Wooley v. State

273 S.W.3d 260, 2008 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 762, 2008 WL 2512843
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Texas
DecidedJune 25, 2008
DocketPD-0861-07
StatusPublished
Cited by210 cases

This text of 273 S.W.3d 260 (Wooley v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Wooley v. State, 273 S.W.3d 260, 2008 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 762, 2008 WL 2512843 (Tex. 2008).

Opinions

OPINION

HERVEY, J.,

delivered the opinion of the Court in which

PRICE, WOMACK, KEASLER and HOLCOMB, JJ., joined.

Appellant’s first ground for review presents the claim that this Court should rein[261]*261troduce the court-made Benson/Boozer1 rule for measuring evidentiary sufficiency when the evidence is reviewed for factual sufficiency.2 The Benson/Boozer rule required that evidentiary sufficiency be measured by the jury charge actually given. In Malik, a case in which only the legal sufficiency of the evidence was at issue, this Court rejected the Benson/Boozer rule and decided that eviden-tiary sufficiency should be measured “by the elements of the offense as defined by the hypothetically correct jury charge for the case.” See Malik v. State, 953 S.W.2d 234, 239-240 (Tex.Cr.App.1997).3 We reject the claim presented in appellant’s first ground for review and decide that Malik’s rule for measuring evidentiary sufficiency also applies when the evidence is reviewed for factual sufficiency. We will, however, reverse the judgment of the court of appeals, based on our disposition of appellant’s second ground for review.

An indictment charged appellant with murdering the complainant by shooting him with a firearm. The State presented evidence from which a jury could rationally find that appellant lured three unarmed individuals into a pool-hall parking lot to facilitate what the State characterized as an “ambush” that appellant and others had planned. The events immediately leading up to the complainant’s death began when appellant pulled his 9-millimeter pistol and fired a shot into the ground as two of the intended ambush victims approached him while the complainant waited in a car in the parking lot. Immediately after this, other shots rang out from different locations in the parking lot. A witness described these shots as coming from everywhere. Evidence was presented that appellant fired several more shots at the two individuals who had initially approached appellant as they fled. When the shooting stopped, the complainant lay fatally wounded in the parking lot. A witness saw appellant and another person (Pablo Velez), whom the witness identified as another one of the shooters, get into a car and drive off. Only one 9-millimeter shell casing was recovered from the scene, and it matched appellant’s 9-millimeter pistol.

The evidence also shows that the police investigation developed four named suspects as being the shooters. Only two of these (appellant and Velez) were identified by witnesses at trial as shooters in the pool-hall parking lot when the complainant was shot dead.4 The police investigation concluded that four shooters and at least three different caliber guns were involved in the shooting. The police could not de[262]*262termine which of the named suspects fired the fatal shot or even which caliber gun caused the complainant’s death, since the bullet causing his death exited his body and was not recovered. A police investigator (King) described the crime scene as follows:

Q. [STATE]: If you’ll see where they’ve got these marked where the cartridge casings are different kinds in relation to the numbers. What — would you agree with me that there are several different kinds of casings, three to be exact, three different kinds of guns — or two different kinds of guns? I’m sorry.
A. [KING]: Three guns.
Q. Three guns?
A. Right.
Q. Okay. And what did that indicate, to you?
A. Three shooters.
[[Image here]]
Q. Officer, based on the information that you had, the witnesses that you talked to, could you tell the jury approximately where the four shooters — I’m sorry — the three shooters were placed?
A. Yes.
Q. Okay.
A. I can.
Q. Would you go back up on the diagram and show 'em.
A. (Complies.) [Appellant] would have been here, just about due east of the front door of the Perfect Rack pool hall. Another shooter came in from the north with an assault rifle here. Those are three 223 caliber shell casings here. Another shooter came out from between the parked cars here and fired seven rounds here and three more rounds out here. That’s because he was chasing the victims.
[Appellant] left a 9 millimeter shell casing here. I should have said all of these are .40 caliber shell casings here. There are seven of them. There’s three .40 caliber shell casings out here all fired from the same gun from this shooter here. There was one shell casing only from a 9 millimeter pistol here. There was the three 223 caliber shell casings here and another one out here. So this shooter was on the run also.
Q. Detective, let me ask you this, Officer: You also said that there was another suspect that was developed, and you said that there were three guns here. Where would the other shooter have been?
A. Out here in the parking lot.
Q. Okay.
A. No shell casings.
Q. Okay. So basically what you’re telling me is that there was a gunman here, a gunman here, a gunman here, and a gunman here?
A. A gunman here, here, came out from here, and then another one somewhere in this area.
Q. Okay. Could it — is it possible they could have jumped out from maybe over here where these cars are?
A. Who are you talking about?
Q. Pablo Velez.
A. He initially would have come out from here because his initial shell casings are here, but then he chased the victims and he continued shooting out to here.
Q. Okay. So did you ever serve any time in the military?
You can have a seat, sir.
A. (Complies.) Yes.
Q. What would you describe — how would you describe what you’ve just pointed out you’ve talked about on that board?
[263]*263A. That was an ambush.
Q. Would you say that it was planned?
A. Yes.
Q. Okay. And based on your investigation did you feel that [appellant] was part of that plan?
A. Yes.

Appellant presented no witnesses. His cross-examination of the State’s witnesses suggested that the only shot he fired was the one shot that he fired into the ground just before the other shooters started filing their weapons. To support this, he pointed to the evidence that the police recovered only one 9-millimeter shell casing at the scene.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
273 S.W.3d 260, 2008 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 762, 2008 WL 2512843, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/wooley-v-state-texcrimapp-2008.