

OPINION

CASTILLO, Justice.

Alex Sander Martins was convicted by a jury of the offense of indecent exposure and sentenced to six months confinement and a fine of $500.00. The confinement portion of the sentence was suspended and he was placed on community supervision for two years. From this conviction, Martins appeals. He alleges ineffective assistance of counsel, asserts violations of his right to confrontation by not having a Portuguese interpreter, and attacks the legal and factual sufficiency of the evidence. We affirm the conviction.

Factual and Procedural Background

On September 21, 1998 at around 12:40— 12:45 pm, as the alleged victim was walking home after leaving her daughter at Garden Park Elementary school, she saw a man parked in a small white car by a convenience store, wearing a partially unbuttoned shirt. He appeared to be wearing very short shorts or no pants as she could see his legs. The man made a u- *464 turn and pulled up beside her as she kept walking. The man made another u-turn, pulled up beside her again and she again kept walking. The first time she saw him, she did not get a good look at him and the second time she did not look at him but did write down his license plate. Making another u-turn, he invited her in Spanish to take a ride with him. He also invited her to give him kisses while simultaneously pointing at his penis which was exposed. The victim was unclear on whether the man’s penis was erect. 2 She had no problems in understanding what he was saying and he spoke in a normal tone of voice. He was wearing a completely unbuttoned shirt, no pants, and sunglasses. She could not see his legs beneath his knees. She got a good look at him on this occasion. She told him “no” in Spanish, told him to leave her alone and kept walking. He made another turn, stopped her again, again told her to get in the car and give him some little kisses, while still exposing himself and driving in reverse as she was walking and telling him “no.” He finally drove off. The victim went home, told her mother, and called the police. The police took her to a store where she identified a man they had detained as the same man who had exposed himself to her.

Appellant, a native of Brazil and a pastor for the Universal Church, was charged with the offense. The waiver of arraignment filed on his behalf indicated that he could read, write, and understand English, but was also marked in handwriting, “translated for him,” followed by initials appearing to be those of his attorney, who spoke both English and Spanish. During the voir dire, appellant greeted the panel in English. Although there was no motion ever filed requesting an interpreter, the official court interpreter translated the proceedings during trial for appellant from English to Spanish. At trial, the victim testified to the event and made an in-court identification of the appellant as the man who exposed himself to her. Two police officers also testified.

Cristobal Abrego, Jr., an officer with the Brownsville Police Department (“BPD”), testified to being dispatched at around 1:00 p.m. on the date of the incident and informed that he was to look for a small white vehicle with certain license plates. He noticed the vehicle near Garden Park Elementary and activated his overhead lights. The vehicle would not come to a stop despite the officer’s use of his overhead lights, siren, and horn, but Abrego acknowledged there was no shoulder at that particular segment of the road. Abrego noticed the driver slouched down and fumbling inside the car with much movement while still driving. The car eventually pulled into a parking lot and the driver continued fumbling. The officer approached carefully because of all the movement, while ordering the driver out of the car in both Spanish and English. The officer noticed the driver tucking with one hand along the waist area. The driver exited once the officer approached the vehicle. Abrego observed that the driver’s shirt was untucked and he was trying to button it. His pants were buttoned but the zipper was completely opened. Abre-go did not notice any sunglasses. The officer interviewed the driver, but had trouble understanding what the driver was telling him. He noticed “kind of a Spanish accent” but had trouble understanding the *465 driver’s Spanish. Abrego then advised another officer via radio that he had detained a subject. The other officer, Leo Garza, advised Abrego that he was on his way with the victim. Garza drove slowly through an adjacent parking lot and then advised over the radio that the victim had positively identified the subject and he was placed under arrest. The officer did not make an in-court identification of the defendant although there were several references to “the defendant’s car.”

The second officer, David Martinez, a detective with the BPD, testified that he responded to a call regarding a small white vehicle with certain license plates, at around 1:00 p.m. on the date of the incident, but by the time he arrived at the scene, another officer had already made contact with the suspect and had him against the car. Martinez made an in-court identification of appellant as the suspect he saw. The officer noticed that the suspect’s shirt was sticking out and was buttoned only at the center button. The suspect was very nervous and was questioning what was going on. Martinez ran the plates through dispatch and they were confirmed as being the same ones identified by the victim. The victim was brought by another officer who drove through the parking lot and the suspect was moved so the victim could get a good view of him. Martinez was advised that there was a positive identification. Martinez later took a statement from the victim, who appeared “very scared” and shaken. She was teary-eyed and made the statement because she did not want it to happen again and was concerned because someone did that so close to the school.

Appellant put on three witnesses. The official court interpreter translated the testimony of all three witnesses from Spanish into English for the jury. It was noted that appellant would understand his wife in Spanish. She testified that her husband was a pastor and had come from Houston, having previously been a pastor in France, Holland, and Brazil and they had been married for almost eight years. She stated that the morning of the incident, he had left at the usual time to take their son to school and then had arrived at home after the service at around 11:30 a.m. He had left home at almost noon to get their son and arrived back home around 12:30. According to Mrs. Martins, her husband had stayed home then about twenty or thirty minutes, leaving at around 12:50 p.m. to take a package to a Federal Express office which was about ten minutes from their home. That day he had worn a white shirt with red stripes which was missing the third button and some grey pants.

The next witness, Maria De Los Angeles Duran, a member of appellant’s congregation, testified that she knew appellant like a son, he had a good reputation, and his reputation was excellent with church members. She occasionally went with him to Pharr and, after he learned the way, he would travel either on Military Road or by the expressway. She also testified that she believed him regarding the allegation.

Appellant, who was the last witness in the case, also testified in Spanish through the interpreter.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
52 S.W.3d 459, 2001 Tex. App. LEXIS 5096, 2001 WL 848455, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/martins-v-state-texapp-2001.