Moone v. State

728 S.W.2d 928, 1987 Tex. App. LEXIS 7036
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedApril 16, 1987
DocketC14-86-528-CR
StatusPublished
Cited by14 cases

This text of 728 S.W.2d 928 (Moone 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
Moone v. State, 728 S.W.2d 928, 1987 Tex. App. LEXIS 7036 (Tex. Ct. App. 1987).

Opinion

OPINION

SEARS, Justice.

This is an appeal from a conviction for driving while intoxicated. Appellant was found guilty by a jury and his punishment was assessed at 730 days in jail, probated, and a fine of $2000.00. We affirm.

Appellant was involved in a two vehicle accident during the early morning hours of August 13, 1985. The driver of the other *930 automobile was pronounced dead at the scene and Appellant was taken by ambulance to Cypress-Fairbanks Medical Center. While there, he consented to giving a blood specimen to determine its alcohol content. This specimen was tested at the Department of Public Safety Crime Laboratory and was found to contain an alcohol concentration of .12 grams per one hundred milliliters of blood.

Appellant asserts three points of error. In his first point of error, Appellant contends that the trial court erred in admitting evidence of the blood alcohol specimen because the State did not conclusively establish the chain of custody of the specimen. In order for the results of a blood test to be admissible in, evidence, a proper chain of custody of the blood sample that was drawn from the accused and later tested must be established. Brown v. State, 156 Tex.Crim.R. 144, 240 S.W.2d 310, 311 (Tex.Crim.App.1951); Lynch v. State, 687 S.W.2d 76, 77-78 (Tex.App. —Amarillo 1985, pet. ref’d).

The record reflects that while Appellant was at Cypress-Fairbanks Medical Center he received the statutory DWI warning and signed a form consenting to the taking of a blood specimen. Deputy Michael Sieck, one of the officers investigating the accident, testified that Nurse Reed drew some of Appellant’s blood and placed it in a glass vial held by the Deputy. Deputy Sieck stated that the vial never left his possession until he deposited it in the DPS lock-box. Further, this was the only blood sample he deposited in the lockbox that night. He testified that he placed a seal over the top of the glass vial on which he wrote the name of the nurse, the time, his own name and other identifying information. Deputy Sieck then personally typed a “submission form” which listed the type of sample, a request for a blood-alcohol test, the date, the officer’s name, Appellant’s name, and the name of the accident victim. The submission form and the sealed glass vial were then placed in a green cardboard tube mailer. The green tube was sealed and marked with the officer’s name, address, and the word “Houston.” At trial, Deputy Sieck positively identified the submission form and the green tube. However, because the seal had been removed, he was not able to positively identify the glass sample vial offered into evidence at trial as the same one he placed in the green tube. He explained that it was necessary for the DPS chemist to break the seal in order to open the vial and test the contents.

Mr. Mike McGeehon, a chemist for the DPS Crime Laboratory, testified that he retrieved the sealed green tube from the DPS lockbox on August 20,1985, marked it with the lab number and placed his initials on it. He took the green tube to the lab, opened it and removed the submission form. He did not remove the glass vial. He then completed an evidence record sheet which he marked with the date, his initials and the lab number, resealed the tube and placed it in the lab’s refrigerator. The same lab number was placed on the evidence record sheet, submission form and the green tube. The submission form was then attached to the evidence record sheet and both were later placed in a file folder bearing the same lab number.

Mr. Lou Haby, also a DPS chemist, testified that he removed the resealed green tube from the lab refrigerator. He positively identified the glass vial introduced into evidence as the one he removed from the green tube. He explained that he placed his initials and the lab number from the green tube and lab forms on the glass vial when he removed the vial from the tube. He then testified that he analyzed the blood sample contained in the vial and determined that the alcohol content was .12 grams of alcohol per one hundred milliliters of blood.

Mr. David Rossi, a deputy in the Harris County Sheriff’s Department, testified that he picked up the green tube containing the blood sample from the DPS laboratory after it had been analyzed. He verified the case number when he received the sample, logged it in the record book, placed it in a box and stored it in the property room until the date of the trial. He personally retrieved the sample and brought it to the courtroom.

*931 All of these items of evidence bore the same lab number and were handled in a methodical manner. There is no evidence that the sample was tampered with or misplaced at any time. In the event it was error to allow the glass vial to be introduced into evidence, we hold such error to be harmless. The chemist’s testimony regarding the results of the blood-alcohol test on Appellant’s blood specimen is the only evidence that could have harmed Appellant. We hold that the chain of custody of the blood sample was sufficiently proven to allow the admission of the blood-alcohol test results into evidence. See Keenan v. State, 700 S.W.2d 12 (Tex.App. —Amarillo 1985, no pet.); Jackson v. State, 640 S.W.2d 323 (Tex.App. —San Antonio 1982, pet. ref’d). Appellant’s first point of error is overruled.

In his second point of error, Appellant attacks the trial court’s inclusion of the statutory definition of intoxication in its charge to the jury. The essence of Appellant’s argument is that the new DWI statute, Tex.Rev.Civ.Stat.Ann. art. 67011 -1(a)(2) (Vernon Supp.1987), by permitting a conviction based on proof that the defendant had an alcohol concentration of at least 0.10 or that he had lost the normal use of his mental or physical faculties by reason of the introduction of alcohol into his body, creates an unconstitutional “conclusive irrebuttable presumption” of intoxication. Appellant asserts that this presumption constitutes an impermissible encroachment upon the province of the jury.

The Court of Criminal Appeals recently rejected a similar argument in Forte v. State, 707 S.W.2d 89 (Tex.Crim.App.1986). That court found that the legislature had merely redefined the offense of driving under the influence so that “ ‘intoxication’ now can consist of an alcohol concentration of 0.10% or more ... and ... made an alcohol concentration of 0.10% or more an element of the offense.” Forte v. State, 707 S.W.2d at 94. Certainly, this analysis applies equally to the alternative definition of intoxication, “not having the normal use of mental or physical faculties by reason of the introduction of alcohol ... into the body.” The Court of Criminal Appeals then concluded that the statute does not in any way encourage the jury to ignore defensive evidence on the issue of intoxication and held the argument that art.

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Bluebook (online)
728 S.W.2d 928, 1987 Tex. App. LEXIS 7036, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/moone-v-state-texapp-1987.