Court Opinion

ID: 9682377
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 08:10:20.425374+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:38.967141
License: Public Domain

CLINTON, Judge,
concurring.
We granted review in this cause to determine whether the law of parties is applicable to § 3f(a)(2), Article 42.12, V.A.C.C.P. The Court finds that “the phrase ‘the defendant used or exhibited a deadly weapon’ implies1 that the defendant, himself, use or exhibit a deadly weapon during the commission of a felony or flight therefrom.” Though I agree with the result, my reasons are somewhat more expansive.
The provisions of § 3f(a)(2) should be read literally. Every indication is that the Legislature intended it to be.
In the first place, the statute itself deals with punishment of the defendant, individually and personally. Similarly, in every sentence of § 3f(a)(2) the pointed reference is to “the defendant.”
Secondly, a significant effect of § 3f(a) is to withdraw authority of a judge of the trial court alone to grant probation to a defendant “adjudged guilty” of an offense listed in § 3f(a)(l) or to a defendant “shown” to have used or exhibited a deadly weapon during commission of any felony offense or immediate flight therefrom, but in otherwise prescribed circumstances to continue to permit a jury to recommend probation for such a defendant. Thus, “when it is shown that the defendant used or exhibited a deadly weapon” et cetera, and though the jury properly makes an “affirmative finding that the defendant used or exhibited a deadly weapon,” the Legislature was willing to allow a jury considering all evidence about the defendant at the punishment phase to recommend that probation be granted to the defendant. See generally Ex parte Thomas, 628 S.W.2d 905 (Tex.Cr.App.1982).
Finally, contrasting format and language used in § 3f(a)(l) and (2) reflect that the Legislature knew exactly what it was doing. Thus in (1) a defendant is “adjudged guilty” of one of the prescribed aggravated offenses (which would admit a finding of guilty based on the law of parties) — regardless of whether a deadly weapon was used or exhibited, whereas in (2) though a defendant implicitly is adjudged guilty of committing a felony offense, that a deadly weapon was used or exhibited is personalized by the repeated requirement that it be shown and found “the defendant” did so. That kind of juxtaposition in the same sub*403section clearly reveals that the law of parties is contemplated in the first situation but that it is no substitute for proving what must be shown and found in the second.
For those reasons I agree with the majority that “the defendant, not another party, must use or exhibit the deadly weapon.” With those reservations expressed in my concurring opinion in Polk v. State, 693 S.W.2d 391 (Tex.Cr.App.1985), I join the opinion and judgment of the Court.

. All emphasis is mine unless otherwise indicated.