Court Opinion

ID: 9639628
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 16:42:03.186101+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:20.480692
License: Public Domain

MEYERS, Judge,
concurring.
Although I join the Court’s judgment dismissing this cause, I write separately to explain why Appellant’s petition for discretionary review is dismissed as improvidently granted.
We granted Appellant’s petition for discretionary review to address its sole ground for review: “The court of appeals erred in holding that the trial court’s error in refusing to allow petitioner’s counsel to make an opening statement upon request immediately following the opening statement of the prosecutor was harmless error pursuant to Tex.R.App. P. 81(b)(2).”
The revised Texas Rules of Appellate Procedure, effective September 1, 1997, replace the harmless error analysis of Rule 81(b)(2) with Rule 44.2. As this appeal was filed with the court of appeals prior to September 1, 1997, that court applied Rule 81(b)(2).
Because Rule 81(b)(2) is no longer applicable, an opinion from this Court examining the Court of Appeals’ application of that rule would be of little benefit to practitioners or *20Texas courts. Further, in my assessment the Court of Appeals correctly applied the analysis required by Rule 81(b)(2). As such, an opinion from this Court examining the Court of Appeal’s application of Rule 81(b)(2) would provide neither useful instruction to that court nor relief to Appellant.
While some of the jurisprudence that has developed regarding Rule 81(b)(2)' may continue to play a part in appellate analysis of constitutional errors under subsection (a) of the revised rule, as that subsection is substantially identical to Rule 81(b)(2), this case raises a non-constitutional error, implicating subsection (b) of the revised rule.