Justia Constitutional Law Opinion Summaries

Scott Niles, a firefighter, was charged by information with two counts of Terroristic Threat - Class A, for threatening his fellow firefighters. He was arraigned, tried, convicted, and sentenced on the two Class A counts. But the jury charges had tracked the Class B misdemeanor version of the crime; the jury was not asked if the terroristic threats were against public servants. Niles raised an “illegal sentence” claim on direct appeal. The State conceded that the jury charges only authorized convictions for Class B Terroristic Threat. The court of appeals reformed the judgments to convictions for Class B misdemeanors and remanded for re-sentencing in the Class B range. The question before the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals was whether the court of appeals erred in doing so. The Court held that the failure to include a jury instruction on an element of an offense included within the charging instrument amounted to jury charge error subject to a harm analysis. The Court reversed and remanded the case to the court of appeals to determine whether Appellant suffered any harm. View "Niles v. Texas" on Justia Law

Applicants James Long, James Pitts, Jr., and Michael Shelton pleaded guilty to the offense of sexual assault and testified against Applicant Richard Kussmaul at his capital murder trial. Long, Pitts, and Shelton all testified that they and Kussmaul had gang raped a female victim, and that Kussmaul had shot both the female and male victims. Post-conviction DNA test results excluded all four men as contributors to the semen collected from the crime scene, but revealed the genetic profiles of two unidentified men. Long, Pitts, and Shelton recanted their inculpatory statements to the police and their testimony at Kussmaul’s trial, and the trial court recommended the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals grant relief on Article 11.073 and actual innocence grounds. The Court agreed applicants were entitled to relief under Article 11.073 based on the discovery of new scientific evidence, but disagreed that they proved they were actually innocent. View "Ex parte James Edward Long" on Justia Law

In this habeas proceeding, Applicant Bobby Moore sought to be exempted from the death penalty on the ground that he was intellectually disabled. The habeas court agreed with Moore, citing what it considered to be the contemporary standards for an intellectual disability diagnosis. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals disagreed with the habeas court for a variety of reasons falling within two overarching categories: (1) because the habeas court failed to follow standards set out in Texas caselaw, and (2) because the habeas court failed to consider, or unreasonably disregarded, “a vast array of evidence in this lengthy record that cannot rationally be squared with a finding of intellectual disability.” The U.S. Supreme Court vacated the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals' decision, concluding that some of the standards in Texas caselaw did not comport with the Eighth Amendment’s requirements regarding an intellectual disability determination. Having received guidance from the Supreme Court on the appropriate framework for assessing claims of intellectual disability, the Court of Criminal Appeals adopted the framework set forth in the American Psychiatric Association, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Disorders, 5th Ed. "Although the Supreme Court has vindicated some of the habeas court’s analysis with respect to the proper framework to apply to intellectual disability claims, it remains true under our newly adopted framework that a vast array of evidence in this record is inconsistent with a finding of intellectual disability. Reviewing Applicant’s claims under the DSM-5 framework, we conclude that he has failed to demonstrate adaptive deficits sufficient to support a diagnosis of intellectual disability. Consequently, we disagree with the habeas court’s conclusion that Applicant has demonstrated intellectual disability, and we deny relief." View "Ex parte Bobby James Moore" on Justia Law

The State alleged appellant Jason Ramjattansingh had committed the offense of driving while intoxicated. It also alleged that he had an alcohol concentration level of 0.15 or more “at the time the analysis was performed,” a Class A DWI. But the information went further, alleging that Ramjattansingh also had this alcohol concentration level “at or near the time of the commission of the offense,” which the statute did not require. The jury charge tracked the information, requiring the jury to find this extra element. The jury convicted Appellant, but the court of appeals reversed. The court, measuring the sufficiency of the evidence under the charge given, found the evidence insufficient to prove the extra element. Under Texas case law, when a jury instruction sets forth all the elements of the charged crime but incorrectly adds an extra element, a sufficiency challenge is assessed against the elements of the charged crime, not against “the erroneously heightened command in the jury instruction.” The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals not only found the jury charge in this case added the extra element, the State failed to object to the erroneously heightened jury instruction. The Court reversed the court of appeals' judgment and remanded this case for further proceedings. View "Ramjattansingh v. Texas" on Justia Law

