Scott Anderson Copeland v. State

• Court: Court of Appeals of Texas
• Decided: October 30, 2008
• Docket: 14-07-00475-CR
• Status: Published

Opinion

Affirmed and Memorandum Opinion filed October 30, 2008

Affirmed and Memorandum Opinion filed October 30, 2008.

In The

Fourteenth Court of Appeals

_______________

NO. 14-07-00475-CR

SCOTT ANDERSON COPELAND, Appellant

V.

THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee

On Appeal from the 212th District Court

Galveston County, Texas

Trial Court Cause No. 04CR0826

M E M O R A N D U M   O P I N I O N

A jury convicted Scott Anderson Copeland of capital murder, and the trial court imposed an automatic life sentence.  On appeal, appellant asserts that the trial court erred in overruling his objection to a statement made by the prosecutor during voir dire and argues that the automatic life sentencing provisions of the Texas Penal Code violate the United States and Texas constitutions.  We affirm.

I.  Background

Appellant has not challenged the sufficiency of the evidence to support his conviction.  We therefore discuss only those facts necessary to address appellant=s issues.

Appellant was indicted for the offense of capital murder, alleged to have occurred on or about October 11, 2002.  The State did not seek the death penalty.  Appellant pleaded not guilty.  At the beginning of voir dire, the trial judge explained to the venire panel that appellant was not required to prove anything.  The judge informed the venire panel that the burden of proof was on the State, and that this burden required the State to prove its case to the jury beyond a reasonable doubt.

Later, the prosecutor further discussed the burden of proof.  He explained that the Court of Criminal Appeals had eliminated the requirement that trial courts define the terms Abeyond a reasonable doubt@ as follows:  AAnd there used to be a definition.  The Court of Criminal Appeals threw it out, says it was circular and nonsensical, but basically whatever it means to you.@  Appellant=s trial counsel objected, stating AYour Honor, I object to that.  It=s not whatever it means to them.  It=s how the words are used and common use [sic] by ordinary people in Texas.@  The trial judge overruled this objection.  Jury selection continued and a jury was empaneled.

At trial, the State presented testimony from several eyewitnesses to the robbery and murder that occurred on October 11, 2002 at Murphy=s on Main, a bar located in LaMarque in Galveston County.  According to the eyewitnesses, two masked individuals holding guns entered the bar at around 10:45 p.m.  One of the gunmen held a gun to the head of a bar employee and demanded money.  The employee complied by opening the cash register, giving the cash to the gunman, and lying down on the floor as directed.  Meanwhile, the other gunman started to take money out of a tip jar, and two of the bar patrons intervened to try to stop the robbery.  A scuffle ensued; the decedent, Joe Morreale, grabbed a chair to assist, but one of the gunmen shot him.  After the shooting, the gunmen ran out of the bar and escaped in a car driven by a third person.

Several months transpired, and the LaMarque Police Department was unable to develop any leads in the robbery and shooting.  But in January 2004, a Crimestoppers tip led them to two suspects.  These suspects were arrested, and they implicated appellant as the third person involved in the robbery.  After officers found appellant at his apartment in Houston, he agreed to accompany them to LaMarque for questioning.  At the LaMarque police station, appellant provided a videotaped statement, in which he admitted being one of the armed gunmen involved in the robbery at the bar, but insisted that he was not the one who shot Morreale.  This videotaped statement was admitted and played before the jury.

At the conclusion of the guilt-innocence phase, the trial court submitted the charge to the jury.  The jury found appellant guilty of capital murder as charged in the indicment.  In accordance with the sentencing provisions of the Texas Penal Code, the trial court assessed punishment at confinement for life in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Institutional Division.  This appeal timely ensued.

II.  Issues Presented

In his first issue, appellant argues  the trial court erred by overruling his objection to the prosecutor=s statement during voir dire that proof beyond a reasonable doubt is Abasically whatever it means to you.@  In his second issue, appellant contends that Texas Penal Code section 12.31(b), requiring a mandatory life sentence without parole in capital cases in which the State does not seek the death penalty, violates the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution.  Appellant asserts in his third issue that this section of the Penal Code violates Article 1, section 13 of the Texas Constitution.

