Court Opinion

ID: 9774813
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 18:34:32.969732+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:32:16.402040
License: Public Domain

OPINION ON MOTION FOR EN BANC REHEARING
The State moves this Court for en banc rehearing of our opinion, Castillo v. State, No. 13-91-381-CR (Tex.App.—Corpus Christi July 29, 1993). We deny the motion for rehearing and write only to respond to the arguments made by the State in the motion.
On motion for rehearing, the State contends that this Court erred by misapplying the standards for reviewing a trial courts decision to admit evidence over a Rule 403 objection and by focusing on the outcome of the trial when applying the harmless error test.
The State concedes that this Court correctly stated the principles governing our review of the trial court’s decision to admit extraneous offense evidence over an objection that the danger of prejudice substantially outweighs the probative value, and it agrees that the controlling case is Montgomery v. State, 810 S.W.2d 372, 386-393 (Tex.Crim.App.1990) (opinion on rehearing). As we noted in our original opinion, the evidence of robbery of the bar patron was admissible to show intent. The State also argues that the evidence was admissible to show identity. The State then excepts to our analysis under Rule 403, contending that we neither gave appropriate deference to the trial court nor considered the curative effects of limiting instructions.
The State is correct that we review a trial court’s decision to admit evidence for abuse of discretion. However, that review still requires that we examine the evidence, its purposes, and its effects to determine whether it should have been admitted.
[Reviewing the trial court’s judgment for abuse of discretion [by admitting evidence over a Rule 403 objection] requires more of an appellate court than deciding that the trial judge did in fact conduct the required balancing and did not simply rule arbitrarily or capriciously. The appellate court must measure the trial court’s ruling against the relevant criteria by which a Rule 403 decision is to be made.
[[Image here]]
[Wjhere relevant criteria, viewed as objectively as possible, lead to the conclusion that the danger of unfair prejudice substantially outweighed the probative value of the proffered evidence, the appellate court should declare that the trial court erred in failing to exclude it. Relevant criteria gleaned from the authorities include, inter alia, that the ultimate issue was not seriously contested by the opponent; that the State had other convincing evidence to establish the ultimate issue to which the extraneous misconduct was rele*96vant; that the probative value of the misconduct evidence was not, either alone or in combination with other evidence, particularly compelling; that the misconduct was of such a nature that a jury instruction to disregard it for any but its proffered purpose would not likely have been efficacious. Accordingly, when the record reveals one or more such relevant criteria reasonably conducing to a risk that the probative value of the evidence is substantially outweighed by unfair prejudice, then an appellate court should conclude that the trial court acted irrationally in failing to exclude it, and thus abused its discretion. The trial court has no “right” to be “wrong” if that means to admit evidence which appears to the appellate court, affording all due defence to the trial court’s decision, nevertheless to be substantially more prejudicial than probative.
Montgomery, 810 S.W.2d at 392-93.
Neither intent to deprive nor identity were seriously contested in this case. In fact, appellant admitted to theft in opening argument. Furthermore, the facts of intent to deprive and identity were shown by direct evidence or readily inferred from the testimony of witnesses to the theft and attempted sale of the watch. We held that the evidence should have been excluded under Rule 403 for being relevant only to issues readily inferred from other facts. The State argues that we examined only the probative value prong and ignored the prejudicial effect prong and that we did not consider curative effect of the trial court’s limiting instructions.
The Court of Criminal Appeals holds that the likelihood that a limiting instruction would not be efficacious to prevent evidence from prejudicing the jury is a factor militating for excluding relevant evidence. Montgomery, 810 S.W.2d at 393. The State argues that a limiting instruction will cure error caused by admitting evidence of probative value so slight that it is substantially outweighed by its prejudicial effect. We do not agree with the State’s position.
Rule 403 assumes that a piece of evidence may be both relevant and prejudicial. Being relevant, the evidence is admissible, subject to the rules of evidence. Tex.R.Crim.Evid. 402. Nevertheless, occasionally, Rule 403 envisions excluding relevant evidence on the grounds that its probative value is too slight to justify the risk that a jury may emotionally respond to the evidence. If the State is correct, and limiting instructions can completely purge the risk that a jury might improperly consider evidence beyond its limits, then Rule 403 is completely useless and should be removed from Article IV of the Rules of Criminal Evidence.
