Reversed and Remanded and Memorandum Opinion filed January 22 , 2014.

In The 

## Fourteenth Court of Appeals

NO. 14

- 13

- 00957

- CR

CORREY OLIVER , Appellant

V.
THE STATE OF TEXAS , Appellee

On Appeal from the 177th District Court Harris County, Texas Trial Court Cause No. 1346323

MEMORANDUM OPINION

The State indicted appellant Correy Oliver for (1) the possession with intent
to deliver cocaine weighing 400 grams or more 1 and (2) the possession with intent to deliver a compound, mixture, or preparation con taining not more than 200 milligrams of codeine per 100 milliliters of non

- narcotic active medicinal

1 S ee Tex. Health & Safety Code Ann. §§ 481.102(3)(D), 481.112(f).ingredi ents weighing 400 grams or more

. 2 The trial court d irected a verdict of not guilty on the codeine charge, and the jury found appellant guilty on th e cocaine charge. The court sentenced appellant to an agreed punishment of forty

- five years ’
confinement

. A ppellant contends the trial court reversibly erred by denying his motion to

suppress evidence discovered as a result of the warrantless search of hi s cell phone

. We reverse the trial court’s judgment and remand for a new trial

. W ARRANTLESS S EARCH OF C ELL P HONE In his first issue, appellant contends the trial court reversibly erred by denying his motion to suppress evidence of a text message on appell ant’s cell phone, which a police officer found during a warrantless search of the phone. The State contends the search was justified by exigent circumstances

— “to avoid the
imminent destruction of evidence”

— and that in any event, the error was harmless.
W e hold that the trial court erred by admitting evidence of the text message, and we must reverse the trial court’s judgment because we cannot determine beyond a reasonable doubt that the error did not contribute to appellant’s conviction.

A. Standard of Revie w We apply a bifurcated standard of review, giving almost total deference to the trial court’s determination of historical facts and reviewing de novo the court’s application of the law of search and seizure under the Fourth Amendment.
Carmouche v. State , 10 S.W.3d 323, 327 (Tex. Crim. App. 2000). We view the evidence in the light most favorable to the trial court’s ruling, and we assume that the trial court made implicit findings of fact supported in the record that buttress
the court’s conclusion. Id. at 328. Unless it would be a manifest injustice, we will

2 S ee Tex. Health & Safety Code Ann. §§ 481.105(1), 481.114(e).

2affirm a trial court’s ruling on a motion to suppress if it is correct under any theory of law that is applicable to the case. State v. Esparza , 413 S.W.3d 81, 89

– 90 (Tex. Crim. App. 2013).

B. Law Re garding Search of Cell Phones While this appeal was pending, the United States Supreme Court held th at under the Fourth Amendment ’s prohibition of unreasonable searches , a person’s cell phone may not be searched incident to arrest. Riley v. California , 13 4 S. Ct. 2473, 2494 (2014). Generally, a cell phone may be seized incident to arrest, but police must get a warrant to search it. Id. at 2495. One exception to the warrant requirement, however, is “when the exigencies of the situation make the needs of law enforcement so compelling that [a] warrantless search is objectively
reasonable under the Fourth Amendment.” Id. at 2494 (quotation omitted; alteration in original). One such exigency could be “the need to prevent the
imminent destruction of evidence .” Id. Another could be the need to assist persons who are “threatened with imminent injury.” Id. (citing as examples “a suspect texting an accomplice who, it is feared, is preparing to detonate a bomb or a child abductor who may have information about the child’s location on his cell phone”). The State has the burden to establish that an exigency existed; if the State does not, “then a warrantless [search] will not withstand judicial scrutiny.” Gutierrez v. State , 221 S.W.3d 680, 685

– 86 (Tex. Crim. Ap p. 2007).

