Spelling v. State

825 S.W.2d 533, 1992 Tex. App. LEXIS 491, 1992 WL 33996
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedFebruary 26, 1992
Docket2-91-117-CR
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 825 S.W.2d 533 (Spelling 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
Spelling v. State, 825 S.W.2d 533, 1992 Tex. App. LEXIS 491, 1992 WL 33996 (Tex. Ct. App. 1992).

Opinion

OPINION

HILL, Justice.

Arema Margaret Spelling appeals from the jury’s assessment of her punishment for the offense of murder at life imprisonment in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Institutional Division, and the jury’s finding that she used or exhibited a deadly weapon during the murder. This cause had previously been remanded for a new hearing on punishment due to the inclusion of a parole law instruction in the court’s charge in her initial trial.

Spelling urges in two points of error that the trial court erred by submitting a deadly weapon issue in its charge in violation of due process due to lack of notice and in violation of the Ex Post Facto Clause. She urges in a third point of error that the trial court erred by denying her motion for new trial based upon a juror’s failure to disclose information during voir dire.

We affirm because Spelling received adequate notice of the State’s intention to seek a deadly weapon finding; because the law as currently applied concerning the deadly weapon finding does not increase the punishment for the offense from the time that the offense was committed, therefore not being an ex post facto law in violation of the United States or Texas Constitution; and because we hold that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in overruling Spelling’s motion for new trial because her counsel was not diligent in that he did not ask a more specific question that would likely have elicited a more accurate response than the general questions contained in the juror questionnaire answered by the members of the venire.

Spelling urges in point of error number one that the trial court erred by submitting a deadly weapon issue in its charge in violation of due process due to lack of notice.

Spelling’s first trial for the murder of her three-month-old son was held in December 1985. At that time she was convicted by a jury of murder, and the jury assessed her punishment at seventy-five years in what was then termed the Texas Department of Corrections. This court affirmed her conviction initially upon appeal, Spelling v. State, 719 S.W.2d 404 (Tex.App.—Fort Worth, 1986), but following an appeal to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals the cause was remanded to this court for a harm analysis on punishment due to an instruction on the parole law being included in the court’s charge at her initial trial. Spelling v. State, 770 S.W.2d 571 (Tex.Crim.App.1988). This court remanded to the trial court for a new trial on punishment. Spelling v. State, 768 S.W.2d 949 (Tex.App.—Fort Worth 1989, pet. ref’d). Upon remand, the jury, on November 13, 1990, assessed her punishment at life in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Institutional Division. Additionally, the jury found that Spelling used or exhibited a deadly weapon during the commission of the offense.

Spelling was charged and convicted of murdering her son by committing an act clearly dangerous to human life, namely hitting him on the head. On appeal, she noted the indictment’s failure to allege the instrument she used to commit the murder. This court overruled her point of error be *535 cause of her failure to present a pretrial motion to quash the indictment. Spelling, 719 S.W.2d at 406-07. We also noted that she was not charged with the use of a particular deadly weapon because it was not contended that she used a deadly weapon, so that the issue was never before the jury. Id. at 407.

On October 31, 1990, after Spelling’s initial conviction but before the new trial on punishment, the State filed its notice of intent to seek an affirmative finding of the defendant’s use or exhibition of a deadly weapon, and on November 1, 1990, mailed the notice to counsel for Spelling. Trial began on November 12, 1990.

Spelling contends that the State’s notice was untimely because it was filed after her conviction. We will first address when a defendant is entitled to receive notice of the State’s intention to seek a deadly weapon finding. We note that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has stated that if the jury determines the deadly weapon question by means of a “special issue,” it is the better practice, where the jury assesses punishment, to submit the issue at the punishment stage of the proceeding. See Polk v. State, 693 S.W.2d 391 (Tex.Crim.App.1985). Because the State mailed Spelling a notice on November 1, 1990, and the punishment hearing did not begin until November 12, 1990, Spelling had adequate notice of the State’s intention to seek a deadly weapon finding.

Spelling relies on the case of Speering v. State, 763 S.W.2d 801, 808 (Tex.App.—Texarkana 1988, judgment reformed at 797 S.W.2d 36 (Tex.Crim.App.1990)) as authority for her position that the notice at the conclusion of the guilt-innocence phase of trial is not sufficient. We first note that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals reformed the judgment in that case, holding that the indictment in Speering was sufficient to give notice of the State’s intention to seek a deadly weapon finding where it alleged that the death was caused by a named weapon or instrument. Speering, 797 S.W.2d at 37. Although no weapon was alleged in the indictment in this case, we find Speering to be distinguishable because the punishment hearing in Speenng was apparently held immediately after the determination of guilt or innocence, so that the defense was given no notice until just before the hearing, whereas in this case the defense would have had several days notice of the State’s intention to seek the deadly weapon finding. We overrule point of error number one.

Spelling urges in point of error number two that the trial court erred by submitting a deadly weapon issue in its charge in violation of the Ex Post Facto Clause, thereby violating due process.

Spelling asserts that the submission of a deadly weapon finding violates the Ex Post Facto Clause of article I, section 16 of the Texas Constitution and violates the fundamental fairness of the Due Process Clause of article I, section 19 of the Texas Constitution and the fifth and fourteenth amendments to the United States Constitution. Her assertion is based upon the fact that the legislature, in 1987, after her commission of the offense, and after her first trial, amended article 42.18, section 8(c) to provide that a prisoner might not be released to mandatory supervision if the judgment of her conviction contains a finding of the use or exhibition of a deadly weapon. She insists that the finding affects her fundamental interest in her liberty on parole.

The core concern of the Ex Post Facto

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825 S.W.2d 533, 1992 Tex. App. LEXIS 491, 1992 WL 33996, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/spelling-v-state-texapp-1992.