Court Opinion

ID: 9682387
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 08:10:30.459426+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:39.039092
License: Public Domain

SPARLING, Justice,
concurring.
I concur in the result reached by the majority. It is an understatement to acknowledge that the majority here and the court of criminal appeals in Dickinson v. State, 685 S.W.2d 320 (Tex.Crim.App.1984), do not like arguments like the one in the present case. I disagree, however, with the legal theories under which they express their displeasure.
I liken this area of law to the allegory of the woodcutter who attempted to cut firewood in uniform lengths. Instead of measuring each successive log to the original, he measured it to the log cut immediately before. At the end of the cord, he discovered that the last log bore no resemblance in length to the first.
Undoubtedly, this jury argument resembles the jury argument in Dickinson —which is the last log cut — and, therefore, must be reversed. I seriously doubt, however, that the framers of our constitution had this extreme in mind when they wrote, “nor shall [any person] be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.” U.S. CONST, amend. V. Nor do I believe that our legislature envisioned this extreme application when enacting TEX. CODE CRIM.PROC.ANN. art. 38.08 (Vernon 1979) which extends the principles of the Fifth Amendment: “[T]he failure of any defendant to so testify shall not be taken as a circumstance against him, nor shall the same be alluded to or commented on by counsel in this cause.” And, finally, I do not believe that the interpretation by Ramos v. State, 419 S.W.2d 359 (Tex.Crim.App.1967) (cited by the majority in Dickinson), of article 38.08 authorizes this extreme application. Ramos states the test:
“the language used must be looked to from the standpoint of the jury, and the implication that the language used had reference to the defendant’s failure to testify must be a necessary one. It is not sufficient that the language might be construed as an implied or indirect allusion thereto.”
Ramos, 419 S.W.2d at 367.
The offending argument in this case is as follows:
[PROSECUTOR]: “Did you see the little grin on his face now and when he was looking at Lisa when she was arguing? I want to talk about what he looks like in the courtroom right now. You’ve looked at him throughout the trial — and that’s all I’m talking about, just his actions *746here in this courtroom while you ve watched him.
Have you seen by his actions one single iota of remorse for aggravated rape—
[DEFENSE ATTORNEY]: Judge—
[PROSECUTOR]: —and aggravated sexual assault?
[DEFENSE ATTORNEY]: Objection, Your Honor. Counsel is commenting on the defendant’s failure to testify.
THE COURT: I'll overrule that objection.” [Emphasis added.]
Applying the Ramos test to the above argument, I cannot, in my mind’s eye, fathom a jury of laypersons thinking to themselves that the prosecutor was referring to the defendant’s failure to testify. Or, stated differently, the prosecutor’s unequivocal statement, “that’s all I’m talking about, just his actions,” does not — could not — be a necessary allusion to a failure to testify. Thus, it appears that our holding is a product of recent case law, with no thoughtful view to the Fifth Amendment, article 38.08 or Ramos. Like the woodcutter we have lost sight of our original standards.
Finally, the rationale in Dickinson, as in the majority here, hinged partially upon the fact that the record did not reflect misbehavior of the defendant in court. The prosecutor referred to a “little grin” in this case, and in Dickinson said the complainant “hid her face in shame.” Neither the majority here nor the majority in Dickinson tells us how, from a practical viewpoint, an act of the defendant in open court gets into the record. Is it the court reporter’s responsibility to observe and record conduct and gestures? Does the judge have the responsibility to make gestures appear in the record? If the prosecutor says “let the record reflect ...” in an effort to establish, for example, an obscene gesture by the defendant, is it properly in the record? Or, alternatively, should the prosecutor take the stand and testify under oath to facts that he and the jury were in an equal position to see?
The prosecutor’s verbal rendition in argument of his observation of the appellant would, I would hold, have the same weight as if the prosecutor had made the record reflect the act during the trial. They are both unsworn descriptions in the record regarding the defendant's conduct. The jurors, as witnesses, can see for themselves if the event occurred or if it was mischarac-terized, thereby resolving any issue that the prosecutor’s description is erroneous. Indeed, the majority in Dickinson characterized the prosecutor’s argument in Hawkins v. State, 660 S.W.2d 65 (Tex.Crim.App.1983), as amounting “to directing the juror’s attention to that which they themselves had witnessed, namely, that the defendant had slept during his trial.” Dickinson, 685 S.W.2d at 327. If the jurors are competent to witness the defendant sleeping, then it would follow that they were competent to see our appellant’s “little grin.” Yet the majority here says that the showing-of-the-teeth scenario is the “only place in the record reflecting any act on appellant’s part.” Thus, I conclude that the majority has dismissed the prosecutor’s comment about the “little grin” as though it were outside the record.
In sum, I concur with the majority only because Dickinson demands it. But I think that if we apply the Ramos test and look at the argument from the jury’s perspective, this cannot be a comment on the defendant’s failure to testify — especially when the prosecutor strenuously argued that he was only referring to the defendant’s actions in court. The fact that we abhor the argument should not result in a reversal in the absence of more pertinent legal theory upon which to rely.