C. Evidence Regarding the Search and Exigent Circumstances Houston Police Department Officer Andrew Wright stopped a car driven by Michael Floyd. Appellant was a passenger in the front seat. The car was registered to appellant and his girlfriend. In plain view in the front cup

- holder area of the car, Wright saw a prescription bottle, a bottle of red Sunkist soda, and two Styrofoam cups with ice. Wright believed the prescription bottle contained

3codeine cough syrup b ecause people who drink it comm only mix it with fruity red
soda. 3 Floyd consented to a search of the vehicle, and appellant did not object. Wright and another officer detained Floyd and appellant in separate vehicles.
Wright testified that he observed appellant touching the buttons on an open , flip

- style cell phone, so he took the phone from appellant and put in in a patrol car where it “would be difficult for him to get.” The search of the vehicle revealed a bag behind the driver’s seat containing 654 grams of cocaine and multiple bottles of codeine cough syrup. After Wright arrested appellant, Wright searched the phone “ incident to arrest. ” 4
Wright did not testify that an exigency caused him to search the phone. Wright testified that once the phone was seized, appellant did not have any opportunity to try to take the phone back or do anything with the phone. Wright also testified that he could have disabled the phone and obtained a warrant : Q. Okay. Flip phones are sort of older technology. Do you think

— you could have figure d out how to turn this phone off pretty easily, right?

3 At some point, Wright examine d and smelled the bottle, and he opined that the bottle contained codeine.

4 Wright testified, Q [the State]. At that point, without going into details, did you search the cell phone that Correy Oliver had on him? A. Yes, I did. Q. Was that a search in cident to arrest? A. Yes, it was.

. . . . Q [defense counsel]. And you did that

— once you arrested Mr. Oliver, you just searched it incident to arrest? A. That’s correct.

. . . . Q [the State]. And after you had Correy Oliver, this defendant, under arr est, did you search that phone search [sic] incident to arrest? A. Yes, I did.
4A. Probably just take out the battery. Q. Exactly. And that disables the phone, correct? A. Right. Q. Sometimes phones have cards or something that you can take out as well, correct? A. Right. Q. Okay. All of that would have stopped the phone from doing anything, from being a phone at all, correct? A. Yes.

. . . . Q. There was nothing preventing you from getting a warrant? A. No, there was not. Q. Turning off the phone would have disabled it so that nothing could have happened to it between the time you got the warrant and were able to search it? A. Yes. Wright testified that he found a text message sent to appellant, and Wright took a picture of it. Over appellant’s objection, the trial cou rt admitted this picture

— Exhibit 7

— as evidence. The text message reads, “U got some oil[.]” Wright testified that “oil” is slang for codeine cough syrup. And although there is no punctuation, Wright testified that based on his training and experience, t he text message indicated, “Someone was asking him if he had any codeine syrup.”

D. Error to Admit Text Message The State contends the trial court could have found that exigent circumstances justified the warrantless search of appellant’s cell phone because o f
the need “to avoid the imminent destruction of evidence.” The State acknowledges Wright’s testimony that the phone could have been disabled, but the State argues that disabling the phone “did not mean that the deleted items would remain

5recoverable or t hat it could later be reinstated to a working phone with the
information intact.” T he State contends that “appellant pro ffer ed no evidence that [ disabling the phone ] would have retained the information already deleted or rendered the phone operational whe n the officer later replaced the [ SIM card or battery].” Ultimately, the State contends,
The lack of knowledge about what disabling the phone would do, or even closing the opened flip phone he held (much less removing the memory card) could do to it, alon g with appellant’s manipulations of the phone, created exigent circumstances from which the trial court could conclude the search was immediately necessary to prevent the destruction of evidence. Initially, we note that it was the State’s burden to prove e xigency
, not appellant’s burden to prove a lack of exigency

. See Gutierrez , 221 S.W.3d at 685

– 86. Accordingly, the lack of evidence in this record concerning Wright’s knowledge about the effects of disabling the phone does not help prove that exigent cir cumstances existed.
Regardless, the Supreme Court addressed some of the State’s practical
concerns in Riley

