Court Opinion

ID: 9763234
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 02:39:19.751386+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:56:31.650657
License: Public Domain

BUTTS, Justice,
dissenting.
While I agreed with and joined in this court’s original opinion at 624 S.W.2d 953, the turn now taken by the majority calls for my departure and, thus, my dissent.
The indictment in this case alleges that appellant “did then and there knowingly cause the death of [deceased] by shooting her with a gun.... ” Section 6.03(b) of the Texas Penal Code provides:
A person acts knowingly, or with knowledge, with respect to the nature of his conduct or to circumstances surrounding his conduct when he is aware of the nature of his conduct or that the circumstances exist. A person acts knowingly, or with knowledge, with respect to a result of his conduct when he is aware that his conduct is reasonably certain to cause the result.
The distinction to be drawn in determining if a homicide is criminal is not whether the act is intentional or unintentional, but whether the act is voluntary or involuntary. Womble v. State, 618 S.W.2d 59, 64 (Tex.Cr.App.1981). A person may act unintentionally and still commit a criminal offense, provided he acts with knowledge, recklessness or negligence. In order for the homicide to be punishable, the evidence must show that the defendant committed a voluntary act with the requisite culpable mental state. Id. and cases there cited.
The transferred intent doctrine, long known in criminal law, has been codified in Texas as TEX.PENAL CODE ANN. § 6.04 (b) (Vernon 1974):
A person is nevertheless criminally responsible for causing a result if the only difference between what actually occurred and what he desired, contemplated, or risked is that:
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(1) a different offense was committed; or
(2) a different person or property was injured, harmed, or otherwise affected.
It was the abstract definition of § 6.04(b)(2) that the trial court gave to the jury in this case, and it is obvious from the evidence that the State relied upon this theory in its case. This it could properly do. Williams v. State, 567 S.W.2d 507, 509 (Tex.Cr.App.1978).
Two witnesses, the husband and daughter of the deceased, testified that appellant went to her car, took out the rifle, braced it on the trunk of the car, and fired toward the trailer house. Another witness, Rankin, the one who quarreled with appellant, testified he had just been at appellant’s car and had turned his back, intending to return to the Bennetts’ trailer house when he heard the shot from the rifle.
The scene was a trailer park with trailers spaced a short distance apart. The appellant lived five trailers away from the Ben-netts. Rankin lived “next door” to them. It is undisputed that Rankin and appellant argued. Appellant’s version was that the gun went off as she and Rankin struggled over it; Rankin denied he touched her or the gun. There was evidence that the Ben-netts had three children who lived with them in the trailer house. Further, there was evidence that the deceased, one daughter, and a son sat outside with the deceased’s husband, Rankin, and appellant at a table, and that the mother and daughter later went inside. It was about 9:00 p.m. Appellant admitted the gun was in her car and that she knew it was loaded. She also said she knew what the gun salesman told her husband when he purchased it: that a bullet from that gun could go through a motor block.
Whether appellant saw the deceased actually go into the trailer house is not the point; that someone was in the house (family members) was highly probable. It would not be necessary that the appellant *103actually know that it would be Mrs. Bennett who would receive the discharged bullet. The actual result was that someone inside the trailer was killed; this was a foreseeable consequence. Moreover, in a trailer park it would be within the realm of foreseeability that many persons’ lives would be endangered by the act of shooting a high-powered rifle.
We are bound by the law to view the evidence in the light most favorable to the jury verdict. Bowers v. Texas, 570 S.W.2d 929, 932 (Tex.Cr.App.1978). Under the court’s charge which included the definition of “knowingly or with knowledge,” the jury could properly infer from the circumstances that appellant had the requisite culpable mental state. I would hold the evidence to be sufficient. For these reasons I dissent.