Court Opinion

ID: 9778333
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 21:00:50.265962+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:33:07.620574
License: Public Domain

DALLY, Judge,
dissenting.
The complainant, who was five feet four inches tall and a ninth grade student on December 1, 1975, the day the offense was committed, lived with her mother and sisters at Clayton Homes in Houston.
The appellant and two others assaulted the complainant, carried her, while she was fighting and screaming, to an area near some warehouses and box cars. All three raped the complainant, who said she had a good opportunity to see the appellant’s face while he was on top of her. She had never before seen the appellant and did not know his name.
About one week after she was raped the complainant was shown photographs of five people. She identified a photograph of the appellant as one of the three rapists. Later, police officers on two occasions had her view a lineup at the Clayton Homes office. She did not identify anyone in either lineup. She testified she had never misidentified anyone as one of the rapists and she had never told anyone that someone other than the appellant or one of his companions had raped her.
The appellant testified that he did not rape the complainant and that he spent the day on December 1 in a gymnasium playing basketball with his friend Richard Bennett. The appellant also said he had appeared in a police lineup and the complainant failed to identify him. Richard Bennett testified that he had been at the gymnasium with appellant at the time of the rape. Bennett also testified that he had been in a police lineup with the appellant and that the complainant failed to identify the appellant as one of the rapists.
It would not be proper to instruct the jurors to acquit the appellant if they found that the complainant had failed to identify appellant in the police lineup; therefore, misidentification is not an affirmative defense. In Ward v. State, 505 S.W.2d 832 (Tex.Cr.App.1974), this Court, in rejecting the contention that the trial court erred in failing to grant the defendant’s instruction on misidentification, stated:
“The court’s charge affirmatively required the jury to find beyond a reasonable doubt that appellant committed the offense before he could be convicted. The jury was further instructed that if it had a reasonable doubt as to the appellant’s guilt it should acquit. The court did not err in failing to instruct the jury as requested by appellant.”
In the instant case, just as in Ward, the charge affirmatively required the jury to *664find beyond a reasonable doubt that the appellant committed the offense before he could be convicted and that if the jury had a reasonable doubt as to appellant’s guilt it should acquit him. Although the appellant argues that his testimony and that of his friend raised the issue of misidentification for the jury’s consideration, this evidence would not require a submission on the issue of identity. The appellant’s rights were adequately protected as to any issue raised regarding identity by the court’s charge, and the trial court did not err in failing to instruct the jury as requested by the appellant. In Laws v. State, 549 S.W.2d 738 (Tex.Cr.App.1977), a case not mentioned by the majority, we recently rejected a defendant’s contention that he was entitled to a charge on misidentification because it would improperly single out evidence for the jury’s consideration.
Wheeler v. State, 56 Tex.Cr.R. 547, 121 S.W. 166 (1909), cited by the majority, is not apposite because there, if found to be true by the jury, the defensive matter was an affirmative defense that would require that the defendant be acquitted. That the complainant in the instant case may have failed to identify the appellant in one lineup would not require the jury to acquit the appellant; it was not an affirmative defense.
Briscoe v. State, 106 Tex.Cr.R. 478, 293 S.W. 573 (1926), cited by the majority, is not a case in which the Court held that it was necessary to submit a charge on misidentifi-cation. The Court there merely observed that the trial court had submitted such a charge. The majority cites no case that has ever required that a charge on identity be submitted to the jury. Such a charge would be in the nature of a special issue— criminal cases are submitted on a general charge. Moreover, any such charge would constitute a comment on the weight of the evidence. The majority fails to advise the bench and bar how such a charge could be worded so as not to constitute a comment on the weight of the evidence. The most important reason why such a charge is unnecessary is because mistaken identity is not an affirmative defense.
The majority is clearly wrong; I dissent to the reversal of the judgment.
Before the Court En Banc.