. The Court noted that “once law enforcement officers have secured a cell phone, there is no longer any risk that the arrestee himself will be
ab le to delete incriminating data from the phone.” 134 S. Ct. at 2486. Here, Wright acknowledged that appellant had no opportunity to delete data from the phone after Wright seized it. Further, the Supreme Court explained that if an officer seizes a phone in an unlocked state, as Wright did, the officer may be able to disable a phone’s locking feature to prevent locking and the encryption of data.
See id. at 2487. An officer can prevent a remote wipe of the phone’s data by “disconnecting a phone from the network” in at least two simple ways: turning the phone off or removing the battery. Id. So, under appropriate circumstances
, officers may take measures to preserve data on a phone without resorting to

6searching it. See id. The Supreme Court’s “answer to the question of what police must do before searching a cell phone seized incident to arrest is accordingly simple

— get a warrant.” Id. at 2495.
Here, th e trial court did not find that exigent circumstance s justified the warrantless search of appellant’ s cell phone, and based on this record, no rational jurist could so find. Wright testified multiple times that he searched the phone “incident to arrest,” and there was “ nothing ” preventing him from getting a

warrant

. Appellant had no opportunity to dele te data himself once the phone was
seized , and “[t] urning off the phone would have disabled it so that nothing could have happened to it between the time [Wright] got the warrant and [would have been] able to search it .” Wright never testified about any o f the concerns that the State now raises for the first time on appeal. 5
Accordingly, the trial court erred by admitting the evidence gathered from the warrantless search of ap pellant’s cell phone.

E. Harm Appellant and the State agree that this error is const itutional, and therefore, we must reverse appellant’s conviction unless we determine “beyond a reasonable doubt that the error did not contribute to the conviction.” Tex. R. App. P. 44.2(a). This standard for determining harmful error “should ultimately serve to vindicate

5 For the first time at oral argument, the State suggested that exigent circumstances existed because appellant and Floyd were “calling their posse to the scene, . . . actively seeking to have people come and complicate an arrest situation.” Although courts have recognized exigent circumstances for the purpose of “protecting police officers from persons whom they reasonabl y believe to be present, armed, and dangerous,” Gutierre z , 221 S.W.3d at 685, Wright never testified that he searched the phone in an attempt to gain information that would help protect himself or others from harm. In fact, he testified that he was not in fear for his safety, and there were no circumstances re garding the phone that he found scary or harmful to himself. “Nothing” prevented Wright from obtaining a warrant. Accordingly, the State failed to adduce evidence of exigent circumstances based on an alleged desire for Wright to protect himself or others from danger.

7the integrity of the fact

- finding process rather than simply looking to the justifiability of the fact

- finder’s result.” Snowden v. State , 353 S.W.3d 815, 819 (Tex. Crim. App. 2011)

. Accordingly, w e must focus “not upon the perceived ac curacy of the conviction or punishment, but upon the error itself in the context of the trial as a whole, in order to determine the likelihood that it genuinely corrupted the fact

finding process.” Id

. We focus not on “whether the jury verdict was suppor ted by the evidence,” but rather, on whether “the error adversely affected the integrity of the process leading to the conviction.” Langham v. State , 305 S.W.3d 568, 582 (Tex. Crim. App. 2010) (quotation omitted). We must “focus not on the weight of
the other evidence of guilt, but rather on whether the error at issue might possibly have prejudiced the jurors’ decision

- making.” Harris v. State , 790 S.W.2d 568, 586 (Tex. Crim. App. 1989), overruled on other grounds by Snowden , 353 S.W.3d
at 821

– 22; accord Daniels v. State , 25 S.W.3d 893, 899 (Tex. App.

— Houston [14th Dist.] 2000, no pet.).
So, an error is not harmless “simply because the reviewing court is confident that the result the jury reached was objectively correct.” Snowden , 353 S.W.3d at
819. E rr or is not harmless “ if there is a reasonable likelihood that it materially affected the jury’s deliberations.” Neal v. State , 256 S.W.3d 264, 284 (Tex. Crim. App. 2008). Nor is error harmless if it “disrupted the jury’s orderly evaluation of
the evidence .” Walker v. State , 180 S.W.3d 829, 835 (Tex. App.

