Court Opinion

ID: 9766555
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 04:53:03.46937+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:23.763174
License: Public Domain

TEAGUE, Justice,
concurring and dissenting.
Although I agree with the majority opinion that appellant’s fourth ground of error is without merit, I am compelled to dissent to its holding that his ground of error is not properly before this Court for review purposes.
It is clear from the record that appellant’s main objection at trial to the admission into evidence of four still photographs was that because a police officer posed in positions that fit the State’s witness Lee Slotnik’s description of what he had seen after the third gunman, (alleged to be appellant), came out the door of the store where the killing occurred, the photographs should not have been admitted into evidence. On appeal, he also argues that the photographs bolstered the testimony of Slotnik. I am unable to agree that the ground of error that appellant presents is not subject to review.
*218The four still photographs depict what Slotnik could see “at some point in time,” and were like “a still frame on a motion picture.” A police officer posed in the photographs. However, the record reflects that the State agreed to block out from the photographs the police officer who was in the photographs.
The Fort Worth Court of Appeals in Lopez v. State, 651 S.W.2d 413 (Tex.App.—Ft. Worth 1983), reversed on other grounds, see Lopez v. State, 664 S.W.2d 85 (Tex.Cr.App.1985), correctly pointed out that “any staged, re-enacted criminal acts or defensive issues involving human beings are impossible to duplicate in every minute detail and are therefore inherently dangerous, offer little in substance and the impact of re-enactments is too highly prejudicial to insure the State or the defendant a fair trial.” However, whether the trial court will be found to have abused its discretion in admitting or excluding such re-enactments must be determined on an ad hoc basis. Ginther v. State, 672 S.W.2d 475 (Tex.Cr.App.1984).
In this instance, what was exhibited to the jury was not a motion picture or videotaped re-enactment of the offense, but, instead, were four still photographs with a person therein depicting locations that fit Slotnik’s description of what he had seen after the third gunman, (alleged to be the appellant), came out of the store. Thus, what is before us closely resembles what occurred in Sales v. State, 426 S.W.2d 249 (Tex.Cr.App.1968), in which this Court upheld the admission into evidence of a still photograph of the victim who was robbed in that cause. In Sales, supra, the photograph, taken after the robbery, depicted the victim standing at the checking stand where she had been robbed. Here, the still photographs depicted the path the gunman took after he had departed from the store.
Although I agree with appellant’s counsel on appeal that arguably the photographs, in the eyes of the jury, might have bolstered the testimony of Slotnik, I am also unable to state that the need for the jury to better understand the path that the gunman took was not great. I am also unable to conclude that the photographs made more vivid the prosecution’s argument that the defendant was the third gunman who departed from the store.
In this instance, because I believe that the still photographs could have been of great benefit to the jury, and because I also find that the prejudice, if any, was not great to appellant, I am unable to state in this instance either that the trial judge abused his discretion in admitting the photographs into evidence or that if it can be said that he did abuse his discretion in admitting the photographs into evidence, such error calls for reversal of appellant’s conviction.
The majority correctly overrules appellant’s ground of error.