If the State is correct, Rule 402, which states that irrelevant evidence is inadmissible, would encompass all complaints regarding relevance and prejudice. In such a case, evidence would be offered, objected to on relevancy grounds, and found relevant to show ‘X.’ The party resisting the evidence would then request an instruction limiting consideration of the evidence only to the issue of ‘X.’ See Tex.R.CRIM.Evid. 105.
The Code Construction Act applies to rules promulgated under a statutory grant of authority. Tex.Gov.Code Ann. § 311.-002(4) (Vernon 1988). The Court of Criminal Appeals promulgates evidentiary rules under statutory authority. Tex.Gov.Code Ann. § 22.109 (Vernon 1988). This Court has previously applied the provisions of the Code Construction Act to the Rules of Criminal Evidence. See, e.g., McVickers v. State, 838 S.W.2d 651, 655 (Tex.App.—Corpus Christi 1992), aff'd, No. 1453-92, 1993 WL 491538 (Tex.Crim.App. December 1, 1993) (not yet reported). We presume that the entire statute or rule is intended to be effective. Tex. Gov.Code Ann. § 311.021(2) (Vernon 1988). Our interpretation of Rule 403 should not render its provision a nullity.
The State’s argument that a limiting instruction suffices to tip the prejudicial effect/probative value balance in favor of admission might be -well taken in a case in which we find the evidence probative to some issue which is in dispute at trial. However, if the evidence is admissible only for showing things not in dispute (e.g. identity and intent to commit theft), Rule 403 should dictate the evidence be excluded no matter what limiting instructions the court might attach. See Montgomery, 810 S.W.2d at 392-93. In this case, the trial court abused its discretion by admitting extraneous offense evidence that *97was relevant only to issues that were not seriously contested and that were proved by direct evidence or were readily inferred from other available evidence.
The State also argues that we im-permissibly focused on the outcome of the trial when we conducted a harm analysis. We admit that our harm analysis was brief, perhaps to the point that we omitted steps in our analysis. However, under the appropriate standard of analysis, a reviewing court must examine the verdict and the punishment when performing harm analysis.
When we perform a harmless error analysis, we must
first, isolate the error and all its effects, using the considerations set out above and any other considerations suggested by the facts of the case; and second, ask whether a rational trier of fact might have reached a different result if the error and its effects had not resulted.
Harris v. State, 790 S.W.2d 568, 588 (Tex.Crim.App.1989) (emphasis added). Harris does not forbid this Court from examining the verdict to determine whether error harmed the appellant; rather, we are commanded to look to the verdict. Harris addressed the evils which could have resulted from appellate courts examining error under standards appropriate for sufficiency review, i.e., the practice of finding the properly admitted evidence sufficient to support a conviction and ruling the improperly admitted evidence harmless. Such practice would have encouraged the State to ignore the rules of evidence entirely. See id. at 587.
Appellant was indicted for aggravated robbery, and the court charged the jury under aggravated robbery, robbery, and theft. Appellant admitted theft. The State produced the victim’s testimony that appellant had a gun. The State produced no other evidence that appellant committed any bodily injury or threatened any bodily injury to the victim. The jury acquitted appellant of aggravated robbery but convicted appellant of robbery. Had the jury chosen to believe the State’s witness that appellant threatened the victim with a gun, it could have convicted appellant of aggravated robbery. Since the jury obviously chose to disbelieve the State’s evidence that appellant had a gun, then it disbelieved the only competent evidence that appellant threatened bodily injury to the victim. Thus, we concluded that we could not state beyond a reasonable doubt that the jury was not prejudiced by evidence of a separate robbery which included committing bodily injury.
That we did not explicate the likely prejudicial effect of evidence of an independent felony is perhaps unfortunate, but neither is that omission fatal to our analysis, nor should our implied reasoning be secret. Persons are not tried as criminals generally; they are tried for individual offenses. The rules of evidence, as they address relevance and prejudice issues, cascade from allowing relevant evidence (Rule 402), to excluding evidence that is particularly prejudicial but somewhat relevant (Rule 403), to forbidding the use of extraneous offenses to prove character conformity (Rule 404(a)). As the rules contemplate, and our discussion of the admission of extraneous offense evidence under Rule 403 shows, extraneous offense evidence is inherently prejudicial. When a trial court admits such evidence over objection for no good purpose, a reviewing court is loath to blind itself to that prejudicial effect and find the error harmless.
We DENY the State’s motion for en banc rehearing.