Appellant Michael Bien hired an undercover officer to kill his ex-wife’s brother. Based on his efforts, Appellant was charged with and convicted of two crimes: attempted capital murder and criminal solicitation of capital murder. The court of appeals found that Appellant’s convictions on both charges violated the Double Jeopardy Clause's prohibition against multiple punishments for the “same offense.” The court, deeming criminal solicitation the “most serious” offense, upheld that conviction and vacated the conviction for attempted capital murder. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals agreed with the court of appeals that conviction for these two offenses violated double jeopardy, but disagreed with the court of appeals that these offenses each required proof of a different element. Applying the cognate-pleadings test, the Court determined the elements of the offense of attempted capital murder were functionally equivalent to the elements of solicitation of capital murder. The Court affirmed the court of appeals, agreeing that criminal solicitation was the most serious offense. View "Bien v. Texas" on Justia Law

Appellant Ricardo Zuniga was convicted of two counts of engaging in organized criminal activity and one count of capital murder based on his participation in a shooting that caused the deaths of two individuals. On appeal, he argued that the evidence was insufficient to support his convictions for engaging in organized criminal activity because the record failed to show that he committed the shootings while possessing the intent to establish, maintain, or participate “as a member of a criminal street gang.” Agreeing with appellant’s argument, the court of appeals vacated his convictions and entered judgments of acquittal as to both counts of engaging in organized criminal activity. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals disagreed with the court of appeals’s analysis and holding. Viewing the evidence in a light most favorable to the jury’s verdict as measured against a hypothetically correct jury charge, the Court concluded a rational factfinder could have determined that appellant participated in the shootings “as a member of a criminal street gang,” in the sense that he was acting in the role, capacity, or function of a gang member in carrying out the offenses. Therefore, the Court held the evidence was sufficient to support appellant’s convictions for engaging in organized criminal activity; the trial court's judgments of conviction were reinstated. View "Zuniga v. Texas" on Justia Law

Appellant Jose Oliva was charged by information with DWI. The information contained two paragraphs: the first alleged the commission of the current DWI, and the second alleged a prior DWI conviction. The focus of the guilt stage of trial was solely on the first paragraph. The prior-conviction allegation was not read to the jury at the guilt stage, no evidence of the prior conviction was offered at the guilt stage, and there was no mention of a prior conviction in the guilt-stage jury instructions. Appellant was found guilty. At the punishment stage, the State read the prior-conviction allegation to the jury and introduced evidence of a prior DWI conviction. The jury found the prior-conviction allegation to be true and assessed punishment at 180 days’ confinement. The judgment labeled Appellant’s current conviction as a “DWI 2ND” and the degree of offense as a “Class A Misdemeanor.” The court of appeals held that the existence of a prior conviction was an element of the offense of “Class A misdemeanor DWI.” The court reasoned that a fact that elevates the degree of an offense is necessarily an element of the offense and that Penal Code Section 49.09 lacked the “shall be punished” language present in other statutes containing punishment enhancements. Because no evidence of a prior conviction was introduced at the guilt stage of trial, the court of appeals held that the evidence was legally insufficient to support the prior-conviction allegation. Consequently, the court of appeals reversed and remanded the case to the trial court with instructions to reform the judgment to reflect a conviction for Class B misdemeanor DWI and to conduct a new punishment hearing. Under Penal Code section 49.09(b), the existence of two prior convictions for DWI elevated a third DWI from a Class B misdemeanor to a third degree felony. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals addressed the status of section 49.09(a), which provided that the existence of a single prior conviction elevated a second DWI offense from a Class B misdemeanor to a Class A misdemeanor. The Court held in this case that, unlike the existence of two prior convictions for felony DWI, the existence of a single prior conviction for misdemeanor DWI was a punishment issue; the litigation of the prior-conviction allegation at the punishment stage of trial was proper. The Court reversed the court of appeals and affirmed the judgment of the trial court. View "Oliva v. Texas" on Justia Law

