Richard Lee Davis v. the State of Texas

CourtTexas Court of Appeals, 11th District (Eastland)
DecidedMay 29, 2026
Docket11-24-00264-CR
StatusPublished

This text of Richard Lee Davis v. the State of Texas (Richard Lee Davis v. the State of Texas) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Texas Court of Appeals, 11th District (Eastland) primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Richard Lee Davis v. the State of Texas, (Tex. Ct. App. 2026).

Opinion

Opinion filed May 29, 2026

In The

Eleventh Court of Appeals __________

No. 11-24-00264-CR __________

RICHARD LEE DAVIS, Appellant

V.

THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee

On Appeal from the 358th District Court Ector County, Texas Trial Court Cause No. D-21-1967-CR

MEMORANDUM OPINION Appellant, Richard Lee Davis, was convicted by a jury of aggravated sexual assault of a child, a first-degree felony. See TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 22.021(a)(1)(B)(i), (a)(2)(B) (West Supp. 2025). Appellant pled “not true” to an enhancement allegation (a 2009 conviction for aggravated sexual assault of a child), which the jury found to be “true,” and the jury assessed his punishment at life imprisonment in the Correctional Institutions Division of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. Id. § 12.42(c)(2). The trial court sentenced Appellant accordingly. On appeal, Appellant contends that the trial court erred when it: (1) failed to limit in its guilt/innocence charge the correct definitions of the culpable mental states—“intentionally” and “knowingly”—that apply to the offense of aggravated sexual assault of a child; and (2) submitted an Article 38.37 instruction in the same charge that was inconsistent with the extraneous offense limiting instruction it orally gave the jury during trial.1 See TEX. CODE CRIM. PROC. ANN. art. 38.37, § 2(a)(1)(E), (b) (West Supp. 2025). We affirm. I. Factual Background Because Appellant does not challenge the sufficiency of the evidence to support his conviction, we only recite the facts that are necessary to address the issues that he has raised on appeal. The child victim, J.H.D., was eleven when Appellant began touching her inappropriately in the fall of 2019.2 At the time, Appellant lived in a vehicle on the property where J.H.D. and her mother resided, but J.H.D.’s mother allowed Appellant to have access to the common areas of her home. J.H.D. testified that she and her mother were in their home watching a movie with Appellant when at some point Appellant reached under a blanket that was covering J.H.D. and began rubbing

1 Appellant’s first court-appointed appellate counsel submitted an Anders brief and filed a motion to withdraw. See Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738 (1967). Following the procedures set forth in Anders, Kelly v. State, 436 S.W.3d 313 (Tex. Crim. App. 2014), and In re Schulman, 252 S.W.3d 403 (Tex. Crim. App. 2008), we independently reviewed the record and concluded that this appeal was not particularly amenable to disposition under Anders. Appellant filed responses to counsel’s Anders brief and requested the appointment of new appellate counsel. Accordingly, we granted counsel’s motion to withdraw, abated this appeal, and remanded this cause to the trial court with instructions to appoint other appellate counsel. New appellate counsel was directed to file a brief on the merits and address any substantive issues that appellate counsel deemed to be arguable. This appeal was reinstated after the trial court appointed new appellate counsel. 2 To protect the identities of the child victim and her family, we refer to them by pseudonyms or initials. See TEX. CONST. art. I, § 30(a)(1); TEX. R. APP. P. 9.10(a)(3), 9.8 cmt.

2 her upper thigh and pubic area over her pants. In the days that followed, Appellant showed J.H.D. pornography. One evening, Appellant entered a bedroom where J.H.D. was sleeping, crouched next to the bed, slid his hand under her clothing, and penetrated her vagina with one of his fingers. After J.H.D.’s mother saw her watching pornography approximately two years later, J.H.D. told her mother that Appellant had shown her pornography and sexually abused her in the past. At trial, J.H.D.’s older sister testified that Appellant had made inappropriate and sexually suggestive comments to her and entered her bedroom on one occasion wearing only a towel. Evidence was also presented that on August 10, 2007, Appellant pled guilty to the same offense—aggravated sexual assault of a child (the child victim of this offense was thirteen)—and was placed on deferred adjudication community supervision; he was subsequently adjudicated and convicted of this offense on September 11, 2009. Appellant’s primary defenses at trial were that (1) the charged offense was based on fabricated testimony, and (2), alternatively, J.H.D. was mistaken as to the identity of the person who had allegedly sexually assaulted her—he denied that he ever touched J.H.D. In its guilt/innocence charge, the trial court submitted the “intentionally” and “knowingly” definitions that Appellant challenges on appeal and an extraneous-offense instruction that is consistent with the language in Article 38.37, Sections 1(b) and 2(b), and Rules 404(b) and 405(b) of the Texas Rules of Evidence. See CRIM. PROC. art. 38.37 §§ 1(b), 2(b); TEX. R. EVID. 404(b), 405(b). II. The Culpable Mental State Definitions In his first issue, Appellant contends that the trial court erred when it did not provide the correct definitions of “intentionally” and “knowingly” in the charge because it failed to restrict the culpable mental states that apply to the offense of aggravated sexual assault of a child. 3 The Penal Code prescribes four culpable mental states—intentionally, knowingly, recklessly, and criminally negligent. See PENAL § 6.03 (West 2021). “‘[T]he scope of those culpable mental states is limited by the type of offense [that is charged],’ which depends on the ‘conduct element.’” Campbell v. State, 664 S.W.3d 240, 245 (Tex. Crim. App. 2022) (quoting Cook v. State, 884 S.W.2d 485, 487 (Tex. Crim. App. 1994)). “There are three ‘conduct elements’: (1) nature of [the] conduct; (2) result of [the] conduct; and (3) the circumstances surrounding the conduct.” Id. (quoting McQueen v. State, 781 S.W.2d 600, 603 (Tex. Crim. App. 1989)); see also Young v. State, 341 S.W.3d 417, 423 (Tex. Crim. App. 2011). An offense may contain any one or more conduct elements that alone or in combination form the overall behavior that the legislature intended to criminalize, and it is these essential conduct elements to which a culpable mental state must apply. McQueen, 781 S.W.2d at 603. A trial court errs when it fails to limit in its charge the language of the applicable culpable mental state(s) to the appropriate conduct element or elements of the specific offense to which they apply. Price v. State, 457 S.W.3d 437, 441 (Tex. Crim. App. 2015); Cook, 884 S.W.2d at 491. As charged in this case, a person commits the offense of aggravated sexual assault of a child if the person intentionally or knowingly causes the penetration of the sexual organ of a child by any means, here, by Appellant penetrating J.H.D.’s vagina with one of his fingers. See PENAL § 22.021(a)(1)(B)(i). There is a distinction between a “result of conduct” offense and a “nature of conduct” offense. Aggravated sexual assault of a child is a “nature of conduct” or “conduct-oriented” offense. See Young, 341 S.W.3d at 423 (citing Vick v. State, 991 S.W.2d 830, 832 (Tex. Crim. App. 1999)). Appellant contends that the culpable mental states that apply—“intentionally” and “knowingly”—were incorrectly defined in the charge. We agree, as does the State. Here, the charge defined “intentionally” and “knowingly” as follows: 4 A person acts intentionally, or with intent, with respect to a result of his conduct when it is his conscious desire to cause the result.

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Richard Lee Davis v. the State of Texas, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/richard-lee-davis-v-the-state-of-texas-txctapp11-2026.