— Houston [14th Dist.] 2005, no pet.) (citing Harris , 790 S.W.2d at 588).
To determine whether constitutional error was harmless, we must “calculate, as nearly as possible, the probable impact of the error on the jury in light of the
other evidence.” Neal , 256 S.W.3d at 284. Accordingly, the presence of “overwhelming evidence of guilt is a factor to be considered.” Motilla v. State , 78

8S.W.3d 352, 357 (Tex. Crim. App. 2002). Other factors to consider may include the nature of the error, whether it was emphasized by the State, the probable implications of the error, and the weight the jury would likely have assigned to it in
the course of its deliberations. Snowden , 353 S.W.3d at 822. These are not
exclu sive considerations or even necessary considerations in every case. See id. “At bottom, an analysis for whether a particular constitutional error is harmless should take into account any and every circumstance apparent in the record that logically inform s an appellate determination whether ‘beyond a reasonable doubt [that particular] error did not contribute to the conviction or punishment.’” Id. (alteration in original) (quoting Tex. R. App. P. 44.2(a)). We examine the entire record “in a neutral, impa rtial and even

- handed manner and do not make our examination ‘in the light most favorable to the verdict.’” Daniels , 25 S.W.3d at
899 (quoting Harris , 790 S.W.2d at 586 ); see also Tillman v. State , 376 S.W.3d 188, 202 (Tex. App.

— Houston [14th Dist.] 2012, no pet.). We begin the analysis by reviewing the evidence of appellant’s guilt. The
evidence of appellant’s possession with intent to deliver cocaine , viewed in isolation, was strong indeed: (1) a secretly recorded conversation between appellant and Floy d demonstrated appellant’s knowledge of the presence of the
cocaine when he told Floyd there was “about a half” of a kilogram of cocaine in
the car ; (2) appellant had over $1, 1 00 in small denomination bills on him at the
time of the arrest , which indicated to Wright that appellant was “selling small quantities of narcotics or making change for other people buying” ; (3) the car was registered to appellant and his girlfriend, not Floyd; (4) the cocaine was within easy reach of appellant, having been found in a bag behind the driver’s seat; ( 5 ) the cocaine weighed 6 5 4 grams and was wor th about $60,000 on the street ; (6 ) appellant was linked to several bottles of codeine cough syrup found in the same

9bag as the cocaine because a bottle of codeine was in plain vi ew in the front seat,
and the officers found a six

- month

- old prescription for codeine cough syrup in appellant’s name in the car ; and ( 7 ) after appellant was informed he was being arrested for possession of cocaine and codeine and was told his money would be seized, appellant said, “I’m going to keep doing what I do no matter what you do,” which Wright understood as, “He’s going to keep selling drugs and trying to make money no matter if he gets arrested and charged.” 6 However, t he evidence was sharply con troverted by Floyd’s purposeful, self

- incrimination. Floyd gave a recorded, Mirandized statement to Wright that he had borrowed the car from appellant the night before , that all the drugs were Floyd’s, and that he put the drugs in the car before picking u p appellant. 7

6 This statement may be a “persuasive admission of personal involvement,” but it is not necessarily an “explicit admission of guilt.” See Hutchinson v. State , 424 S.W.3d 164, 184 (Tex. App.

— Texarkana 2014, no pet.) (referencing a statement m ade by a defendant after he was detained and told he would be arrested and his house searched, “I’ve just been doing what I’ve been doing for a little extra money” ; reversing for constitutional error despite “relatively strong” evidence linking the defenda nt to 11.58 grams of methamphetamine, 32.51 grams of GHB, and some Xanax pills; evidence included the admissible statement quoted above, the defendant had $1,600 in cash on his person, he lived at the residence where drugs were found, he gave keys to polic e officers that unlocked his bedroom where the officers found the drugs; the State twice referenced appellant’s second, inadmissible statement during closing arguments ).

