Court Opinion

ID: 9768129
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 05:43:27.647527+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:36.812113
License: Public Domain

JONES, Justice,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent.
The majority has adequately set forth the relevant evidence. On the basis of that evidence, appellant was convicted of intentionally or knowingly injuring the child victim. The Penal Code provides that “[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.” Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 6.03(b) (West 1994). Considering all the evidence, and viewing it without the prism of “in the light most favorable to the prosecution,” I believe the verdict is probably so contrary to the overwhelming weight of the evidence as to be clearly wrong and unjust. See Clewis v. State, 922 S.W.2d 126 (Tex.Crim.App.1996); Stone v. State, 823 S.W.2d 375 (Tex.App.—Austin 1992, pet ref'd, untimely filed).
Viewing the evidence through that prism, however, effectively requires an appellate court to consider only the evidence that supports the verdict. Clewis, 922 S.W.2d at 132 n. 10. See also Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 2789, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979); Villalon v. State, 791 S.W.2d 130, 132 (Tex.Crim.App.1990). Here, the record contains evidence that when the child was returned to Becky at about 4:15 p.m., he was “limp, stiff, drawn up like a bah.” Also that he was “scrunched up and squirming,” and that he “had been like that all day.” There is also evidence that within 3 to 5 minutes after arriving home with the child, Becky was alarmed enough to call 911. Since it was so obvious to Becky that the child needed emergency medical care, and since there was evidence he had been like that for the better part of the day (while he was with appellant), a reasonable jury could, it seems to me, infer that appellant must also have realized the seriousness of his injury and his desperate need for immediate medical care. Accordingly, I would overrule appellant’s point of error challenging the legal sufficiency of the evidence.