Court Opinion

ID: 9771820
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 16:54:28.598874+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:37.267040
License: Public Domain

PHILLIPS, Judge,
concurring.
The facts of this case are adequately set out in the opinion of Presiding Judge Onion. It is clear from a reading of Wester v. State, 542 S.W.2d 403, 405-406, that if a probationer is continued on probation, either expressly or impliedly, it is because the trial court has made a determination that such action is in the best interest of society, the individual probationer, and the ends of justice. See Article 42.12, Section 3, V.A.C.C.P. Subsequent withdrawal of probationary privileges cannot be arbitrary. When those privileges are subsequently withdrawn following a motion to revoke probation and a hearing, it is because after reviewing the facts alleged to support the motion the trial court determines it is no longer in the best interest of society or the probationer to permit that probationer the privilege of conditional freedom.
This case represents the threshold question of whether the trial court, following the motion to revoke probation hearing, revoked or continued the probationer in his probationary status. This case represents a situation where the recorded words are at a total variance to the recorded behavior. Since the latter is a more objective and accurate barometer of events transpiring at times and places remote from this Court, more weight should be accorded it when reviewing appeals. This principle is traditionally applied when the accused denies having the requisite culpable mental state for commission of the crime for which he or she is convicted. We look at the testimony describing his/her conduct in committing the crime to determine if it is consistent with the required culpable mental state. If so, we consider the jury to have been supported in inferring that he acted with the alleged mens rea, notwithstanding his protestations.
Similarly, here we have words (“ . probation you received January 23, 1976, is revoked, . . . .”) that are belied by conduct (temporary four months’ imprisonment, modification of probationary terms upon release from temporary confinement, and imposition of sentence only upon notice to trial court of an additional violation). There are even words that are at a variance with the initial declaration that the probation was revoked, i. e., “ . . . but I will not impose sentence at this time. I will delay that action until some further date. I hope that I don’t have to take that action.” It is clear as day that the trial court took the cue from this Court’s opinions in Sappington v. State, 508 S.W.2d 840, and Traylor v. State, 561 S.W.2d 492, and changed his expressions on the record which were condemned in Wester v. State, supra. Yet, the substance of the trial court’s actions has not changed. It is his apparent purpose to create a class of probationers not authorized under our statutes. This class of probationers has fewer due process rights as a result of the invocation of magic words — “revoked —deferred.” Theoretically, the probationer is benefitted because of this “second chance.” But this “second chance” is not *516sanctioned under our law. The options of the trial court are really only twofold: (1) revoke or (2) continue, with or without modifications. See Article 42.12, Section 8, V.A.C.C.P.
Thus, the objective facts of this cause demonstrate unequivocally that of the two available options, the trial court continued Mr. Wallace on probation, with a modification of probationary conditions. To have subsequently revoked that modified probation on January 31, 1978, without adducing evidence on any alleged violations of the modified terms is to deny the probationer due process, due course of the law and fundamental fairness. Wester v. State, supra. The procedure used also circumvents our statute on probation. Article 42.12, V.A.C.C.P.
I have equal reservations about the vitality of Traylor v. State, supra, because there again the invocation of magic words, i. e., “recesses this hearing pending the court’s making a decision,” serves to create a new class of probationer unauthorized under Article 42.12, V.A.C.C.P. After an eight month recess, revocation was deemed the appropriate discharge of the trial court’s discretion. Interestingly enough, this action took place only after the State brought another violation to the court’s attention. The discussion in Traylor, supra, also represents the creation of an impossible burden of proof on probationers. In Wester, supra, Sappington, supra, was distinguished because there was no record showing that the trial court knew or, if known, relied upon Sappington’s subsequent arrest when it entered its revocation order.1 In Traylor, supra, there was a clear record showing that the trial court knew of the probationer’s arrest after the “recessed” hearing. However, this Court concluded that the discussion of the arrest related only to jail time credits.2 The decision of this Court to leave the probationer-revokee-appellant with the burden of proving affirmatively that the trial court relied on the arrest subsequent to the recessed/deferred revocation hearing/decision is an impossible burden.
A sounder course in these turbulent waters is to reaffirm the statutory limitation on the trial court’s discretion. That is, the trial court either revokes or continues, with or without modifications. There is no such animal as a quasi-revoked/quasi-continued probation. If some time is required to decide whether to reduce the term of imprisonment, then, of course, a recess for a reasonable period of time is appropriate.3 The trial court in Sappington v. State, supra, if of the opinion that the ends of justice and the best interests of society and Sappington warranted it, should have continued the probation with the rehabilitation treatment as a new condition.
Insofar as the Traylor and Sappington decisions elevate trial courts’ discretion above the statutory limitations of Article 42.12, V.A.C.C.P., they should be overruled. The schemes they foster serve only to obfuscate procedure and distort the administration of justice.
For the foregoing reasons and the reasons expressed in Presiding Judge Onion’s opinion, I am of the opinion that the trial court in this case abused its discretion and the judgment should be reversed and remanded.

. After the prior hearing no ruling on revocation was entered because the probationer requested an opportunity to undergo narcotic addiction rehabilitation treatment.

. This conclusion is of doubtful validity since Traylor was arrested on November 12, 1976, for the “new offense” of heroin possession. The motion to revoke probation was not filed until November 16, 1976. There was no indication that a capias ever issued under the November 16 motion to revoke probation. Thus, Traylor was not under arrest from November 12, 1976, on “said cause” of the recessed hearing on the April 5, 1976, motion to revoke probation. See Article 42.03, Section 2, V.A.C. C.P.

. I consider eight months as an inappropriately long recess. See Traylor v. State, supra.