7 The State undermined Floyd’s confession with evidence that it was contrived and inst igated by appellant. Before Floyd confessed, the officers had placed appellant and Floyd in the back of a patrol car together where their conversation was secretly recorded . Although appellant and Floyd were “talking pretty quiet” and “mumbling” accordin g to Wright, Wright identified appellant as saying “I got you.” Appellant also said, “I can’t go down,” and, “You would get probation.” Floyd asked, “How much work was in that [expletive],” and appellant responded, “About a half.” (Testimony at trial es tablished that “work” is slang for cocaine.) Appellant then said, “I got you, though . . . . When you dropped me off last night, you put it in there. You hear me?” Floyd said, “I got you.” Appellant and Floyd then used a different cell phone (unbeknow nst to the police officers at the time) to call someone. Appellant told Floyd, “Just tell them everything,” and Floyd said, “I got you, I got you.” Floyd told someone on the phone, “All that [expletive] was mine that I had with us,” and Floyd said he had “a half of a whole.” Floyd said he was going to tell the police “ it was mine.”

10Thus, t he evidence of appellant’ s possession with intent to deliver the
cocaine was not overwhelming . Courts have considered several factors for measuring the weight of the evidence concerning an intent to deliver a controlled substance, s uch as: (1) the nature of the location at which the accused was arrested (whether an area known for drug dealing); (2) the quantity of contraband in the accused’s possession; (3) the manner of packaging (whether packaged in individual units for resale); (4 ) the presence or lack thereof of drug paraphernalia (whether for use or sale); (5) the accused’s possession of large amounts of cash (particularly in amounts indicative of drug sales); and (6) the accused’s status as a drug user. See Moreno v. State , 195 S.W.3d 321, 325 (Tex. App.

— Houston [14th Dist.] 2006, pet. ref’d); see also Carter v. State , 419 S.W.3d 1, 18 (Tex. App.

— Amarillo 2009), rev’d on other grounds , 309 S.W.3d 31 (Tex. Crim. App. 2010).

The State contends that the “sheer volume” of cocaine wa s “sufficient evidence to demonstrate appellant’s intent to deliver.” But the test is not merely
one of weight or sufficiency; we are concerned with the likelihood that the admission of the text message corrupted the fact

- finding process, affected the
int egrity of the process leading to the conviction, or prejudic ed the jurors’
decision

- making. See Snowden , 353 S.W.3d at 819; Langham , 305 S.W.3d at 582;
Harris , 790 S.W.2d at 586.
In considering the remaining evidence, or lack thereof, about possession
wit h an intent to deliver, we note that there was no evidence that Floyd and appellant were stopped in an area known for drug dealing although the area was “high crime

. ” The cocaine was not packaged in individual units for resale, nor was there any evidence of other drug

- distribution paraphernalia found in appellant’s car ( or any other location ) that would have i ndicated an intent to deliver , such as baggies or measuring devices . Accordingly, the evidence of guilt was not

11overwhelming. See Carter , 419 S.W.3 d at 18 & n.19 (reasoning that, other than the defendant’s confession, there was “ virtually no evidence ” establishing the defendant’s intent to deliver; holding error harmful when there were 491 grams of cocaine found in a vehicle with a passenger and a dr iver, and there was no evidence the defendant possessed an excessive amount of cash, that the cocaine was packaged in a manner indicating an intent to sell, that the defendant possessed any baggies, scales or other items used in drug transactions, that the defendant was arrested in an area known for drug sales, that the defendant had any weapons in the car, or that t he defendant attempted to flee)

. 8

Further , there was drug paraphernalia indicative of appellant’s personal use of the codeine cough syrup. Wri ght testified that he observed a small prescription bottle of codeine in appellant’s name, two cups of ice, and a red fruity beverage bottle in the front cup

- holder area of the car. These items were consistent with drug use according to Wright: “Typically they will mix the codeine with some kind of fruity soda beverage, and a lot of times they ch o ose a fruity beverage that is red so that the color won’t have changed that much if you pour codeine in it.” The State elicited Wright’s opinion, based on his tr aining and experience, that the text message indicated, “Someone was asking him if he had any codeine syrup.” Thus,
the text message and Wright’s opinion provi ded evidence that appellant was a drug
dealer
, rather than merely a drug user

. Despite the tri al court directing a “not guilty” verdict on the codeine c harge, the State relied on the text message during closing argument. First, the State

