Court Opinion

ID: 9770261
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 15:56:00.775763+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:16.154901
License: Public Domain

KOEHLER, Justice,
concurring and dissenting.
I concur in the majority’s overall conclusion overruling Appellant’s sole point of error but respectfully dissent from that part of the opinion which found that the tardy objection by Appellant’s attorney to improper testimony was timely.
First, I disagree with the majority conclusion that Appellant’s question directed at Appellee did not disclose or in any manner suggest the character of the answer that might be given. Appellant knew that her response to Appellee’s interrogatory inquiring as to her policy limit was $500,000 and that Appellee thereafter amended his petition to claim that amount in damages. Yet Appellant’s counsel asked the question that invited an obvious answer. Although I would certainly agree that Appellee should have been instructed by his counsel that any such answer would be highly improper and would invite a likely immediate mistrial, to obtain the mistrial necessitates an immediate proper objection and motion.
Second and more important, I disagree that Appellant’s objection was timely. In Texas, the general rule is that an objection to improper testimony must be timely made, the specific grounds therefor stated, and the trial court’s ruling obtained. Tex.R.App.P. 52(a); Bushell v. Dean, 803 S.W.2d 711, 712 (Tex.1991); Top Value Enterprises, Inc. v. Carlson Mktg. Group, Inc., 703 S.W.2d 806, 811 (Tex.App.—El Paso 1986, writ refd n.r.e.). Failure to assert a timely objection results in a waiver of that alleged error on appeal. Id. To be timely, the objection must be made before the answer is given where it is reasonably obvious that the ques*797tion calls for inadmissible evidence; Juhasz v. State, 827 S.W.2d 397, 401 (Tex.App.-Corpus Christi 1992, pet. refd); Atlantic Richfield Co. v. Misty Prod., Inc., 820 S.W.2d 414, 421 (Tex.App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 1991, writ denied); Morelos v. State, 772 S.W.2d 497, 507 (Tex.App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 1989, pet. refd); or at the earliest possible moment. Hernandez v. State, 808 S.W.2d 536, 544 (Tex.App.-Waco 1944, no pet.).
Appellant’s counsel was conducting cross-examination when the reference to a “policy” occurred. Since counsel undoubtedly knew of the insurance policy limits, her question to Appellee invited the answer she got. Instead of immediately objecting, counsel proceeded to ask a question on a topic unrelated to the previous question. Although the delay was short and may have resulted from a strategic decision by counsel (to avoid drawing the jury’s attention to the issue in case her objection was overruled), the objection still was not made at the earliest possible opportunity and the practical effect is that the objection was not timely. Therefore, Beall did not properly preserve the issue for appeal. Bushell, 803 S.W.2d at 712; Top Value Enterprises Inc., 703 S.W.2d at 811.
Although “timeliness” may be difficult to define in some situations, the only practical rule to follow in the case of evidentiary objections during a trial is that an objection, in order to be timely, must be made at the earliest opportunity. The earliest opportunity in the ease of a question that clearly calls for an inadmissible or otherwise objectionable answer is immediately following the asking of the improper question, not after the answer is given. Rodriguez v. State, 577 S.W.2d 491, 493 (Tex.Crim.App.1979). In the case of any other question, the earliest opportunity is immediately following the nonre-sponsive or otherwise objectionable answer.1 The answer given by Appellee in this case was not only an improper allusion to insurance, it was also nonresponsive. When a nonresponsive answer is given, it has been held that the availability of an objection is an exception to the general rule that an objeetion is not timely unless made before a question is answered. Smith v. State, 763 S.W.2d 836, 841 (Tex.App.—Dallas 1988, pet. refd). In other words, to make a timely objection, the objecting attorney must make his or her objection immediately after he or she recognized or should have reasonably recognized that an improper question was asked or an improper answer was given. Failure to do so results in waiver. To hold otherwise would put the objecting attorney and the trial judge in the position of never knowing whether an objection is timely though made after one, two, three, or what have you, additional questions are asked.
In a recent case, the First Court of Appeals held in a criminal case that the objection was not timely and the error was not preserved for review when defense counsel failed to object immediately to an objectionable answer (in that case, an answer alluding to extraneous offenses). Griffin v. State, 850 S.W.2d 246, 249 (Tex.App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 1993, pet. refd). This Court has also recently held that in order to be timely, an objection must be lodged as soon as the objectionable nature of the testimony becomes apparent. Murillo v. State, 839 S.W.2d 485, 493 (Tex.App.—El Paso 1992, no pet.), citing Ethington v. State, 819 S.W.2d 854, 858 (Tex.Crim.App.1991); Beckley v. State, 827 S.W.2d 74, 77 (Tex.App.—Fort Worth 1992, no pet.); Wade v. State, 814 S.W.2d 763, 767 (Tex.App. — Waco 1991, no pet.).
It would be my conclusion that Appellant’s objection to Appellee’s testimony concerning her policy limits was not timely, but even if it was, Appellant has failed to show that the court’s errors in overruling her objection and in refusing to grant her motions for mistrial or for new trial, or in the alternative to modify the judgment, were calculated to cause and probably did cause the rendition of improper judgment.

. It would make little logical sense if under the rule (Tbx.R.App.P. 52(a)), an objection to an improper question in order to be timely must be made before the answer is given but an objection to a nonresponsive or improper answer is timely even though made after another question is asked and answered.