Wright v. State

832 S.W.2d 601, 1992 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 162, 1992 WL 139282
CourtCourt of Criminal Appeals of Texas
DecidedJune 24, 1992
Docket1234-91
StatusPublished
Cited by30 cases

This text of 832 S.W.2d 601 (Wright 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
Wright v. State, 832 S.W.2d 601, 1992 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 162, 1992 WL 139282 (Tex. 1992).

Opinions

OPINION ON APPELLANT’S PETITION FOR DISCRETIONARY REVIEW

OVERSTREET, Judge.

Appellant was charged by indictment with the offense of possession of cocaine in an amount less than 28 grams, alleged to have been committed on or about December 10, 1989. On April 3,1990 in the 232nd District Court of Harris County, Texas, appellant was found guilty by a jury. On April 5, 1990, appellant was sentenced by the jury to 50 years confinement in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Institutional Division. The conviction/sentence was affirmed by the First Court of Appeals. We granted two of appellant’s grounds for review.

I.

SUMMARY OF PERTINENT FACTS

The record reflects that appellant was a passenger in a vehicle that was stopped for a traffic violation. He was observed by a police officer hiding something in the back seat. Subsequently a sawed-off .12 gauge pump shotgun was discovered laying on the floorboard. A crack cocaine pipe was also found partially concealed between the rear seats up against appellant. The officer testified that he had found the pipe “in the exact place where [he had] observed [appellant] reaching.” A chemical analysis revealed that the pipe contained cocaine.

II.

APPELLANT’S CLAIMS

Appellant’s two grounds on which we granted review complain about the trial court’s finding on his Batson claim and the propriety of the parole law instructions which were included in the jury charge at punishment. The court of appeals held that the record reveals a legitimate, racially neutral reason for striking the venire-member-in-question and that because it found that the trial court’s ruling thereon was not clearly erroneous the trial court’s findings would not be disturbed on appeal. Wright v. State, No. 01-90-00311-CR, 1991 WL 181707 (Tex.App.-Houston [1st Dist.], delivered September 19, 1991). The court of appeals also overruled appellant’s claims regarding the inclusion of the parole law jury instructions. Id.

III.

PAROLE LAW INSTRUCTIONS

The punishment jury charge included the parole instructions prescribed by TEX.CODE CRIM.PROC.ANN. art. 37.07, § 4 (Vernon Supp.1990). The record reflects that appellant did timely “object to the parole charge being included in the jury charge, the punishment stage, in that the parole charge denies the defendant a due process right to affix punishment.” Appellant’s ground for review asks “[w]hether the Court of Appeals is correct in holding [603]*603that' the [ajmendment to [TEX. CONST, art. IV, § 11(a)] cured the [d]ue [pjrocess [i]nfirmities of the mandatory parole law [instructions] ... ?” He claims that the reenacted statute still violates the due course of law provisions of TEX. CONST, art. I, §§ 13, 19.

In Oakley v. State, 830 S.W.2d 107 (Tex.Cr.App.1992), we held that Article 37.07, § 4 was properly re-enacted by the Legislature and that the amendment in Article IV, § 11(a) does not violate the due course of law provisions in Article I, §§ 13 and 19. See also Marks v. State, 830 S.W.2d 113 (Tex.Cr.App.1992) and French v. State, 830 S.W.2d 607 (Tex.Cr.App.1992). Thus the trial court did not err in including the challenged instructions in the punishment jury charge. We therefore overrule appellant’s ground for review complaining of such action.

IV.

BATSON CLAIM

In the other ground on which we granted review, appellant specifically questions the court of appeals’ affirmance of the trial court’s finding of no purposeful discrimination in peremptorily striking a prospective juror. Based upon the discussions between the trial court, the prosecutor, and appellant’s attorney, and the parties’ respective jury strike lists, the record reflects that all eight black veniremembers were challenged and removed from the jury panel.1 Appellant peremptorily struck one, while three others were removed for cause or by agreement. The remaining four were peremptorily struck by the State.2 Appellant, noting that the petit jury “panel [was] all white” and that “all blacks [had] been struek[,]” timely made a Batson claim questioning the propriety of the State’s use of peremptory strikes.3

After appellant asked the prosecutor to “enunciate the reason in the record as to why all the blacks that she struck were struck[,]” the trial court took judicial notice that appellant was black. Then the attorneys and the trial court started listing the blacks that were on the venire panel and the basis for their being struck. It was determined that, as noted above, appellant had peremptorily struck one and that three had been removed for cause or by agreement. The prosecutor then proceeded to detail specific race-neutral reasons for peremptorily striking some of the black venire-members. She made such an explanation for four of the black veniremembers, including the one that both parties had struck, but failed to include a specific rationale for one of the others which she alone had struck. The trial court found “the prosecutor’s explanation as to the reason for each of the strikes against black panelists, and that those reasons [were] free of any racial basis[,]” and “[t]hat they’re neutral reasons and that her [the prosecutor’s] strikes were made for good and valid reasons and not based on any racial consideration.”

The court of appeals stated that it believed “that the omission of a reason for striking [the venireperson in question] was an oversight on the part of all involved.” Wright v. State, No. 01-90-00311-CR, 1991 WL 181707 (Tex.App.-Houston [1st Dist.], delivered September 19, 1991). Be that as it may, we are faced with a record in which the prosecutor failed to articulate a specific race-neutral reason for peremptorily striking the particular veniremember-in-ques[604]*604tion. We observe that after the trial court inquired if there was anything else, the prosecutor added, “No, Your Honor. I exercised my challenges based on what the jurors told me and based upon how I felt they would consider the facts in this case.” Thus this generic statement, obviously referring to all of the prosecutor’s peremptory strikes, is the only explanation given that can apply to her peremptorily striking the veniremember-in-question.

The court of appeals, after noting the “oversight,” looked at the exchange between the veniremember-in-question and the prosecutor during voir dire questioning. Wright v. State, No. 01-90-00311-CR, 1991 WL 181707 (Tex.App.-Houston [1st Dist.], delivered September 19, 1991). It then concluded that based upon that exchange, and the prosecutor’s general explanation noted above, the record revealed a legitimate racially neutral reason for striking the veniremember-in-question, and found that the trial court’s ruling was not clearly erroneous. Id.

Appellant questions the propriety of the court of appeals’ “rewardpng] a prosecutor’s silence” and “bestowing on [such silence] the same force and effect as an articulated neutral explanation related to the particular case to be tried.” The State responds that the record does indeed reveal a legitimate racially neutral reason for striking the veniremember-in-question which supported the trial court’s finding.

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Bluebook (online)
832 S.W.2d 601, 1992 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 162, 1992 WL 139282, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/wright-v-state-texcrimapp-1992.