8 Viewing the record in a neutral light, we disagree with the State’s contention on appeal that “the appearance of the cocaine indicated it was meant to be delivered to someon e else rather than possessed for appellant’s own use.” The State cites Wright’s testimony that the cocaine was “straight off the brick” and “not broken up or diluted in any way.” But Wright did not opine that this appearance indicated an intent to delive r. Such an intent perhaps could have been shown if the cocaine had been broken up into smaller quantities and diluted , ready for resale

.
12rebuffed defense counsel’s suggestion that the text message was not incriminating, arguing:
You got oil. I gue ss he works for BP. I mean, my goodness, if you’ve got

— if your car is low on oil and you need some, just text [appellant]. He’ll get it for you. No problem. Come on. You know, it’s common sense. What did Officer Wright tell you was one of the nicknam es of codeine? Oil. Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out. After referencing the amount of cocaine appellant possessed, the State argued
, “You want to tell me that’s not intent to deliver? You got oil. Unfortunately there’s nothing else we c an bring you other than that, and it’s enough.” Accordingly, the State invited the jury to infer that because appellant intended to deliver codeine, he also intended to deliver the cocaine found in the same bag as
the codeine

. On appeal, the State conten ds the “oil” text was of little significance because it contained no punctuation and there was “no clear indication that it referred to codeine.” But that argument directly contradicts the State’s evidence and its argument to the jury at the close of the case. Further, the State contends that the State mentioned the text during closing argument “only after defense counsel chose to mention it” first. But defense counsel’s attempt during closing argument to
lessen the impact of the inadmissible evidence do es not mean appellant suffered any less harm

— in fact, it cuts the other way because a “ probable implication” or “collateral consequence” of error in the admission of evidence is naturally that
defense counsel will attempt to mitigate the effect of harmful, relevant evidence during closing argument. See Hutchinson v. State , 424 S.W.3d 164, 182, 184 (Tex. App.

— Texarkana 2014, no pet.) (noting that courts must consider “probable collateral consequences” of the error) (citing Snowden , 353 S.W.3d at 822; Higgin botham v. State , 807 S.W.2d 732, 737 (Tex. Crim. App. 1991)). That both

13the State and defense counsel discussed the inadmissible evidence suggests the

error might possibly have prejudiced the jurors’ decision

- making or disrupted the jury’s orderly evaluat ion of the evidence. See Harris , 790 S.W.2d at 586 , 588

. In sum, the text message helped the State paint a clearer picture of appellant’s possession with intent to deliver cocaine , and that is precisely the argument the State made to the jury

. The text m essage connected appellant, as opposed to Floyd, to the distributable quantity of cocaine and a cell phone
solicitation for distribution. The text message was “important in the context of the
entire trial.” S ee Cabrales v. State , 932 S.W.2d 653, 657

– 59 ( Tex. App.

— Houston [14th Dist.] 1996, no writ) (reversing the defendant’s conviction under the beyond

a

- reasonable

- doubt harm analysis when an officer improperly testified that the cocaine could be cracked out and worth $60 million whereas the powder cocain e appellant was charged with possessing with intent to deliver was worth only $15 million; the defendant was the passenger in a vehicle driven by another person, wherein officers found four locked duffle bags containing 78 packages of cocaine weighing abou t 150 kilograms; the defendant had engaged in activity consistent with drug activity, i.e. , keeping a lookout after the drugs were presumably loaded into the vehicle, and the defendant “directed the officers to the hidden keys which unlocked the bags” of c ocaine; this court found harm because the evidence was “important in the context of the entire trial,” where the State had argued that the defendant knew “what was going on” based on the fact that the vehicle contained drugs worth up to $60 million). 9