Russell Estes had an ongoing sexual relationship with K.A. when K.A. was fourteen years old. Estes was legally married to someone else. So, in addition to charging Estes with sexual assault of a child, ordinarily a second-degree felony, the State also alleged that K.A. was a person “whom the defendant was prohibited from marrying or purporting to marry or with whom the defendant was prohibited from living under the appearance of being married[.]”This additional fact, if proven true, would subject Estes to first-degree-felony punishment under Texas Penal Code Section 22.011(f). Estes was also charged with various counts of indecency with a child. Estes filed a pre-trial motion to quash the child-sex-assault counts within the indictment, in which he objected to what he called the “[b]igamy element of this allegation[.]”Specifically, Estes argued that Section 22.011(f) “is unconstitutional both facially and as applied to [him] because it treats married people more harshly than . . . unmarried people in violation of the Due Process and Equal Protection clauses of the United States and Texas Constitutions.” When this motion was denied, Estes asked for, and was granted, a running objection along these lines. As relevant here, Estes was ultimately found guilty of all five counts of sexual assault of a child. In a single special issue, the jury also found “that [K.A.] was a person whom [Estes] was prohibited from marrying or purporting to marry or with whom [Estes] was prohibited from living under the appearance of being married,” thereby triggering the Section 22.011(f) enhancement. Within the first-degree-felony punishment range, Estes was sentenced to 12 years’ confinement on each count of sexual assault of a child. In enacting the current form of Penal Code Section 22.011(f), the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals found the Texas Legislature apparently wished to provide higher penalties for polygamists “who sexually assault their purported spouses.” But the resulting statute had the potentially unintended effect of punishing married offenders more harshly than unmarried offenders. The Court determined the State had a rational interest in enforcing this scheme, and reversed the court of appeals’ holding that the statute was unconstitutional. View "Estes v. Texas" on Justia Law

Appellant Kelvin O’Brien was tried on one count of engaging in organized criminal activity. That count alleged that Appellant, with the intent to establish, maintain, or participate in a combination or in the profits of a combination, committed second degree theft or second degree money laundering. The theory was that Appellant was part of a criminal ring that committed multiple jewelry store heists. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals found that in order to convict someone of “engaging,” the jury does not have to unanimously agree on the specific predicate crime committed by the defendant. “[T]he commission of each predicate crime constitutes a different manner and means of committing the single offense of engaging in organized criminal activity. We affirm the court of appeals’ holding that the trial court did not err in instructing the jury in the disjunctive regarding the predicate offenses in this case.” View "O'Brien v. Texas" on Justia Law

Appellant Crystal Boyett contended the court of appeals erred by upholding the trial court’s denial of her request for a formal determination of her competency to stand trial for manslaughter. Appellant was speeding excessively when she caused a collision with another car that was occupied by three women. Two were killed; one was seriously injured. The State charged appellant with manslaughter for one of the deaths. Appellant pleaded not guilty, and the case proceeded to trial, at which appellant was convicted and sentenced to twenty years in prison. The trial court found that there was “not sufficient evidence to support a finding of incompetence,” and it declined to undertake a formal competency trial aided by expert evaluation. The court of appeals affirmed the trial court’s decision. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals reversed, finding the court of appeals improperly considered evidence of appellant’s competency rather than considering only evidence of her incompetency, and it mistakenly applied a more burdensome evidentiary standard than the “some evidence” standard required by the applicable statute. Because appellant was convicted and sentenced in this case, the case was remanded to the trial court for it to determine the feasibility of a retrospective formal competency trial and, if feasible, to conduct such an inquiry. View "Boyett v. Texas" on Justia Law