OPINION HERVEY , J. , delivered the opinion of the Court in which KELLER , P.J. , PRICE , WOMACK , JOHNSON , KEASLER , COCHRAN , and ALCALA , JJ. , joined. A jury convicted Appellant of capital murder and assessed her punishment at life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. Her conviction was affirmed by the Sixth Court of Appeals after remand from this Court. We granted review to examine the court of appeals's holding that Appellant was not entitled to a lesser-...
OPINION Price , J. , delivered the opinion of the Court in which Womack , Johnson , Keasler , Cochran and Alcala , JJ. , joined. We granted the State's petition for discretionary review in this case in order to address several questions related to the appellate review of a juvenile court's waiver of its otherwise-exclusive jurisdiction over a person alleged to have committed a murder at the age of sixteen. What, exactly, is the appellate court's appropriate role in reviewing the...
OPINION Per curiam . Pursuant to the provisions of Article 11.07 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure, the clerk of the trial court transmitted to this Court this application for a writ of habeas corpus. Ex parte Young, 418 S.W.2d 824 , 826 (Tex.Crim.App.1967). Applicant was convicted of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. The Twelfth Court of Appeals affirmed his conviction. Tiede v. State, No. 12-99-00182-CR, 2002 WL 31618281 (Tex.App. — Tyler, delivered November 20, 2002,...
OPINION Alcala , J. , delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court. Does the Double Jeopardy Clause of the United States Constitution disallow dual convictions for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon against a public servant and intoxication assault stemming from the same criminal act Suggesting that this question should be answered in the affirmative, John Richard Shelby, appellant, argues that the court of appeals erred by permitting both convictions under these circumstances. We...
OPINION Price , J. , delivered the unanimous opinion for the Court. We have before us a subsequent post-conviction application for writ of habeas corpus brought pursuant to Article 11.071 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure. 1 The applicant challenges the constitutionality of his death sentence, specifically arguing that the jury's answer to the special issue submitted to it at the punishment phase of his capital-murder trial with respect to whether he is mentally retarded was...
OPINION HERVEY , J. , delivered the opinion of the Court in which MEYERS , PRICE , JOHNSON , KEASLER , COCHRAN , and ALCALA , JJ. , joined. Applicant, Billy Ray Bryant, was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to confinement for life without the possibility of parole. Applicant argues that he received ineffective assistance of counsel at his trial. We will grant relief. BACKGROUND The facts of this case primarily involve two families and their acquaintances living near the...
OPINION PRICE, J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court. Having concluded that a Fourth Amendment violation occurred in this cause, the First Court of Appeals held that the trial court should have granted the appellant's motion to suppress. The State now contends that the court of appeals should not have reversed the appellant's conviction without first deciding whether the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule applied. 1 We granted the State's petition for discretionary...
OPINION MEYERS, J., delivered the opinion of the unanimous Court. Appellant was convicted in March 2012 of capital murder, specifically the intentional murder of Nancy Weatherly in the course of committing or attempting to commit burglary or robbery. See TEX. PENAL CODE 19.03(a)(2). Based upon the jury's answers to the special issues set forth in Texas Code of Criminal Procedure article 37.071, sections 2(b) and 2(e), the trial judge sentenced appellant to death. TEX.CODE CRIM. PROC. art....
OPINION JOHNSON, J., delivered the opinion of the Court in which KELLER, P.J., and MEYERS, COCHRAN, and ALCAL , JJ., joined. Appellant was convicted of five counts of aggravated robbery pursuant to an indictment that named three different complainants, with all counts arising from a single home invasion. Two counts named Andrew Chaney as the complainant, two counts named James Barker as the complainant, and one count named Paul Linden as the complainant. The jury found him guilty of all five...
OPINION COCHRAN, J., delivered the opinion of the Court in which MEYERS, PRICE, JOHNSON, HERVEY and ALCALA, JJ., joined. Appellant pled guilty to driving while intoxicated. The trial judge accepted his plea and ordered him to pay $7,767.88 in restitution to Lubbock Power and Light (LP & L) for repairing a utility pole that appellant's car had struck. Appellant appealed, arguing that Article 42.037 1 of the Code of Criminal Procedure does not authorize restitution because LP & L was not a "...
OPINION HERVEY, J., delivered the opinion of the Court in which KELLER, P.J., MEYERS, PRICE, KEASLER, COCHRAN, and ALCALA, JJ., joined. Appellant, Leonard Pierson, Jr., was charged with indecency with a child and aggravated sexual assault of a child. After the victim completed her direct-examination testimony, the defense's first question on cross-examination was, "Did you also make an allegation that [Appellant] did these same things to his own daughter " After a hearing, the trial court...
OPINION COCHEAN, J., delivered the opinion of the Court in which KELLER, P.J., and MEYERS, PRICE, WOMACK, JOHNSON, HERVEY, and ALCALA, JJ., joined. This case raises the issue of whether a person retains a legitimate expectation of privacy in the contents of his cell phone when that phone is being temporarily stored in a jail property room. 1 The trial judge granted Anthony Granville's motion to suppress, concluding that the high-school student did not lose his legitimate expectation of...
OPINION ALCALA, J., delivered the opinion of the Court in which KELLER, P.J., and PRICE, WOMACK, JOHNSON, HERVEY, and COCHRAN, JJ., joined. In this case we are asked to decide whether a claim of venue error is subject to review for harm on appeal. We conclude that venue error at trial is subject to a review for harm by using the standard for non-constitutional errors described in Rule 44.2(b) of the Texas Rules of Appellate Procedure. See TEX.R.APP. P. 44.2(b). Applying that standard to...
OPINION MEYERS, J., delivered the opinion of the Court in which PRICE, JOHNSON, COCHRAN, and ALCALA, JJ., joined. Appellant was indicted for the offenses of indecency with a child and aggravated sexual assault. The jury found Appellant not guilty of indecency with a child but guilty of aggravated sexual assault and sentenced him to confinement for fifty years. On appeal, Appellant claimed that he received ineffective assistance of counsel because trial counsel failed to request a jury...
For majority opinion, see 2014 WL 6764475. DISSENTING STATEMENT PRICE , J. , filed a dissenting statement. Having spent the last forty years as a judge for the State of Texas, of which the last eighteen years have been as a judge on this Court, I have given a substantial amount of consideration to the propriety of the death penalty as a form of punishment for those who commit capital murder, and I now believe that it should be abolished. I, therefore, respectfully dissent from the...