9 Although appellant and the State do not squarely address the issue, appellant was charged under the law of parties, so the jury could have convicted him if he was criminally responsible for Floyd’s possession of the cocaine with intent to deliver. Just as the text message supported the State’s theory that appellant had an intent to deliver cocaine, it would have suppor ted the State’s theory that appellant had the intent to promote or assist Floyd’s
14T h e sole case the State cites in support of its argument on harm is Neal v.
State , where the Court of Criminal Appeals held that the admission of a gun and Blockbuster card did not contribute to Neal’s conviction for capital murder. See
256 S.W.3d at 284. The case is inapposite. Neal had confessed to raping and murdering the victim. Id. at 277. Cruz, the accomplice, testified about the rape and murder “in great detail at trial, from the conception of their plan through its execution, as well as the after math in which she confessed to the police and led them to [the] body.” Id. Neal also gave a general account of the rape and murder
to his cellmate. Id. The evidence presented a “clear picture” that appellant abducted the victim, stole some of her valua bles, raped her, and fatally shot her
several times. Id. Fingerprint and DNA evidence linked him to the crime. Id.
The inadmissible gun was not the murder weapon
, but Cruz ha d used it to hold

- up the victim. Id. at 283. At trial, the State had Cruz de monstrate how she held the

gun. Id. The Court of Criminal Appeals found the admission of the gun and
Blockbuster card harmless because, although t he examination of Cruz regarding the gun “may have added a dramatic flourish at trial
, ” the testimony was br ief, the
evidence of Neal’s guilt was overwhelming, the handgun was not essential to the State’s case, and the Blockbuster card “was of little significance.” Id. at 284.

Unlike in Neal , however, here the text message was an item of evidence, among others, that the jury might well have considered in reaching the conclusion that appellant possessed the cocaine with the intent to deliver it or intended to promote or assist Floyd’s possession with intent to deliver

. 10 Appellant cites this court’s prior decisio n in Johnson v. State , which is somewhat more analogous. See

commission of the crime and, at a minimum, was attempting to aid Floyd’s commission of the crime.

10 The jury charge also allowed the jury to convict appellant under the theor y of the law of parties

. S ee Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 7.02 (a)(2)

.
15899 S.W.2d 250 (Tex. App.

— Houston [14th Dist.] 1995, no writ). In Johnson , an

o fficer photocopied a $10 bill. Id. at 252. When the o fficer knocked on the door

to a residence to make an underc over drug purchase , Johnson a nswered and asked
the officer what he needed. Id. The o fficer said a “dime,” which is street slang for

one

- eighth of a gram of cocaine. Id. Johnson told Harden, the State’s accomplice witness, to get the officer “what he wa nted.” Id. Harden took a rock of cocaine from the table in the living room and gave it to the officer. Id. The officer paid Harden the $10 bill. Id. After the officer left, the police raided the apartment
without a warrant. Id. When the police sear ched Johnson , the $10 bill was found in his pocket. Id. He was tried for the delivery of cocaine. Id. The State referenced the $10 bill during closing argument and referenced Harden’s testimony that he gave the $10 to Johnson because the drugs belonged to Johnson. Id. The jury also sent notes during deliberations “requesting copies of the testimony about the seizure of the ten dollar bill from appellant.” Id. at 252

– 53. Despite the testimony from Harden and the undercover officer, t his court revers ed Johnson’s conviction because the $10 bill was “essenti al” to corroborate their testimony and it seemed clear that the evidence of the $10 bill “prejudiced the juror’s decision

making process and disrupted their orderly evaluation of the evidence.” Id.
Although there is no jury note in this case comparable to the one in
Johnson 11 and the text message was not necessarily “essential” to the State’s case, after reviewing the entire record, we hold there is a reasonable likelihood that the error materially af fected the jury’s deliberations and disrupted the jury’s orderly
evaluation of the evidence. W e cannot conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that the error in admitting evidence from the warrantless search of appellant’s cell phone did not contribute to appe llant’s conviction.

11 Here, the jury asked for copies of the recordings of Floyd’s confession and the secretly recorded discussion between Floyd and appellant.

16Appellant’s first issue is sustained.

C ONCLUSION Having sustained appellant’s first issue, we reverse the trial court’s judgment
and remand for a new trial. 12

/s/ Sharon McCally Justice

Pa nel consists of Justices McCally, Brown, and Wise.
Do Not Publish

— Tex. R. App. P. 47.2( b).

12 Because we sustain appellant’s first issue, w e do not address appellant’s second issue concerning the Confrontation Clause. See Tex. R. App. P. 47.1.

17