Perez v. State

56 S.W.3d 727, 2001 Tex. App. LEXIS 5560, 2001 WL 931180
Court of Appeals of Texas·Decided August 16, 2001·No. 14-99-00431-CR·Published·Cited by 47 cases

Opinions

CORRECTED MAJORITY OPINION

LESLIE BROCK YATES, Justice.

Appellant was charged by indictment with the offense of possession with intent to deliver a controlled substance, namely cocaine. The indictment alleged two prior felony convictions for the purpose of enhancing the range of punishment. A jury [729] convicted appellant of the charged offense. The trial comí found the enhancement allegations true and assessed punishment at forty years confinement in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice—Institutional Division and a fine of $5,000. Appellant raises four points of error on appeal. We affirm.

Houston police officer Frank Scoggins received a tip from a confidential informant that appellant was selling drugs from her home. Scoggins secured a warrant for appellant’s arrest and the search ‘of her home. Prior to executing that warrant, Scoggins and several other plain clothes officers maintained surveillance on the residence and saw appellant depart in a vehicle driven by her boyfriend, Romero Ramos. The officers followed the vehicle a sufficient distance to insure that anyone remaining in the house would not know appellant was being stopped. Scoggins then ordered a patrol officer to stop the vehicle in which appellant was traveling. Scoggins approached appellant, presented her with a copy of the warrant, informed her of her legal rights, and took her and Ramos into custody. Both were transported to the residence. Scoggins searched the home and discovered cocaine and marijuana in the master bathroom.

In her case-in-chief, appellant called Ramos as a witness. He testified the drugs recovered in the search of the residence were his and that he admitted possessing the contraband to a plain clothes officer following the search of the residence. Ramos further testified appellant knew nothing of the contraband.

In her first point of error, appellant claims the trial court erred in refusing to allow appellant to present her opening statement at the close of the State’s casein-chief. The record shows that after the State made its opening statement, the trial court asked defense counsel if he would like to make an opening statement. Defense counsel replied, ‘We would waive at this time, reserve the right for later.” The court responded, “You need to make it now.” Defense counsel then stated, “All right. Then we would waive.” After the State presented its evidence and rested, the trial court asked defense counsel if he had any witnesses. Defense counsel responded, “Yes. Did the Court want me to call witnesses now?” The court responded, ‘Yes.” Appellant did not request to make her opening statement at the close of the State’s evidence.

Article 36.01 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure provides that in a jury trial a defendant’s opening statement can follow the presentation of the State’s evidence or follow the State’s opening statement. Moore v. State, 868 S.W.2d 787, 789 (Tex.Crim.App.1993). A defendant can waive this right if she does not timely request an opening statement. Id. Appellant waived her right to an opening statement in this case. Initially, when told he must make his statement before the State presented its evidence, defense counsel stated, “All right. Then we would waive.” Appellant’s explicit waiver of her request for an opening statement precludes appellant from resurrecting this request on appeal. See Atkins v. State, 919 S.W.2d 770, 775 (Tex.App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 1996, no pet.) (Defendant’s explicit waiver of objection to State’s use of peremptory challenge precluded Batson challenge on appeal). Because error was waived, appellant’s first point of error is overruled.

In her second point of error, appellant claims the trial court erred in denying a mistrial when the State argued evidence outside the record. On direct examination, the State asked Officer Scoggins what information he had received about the defendant prior to executing the search warrant. Officer Scoggins responded that he received information that the defendant was [730] dealing cocaine. The trial court sustained appellant’s hearsay objection. In closing argument, the prosecutor stated, “Officer Scoggins got up here and testified that he had an informant who told him that this defendant deals drugs.” Appellant objected, requested an instruction to disregard, and moved for a mistrial. The trial court granted the instruction to disregard, but denied the motion for mistrial.

If an instruction is given and the court denies the defendant’s motion for mistrial, error results only when the argument is extreme, manifestly improper, injected new and harmful facts into the case, or violated a mandatory statutory provision and was thus so inflammatory that its prejudicial effect could not reasonably be removed from the minds of the jurors by the instruction given. Washington v. State, 822 S.W.2d 110, 118 (Tex.App.—Waco 1991), rev’d on other grounds, 856 S.W.2d 184 (Tex.Crim.App.1993). It is considered a sufficient response to most well-founded objections that the material be withdrawn from jury consideration, if necessary, and that jurors be admonished not to consider it during their deliberations. Barber v. State, 757 S.W.2d 359, 362 (Tex.Crim.App.1988), cert. denied, 489 U.S. 1091, 109 S.Ct. 1559, 103 L.Ed.2d 861 (1989). The adversary system thus depends on a belief that the declaration of a mistrial ought to be an exceedingly uncommon remedy for the residual prejudice remaining after objections are sustained and curative instructions given. For this reason, our system presumes that judicial admonishments to the jury are efficacious. Waldo v. State, 746 S.W.2d 750, 754 (Tex.Crim.App.1988). Only when it is apparent that an objectionable event at trial is so emotionally inflammatory that curative instructions are not likely to prevent the jury being unfairly prejudiced against the defendant may a motion for mistrial be granted. Kemp v. State, 846 S.W.2d 289, 308 (Tex.Crim.App.1992), cert. denied, 508 U.S. 918, 113 S.Ct. 2361, 124 L.Ed.2d 268 (1993). Here, the statement was not so inflammatory that an instruction to disregard would not have cured any prejudicial effect. Appellant’s second point of error is overruled.

In her third and fourth points of error, appellant claims she received ineffective assistance of counsel. In the third point of error, appellant claims her counsel was ineffective in failing to cite statutory grounds for the exclusion of testimony of unrecorded custodial statements. In the fourth point of error, appellant claims her counsel was ineffective when he mistakenly requested a lesser offense instruction on less than one gram rather than four to two hundred grams.

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

Perez v. State, 56 S.W.3d 727, 2001 Tex. App. LEXIS 5560, 2001 WL 931180 (Tex. Ct. App. 2001).

56 S.W.3d 727 (Perez v. State) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

Related

Albino A. Nunez v. the State of Texas
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2022
Brittany Cnae McCutcheon v. the State of Texas
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2021
Karen Elaine Madrid v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2020
David Earl Jackson v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2019
Yavon Brydon v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2019
Jessie Earl Nicholson v. State
577 S.W.3d 559 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2019)
Arnesia C. Washington v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2018
Deodrea Markiese Dudley v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2017
Kulwant Gill v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2017
Joseph Neal Jones v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2016
Eric Lopez v. State
470 S.W.3d 146 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2015)
Louis Charles Kirk v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2015
Ibarra, Jamie Alberto
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2015
Scott, Lash Adarrin
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2015
Jamie Alberto Ibarra v. State
456 S.W.3d 349 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2015)
Lash Adarrin Scott v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2014
Wrandy Dewayne Little v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2014
MacIel DelosAngeles Sandoval v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2014
Jason Harrison v. State
Court of Appeals of Texas, 2012
Anthony Wert v. State
383 S.W.3d 747 (Court of Appeals of Texas, 2012)