III.  Analysis

A.        Prosecutor=s Remarks During Voir Dire

In support of his first issue, appellant relies primarily on Wansing v. Hargett, a habeas corpus case from the Tenth Circuit, to support his contention that the prosecutor=s statement was erroneous.  341 F.3d 1207 (10th Cir. 2003).  But the Tenth Circuit reached this conclusion because AOklahoma courts discourage providing a definition of reasonable doubt not because the term has a broad range of meanings or because jurors are entitled to decide the meaning for themselves, but because the term is >self-explanatory.=@  Id. at 1213.  Texas courts, on the other hand, do not provide a definition of reasonable doubt because jurors must determine what proof beyond a reasonable doubt means to them.  See Murphy v. State, 112 S.W.3d 592, 597 (Tex. Crim. App. 2003) (en banc).  A>As the trial judge himself explained . . . early in his voir dire, an individual juror must determine what proof beyond a reasonable doubt means for him, for the law does not tell him[.]=@ Id.  at 598B99 (quoting Garrett v. State, 851 S.W.2d 853, 859 (Tex. Crim. App. 1996) (en banc)).  Appellant has not shown, and we do not discern, any meaningful distinction between this statement and the comment by the prosecutor that reasonable doubt means Awhatever it means to you@ in this case.  Thus, we conclude the trial court did not abuse its discretion^[1] in overruling appellant=s objection to this particular statement by the prosecutor.  We therefore overrule appellant=s first issue.

B.        Constitutionality of Automatic Life Sentencing Provisions

An individual adjudged guilty of a capital felony in a case in which the State does not seek the death penalty Ashall@ be punished by imprisonment for life.  Tex. Penal Code Ann. ' 12.31(a) (Vernon 2003).  Under theses circumstances, a trial judge must sentence the defendant to life imprisonment.  Tex. Code Crim. Proc. Ann. art. 37.071, ' 1 (Vernon Supp. 2003).

Texas courts have consistently held that the life sentence required under section 12.31 of the Penal Code is not unconstitutional under either the Eighth Amendment of the U.S. constitution or Article I, section 13 of the Texas Constitution.  Cienfuegos v. State, 113 S.W.3d 481, 495 (Tex. App.CHouston [1st Dist.] 2003, pet. ref=d (concluding mandatory life sentence provisions of section 12. 31 of Texas Penal Code are not unconstitutional under U.S. or Texas constitutions); Barnes v. State, 56 S.W.3d 221, 239 (Tex. App.CFort Worth 2001, pet. ref=d) (AIt is well settled that a mandatory life sentence for the offense of capital murder is not unconstitutional.@); see also Thomas v. State, No. 14-06-00066-CR, 2007 WL 2238890, at *5 (Tex. App.CHouston [14th Dist.] Aug. 7, 2007, pet. ref=d) (mem. op., not designated for publication) (determining that mandatory life sentence provision was not unconstitutional when applied to a 17-year-old defendant). Likewise, the United States Supreme Court has held that a mandatory life sentencing provision does not violate the Eighth Amendment.  See Harmelin v. Michigan, 501 U.S. 957, 995 (1991) (holding that mandatory life sentence imposed on defendant for possessing 672 grams of cocaine did not violate the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution).

Despite this uncontroverted authority, appellant contends that the United States Supreme Court=s decision in United States v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220 (2005), provides a basis to revisit this well-settled issue.  We disagree.  The constitutional issue in Booker involved the interplay between the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution and the statutory Federal Sentencing Guidelines.^[2]   See id. at 226B27.  According to the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, a judge was required to depart from the sentence authorized by the jury=s verdict when the judge found certain facts by a preponderance of the evidence.  See id.  The Supreme Court determined that this mandate ran afoul of the Sixth Amendment=s requirement of a trial by jury.  See id.  But the mandatory life sentencing provisions of the Texas Penal Code do not present this Constitutional issue because the trial court is not required to depart from the sentence authorized by the jury=s verdict.  Thus, Booker provides no basis upon which to revisit this issue.  For these reasons, we overrule appellant=s second and third issues.

IV.  Conclusion

Having overruled each of appellant=s issues, we affirm the trial court=s judgment.

/s/        Eva M. Guzman

Justice

Judgment rendered and Memorandum Opinion filed October 30, 2008.

Panel consists of Chief Justice Hedges and Justices Guzman and Brown .

Do Not Publish C Tex. R. App. P. 47.2(b).

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^[1]  A trial court maintains broad discretion over the voir dire process.  Hankins v. State, 132 S.W.3d 380, 384 (Tex. Crim. App. 2004).

^[2]  In contrast, appellant=s complaints are based on the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution and Article 1, section 13 of the Texas Constitution.