Court Opinion

ID: 9769761
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 15:01:48.769584+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:07.908646
License: Public Domain

OVERSTREET, Judge,
concurring and dissenting.
I write separately because the majority does not dearly and fully address the issue for review and misrepresents this Court’s opinion in Matchett v. State, 941 S.W.2d 922, (Tex.Cr.App.1996) (plurality opinion).
I.
Appellant contends that “the court of appeals erred in failing to find that the trial court harmfully erred in failing to admonish the appellant upon his guilty plea as required by [Art. 26.13(a)(4)], rendering said plea of guilty illegal and involuntary.” Article 26.13(a)(4), V.A.C.C.P., provides that the trial court shall admonish a defendant prior to accepting a plea of guilty or a plea of nolo contendere of the “fact that if the defendant is not a citizen of the United States of America, a plea of guilty or nolo contendere for the offense charged may result in deportation, the exclusion from admission to this country, or the denial of naturalization under federal law.”
To resolve this issue we must first determine whether the appellant was admonished as required by the statute. The court of appeals in its analysis considered whether there was substantial compliance pursuant to Art. 26.13(c). Article 26.13(e) provides that in admonishing the defendant as required by the statute, “substantial compliance by the court is sufficient, unless the defendant affirmatively shows that he was not aware of the consequences of his plea and that he was misled or harmed by the admonishment of the court.” In this case it is undisputed that there was no admonishment regarding deportation of a non-citizen as required by Art. 26.13(a)(4). We have held that there cannot be substantial compliance where the trial court wholly failed to give the admonishment. Morales v. State, 872 S.W.2d 753 (Tex.Cr. App.1994) and Matchett, supra.
The court of appeals erred in so much as it determined that there was substantial compliance with the statute. A reviewing court must review each admonishment separately in determining whether there is complete compliance, substantial compliance, or no compliance.
In order for there to be substantial compliance and for Art. 26.13(c) to be implicated, it is necessary for the admonishing court to have at least addressed the admonishment in some form or fashion; otherwise there is no compliance. Thus, the court of appeals also erred in conducting a substantial compliance analysis under Art. 26.13(e).
Since a substantial compliance determination is not implicated, a harm analysis under Rule 81(b)(2) of the Texas Rules of Appellate Procedure is appropriate in ascertaining the effect of the trial court’s complete failure to give the admonishment concerning deportation. Matchett, supra. Rule 81(b)(2) provides that “if the appellate record in a criminal case reveals error in the proceedings below, the appellate court shall reverse the judgment under review, unless the appellate court determines beyond a reasonable doubt that the error made no contribution to the conviction or to the punishment.” [emphasis added] In the instant case, the record reveals that the trial court committed error by failing to admonish appellant regarding deportation of a non-citizen.
In order to determine if the error contributed to the conviction or the punishment, we must look to the record. The record in this case reveals that appellant is a United States citizen and is therefore not subject to deportation. As such, it can be determined beyond a reasonable doubt that the error made no contribution to the conviction or the punishment because the admonishment is immaterial to appellant. Upon this finding, it is concluded that appellant suffered no harm as a result of the trial court’s complete failure to admonish on the deportation of a non-citizen. Consequently, the trial court’s error in failing to admonish could not have affected the le*268gality or voluntariness of appellant’s plea of guilty.
The court of appeals was correct in its determination in so much as it held that the Art. 26.13(c)(4) admonishment was immaterial to appellant, a United- States citizen. However, the court of appeals was wrong in its reasoning. The language, “[tjherefore, we hold that the substantial compliance provision of Article 26.13(c) can apply when the record affirmatively proves a defendant is a United States citizen, but the trial court fails to admonish the defendant about the immigration consequences of his guilty plea under [Ajrticle 26.13(c)(4)[,]” Cain v. State, 893 S.W.2d 681, 685 (Tex.App. — Fort Worth 1995), should be completely disavowed.
II.
The lead opinion misrepresents Matchett when it states that “this Court has opined that all errors, including a failure to admonish under Article 26.13(a)(4), are subject to the harmless error standard found in Texas Rule of Appellate Procedure 81(b)(2).” [emphasis in original] Cain, at 264. Having authored the Matchett opinion I can confidently assert that we did not hold that “all” errors were subject to the harmless error standard in Rule 81(b)(2). Instead, we held that certain types of errors are not foreclosed to the application of the 81(b)(2) harm analysis and that harm is presumed in those instances “[w]here the effects of a particular error are not discernable with reasonable certainty ...” Matchett v. State, 941 S.W.2d at 929. This reasoning came in response to Matchett’s argument that a failure to admonish resulted in reversible error without even considering harm. Also, the factor of the record containing evidence of citizenship as opposed to the record in Morales not containing evidence of citizenship militated toward a meaningful harm analysis and thus the application of 81(b)(2).
III.
The final flaw in the majority’s opinion is the assertion that “Marin, Morales, Whitten, and any other decision [that] conflicts” with the opinion “are overruled.” Cain, at 264. Such a statement is too encompassing. In my opinion, appellate courts should view Marin, Morales, and Whitten as good law in conjunction with the body of eases that follow and, as we held in Matchett, should review cases on a case-by-case basis and distinguish them when necessary to dispose of the issue presented. Matchett, supra.

TV.

In conclusion, I concur in the result reached by the majority and the court of appeals, but I respectfully dissent to the majority’s misrepresentation of Matchett and the majority’s decision to overrule Marin, Morales, and Whitten.