Thompson v. State

12 S.W.3d 915, 2000 Tex. App. LEXIS 1917, 2000 WL 300781
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedMarch 22, 2000
Docket09-98-343 CR
StatusPublished
Cited by37 cases

This text of 12 S.W.3d 915 (Thompson 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
Thompson v. State, 12 S.W.3d 915, 2000 Tex. App. LEXIS 1917, 2000 WL 300781 (Tex. Ct. App. 2000).

Opinions

OPINION

WALKER, Chief Justice.

Michael Miller Thompson, pastor of the Spindletop Unitarian Church, was charged by information with the misdemeanor offense of Criminal Trespass by “intentionally and knowingly remainpng] on the property of another, namely, DENNIS ROZELL, without the effective consent of DENNIS ROZELL, and the said defendant had received notice to depart but failed to do so[.]” A jury found Thompson guilty of said- offense and punishment was assessed by the trial court at ninety (90) days in the Jefferson County Jail and a fine of $200. The trial court suspended imposition of both incarceration and fine and placed Thompson on community supervision for a period of six months. Thompson brings forward seven appellate issues for our consideration.

We begin with issues three and seven as they complain of the lack of legally sufficient evidence to support the conviction. The evidence before us includes the transcription of verbal testimony contained in the reporter’s record as well as two video tapes depicting the events leading up to the arrest of Thompson. The video tapes depict the events in question from two separate and distinct perspectives. Specifically, issue three contends:

The court erred in denying appellant’s motion for instructed verdict for insufficient evidence: The evidence was insufficient that Rev. Thompson remained on property of Dennis Rozell without effective consent and received notice to depart but failed to do so.

The trial court’s written instructions to the jury contained several definitions of key terms. We reproduce the ones set out under paragraph 2 as follows:

By the term “notice,” as used herein, is meant oral or written communication by the owner or someone with apparent authority to act for the owner.
By the term “enter” or “entry,” is meant intrusion of the entire body.
By the term “effective consent,” is meant assent in fact, whether express or apparent, and includes consent by a person legally authorized to act for the owner.
The term “owner” means a person who has title to the property, possession of the property, whether lawful or not, or a greater right to possession of the property than the defendant.
By the term “possession” is meant actual care, custody, control, or management of the property.

Mr. Thompson contends that he did not receive sufficient notice to depart. Testimony of Detective W.C. Tatum qf the Beaumont Police Department indicated that he was in attendance at the church where the seminar was taking place merely as a spectator. Tatum testified that he first noticed Thompson when Thompson began to disrupt the meeting. This was apparently during certain remarks being made by the speaker at the podium, Dennis Rozell, the pastor of Highland Avenue Baptist Church. Thompson, who was sitting very close to the podium, began to make loud comments apparently in response to statements being made by Ro-zell. At a certain point after Thompson had again made an audible remark, Rozell informed him that if he interrupted again he would be removed from the church. Thompson immediately replied with, “I’d like to see you try.” Rozell then turned to security personnel and stated, “I would like for him to be removed.” At that point, Detective Tatum, being in plain [919]*919clothes, felt that it would be less confrontational if he [Tatum] approached Thompson and asked him to leave the premises. Tatum testified that he had met Thompson several weeks earlier and Thompson knew Tatum to be a police officer.

The video tape depictions of the events indicate that Detective Tatum approached Thompson from behind, leaned over Thompson’s shoulder, began speaking to Thompson with Thompson responding verbally. Thompson then appears to gather up various papers and a tape recorder and place these items into a briefcase. Thompson, in a seated position, begins to bend at the waist in order to stand up. He hesitates momentarily, straightens back up in a seated position, crosses his legs and then looks up at Tatum who is standing in front of him. Tatum leans forward and reaches out and touches Thompson on his elbow as if to assist him in standing up. Thompson appears to make no attempt to stand up under his own power. Thompson is then physically pulled off of the bench into a kneeling position by Tatum and other uniformed security personnel. Thompson appears to make no attempt to stand. Security personnel then grasp Thompson’s arms and legs and carry him, face down, up the aisle of the church. It is at this point that both tapes end.

In addition to the visual depiction of the events, Detective Tatum’s testimony described the events in the following manner:

Q.[State’s Attorney] Okay. And were you the first individual to approach Reverend Thompson?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Okay. What — describe that contact at that time.
A. Well, I explained to him that he’d been asked to leave; and he was going to have to leave. He refused to leave.
Q. What did he say — what was the first thing he said back to you, if you can recall?
A. That he didn’t have to leave. It was a public — public place and he had a right to be there and he wasn’t going to leave.
Q. Okay. Was he correct about that?
A. No, sir.
Q. What did you tell him?
A. I explained to him that if the preacher asked him to leave that he didn’t have a choice, that he had to leave or he was trespassing, one or the other.
Q. Do you recall what he said at that point, or what he did at that point?
A. Said he wasn’t going to leave. I told him he was under arrest for trespassing.
Q. And what happened next?
A. He started gathering up his briefcase and tape recorder and some other things, got them ready but then when he got — got them all ready, sat back down and said he wasn’t going to leave.
Q. Okay. Did he start to get up?
A. Started to, yes, sir.
Q. And then what did he do?
A. Sat back down.
Q. What happened next?
A. I got him by the arm, and he was going to have to leave.
Q. And after that what happened? How did it — did he say anything—
A. Well, he dropped down to his knees and I was going to have to carry him out but some other officers were right behind me and they helped me carry him out.

A challenge to the trial court’s ruling on a motion for instructed or directed verdict is treated as a challenge to the legal sufficiency of the evidence. See Cook v. State, 858 S.W.2d 467, 470 (Tex.Crim.App.1993) (citing Madden v. State, 799 S.W.2d 683 (Tex.Crim.App.1990)).

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
12 S.W.3d 915, 2000 Tex. App. LEXIS 1917, 2000 WL 300781, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/thompson-v-state-texapp-2000.