Court Opinion

ID: 9654870
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 18:53:27.317598+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:14.277476
License: Public Domain

CLINTON, Judge,
concurring.
In the first decision giving rise to this contretemps, Hall v. State, 736 S.W.2d 818 (Tex.App.—Houston [14th] 1987), PDR refused, the appellate court determined that the district court lacked jurisdiction over two pending indictments alleging essential*189ly criminally negligent homicide proscribed by V.T.C.A. Penal Code, § 19.07, pursuant to Article 21.15 V.A.C.C.P. In its opinion in the instant cause another appellate court applied the “law of the case” doctrine to adopt that prior holding, viz: “that the two indictments purporting to charge appellee with criminally negligent homicide involving official misconduct, did not confer jurisdiction on the district court.” State v. Hall, 794 S.W.2d 916, at 918 (Tex.App.—Houston [1st] 1990).1 In my judgment both courts are basically right, albeit they looked primarily to the definition of “official misconduct” pertaining to removal proceedings involving county officers without taking into consideration “official misconduct” as delineated in V.T.C.A. Penal Code, § 39.01, and for other matters about to be developed.
While there continues to be “a close relationship between ‘removal official misconduct’ and ‘criminal official misconduct,’ ” Talamantez v. State, 829 S.W.2d 174 (Tex.Cr.App., delivered this day), my underlying thesis is that with enactment of the Penal Code in 1973, effective January 1,1974, the Legislature made a rather clean break with past formulations when in V.T.C.A. Penal Code, § 39.01 it created a single offense of “criminal official misconduct,” and thus provided new meaning to the terms “all misdemeanors involving official misconduct” as used in Article V, former § 8, and Article 4.05, V.A.C.C.P. (jurisdiction of district court), and “official misconduct” as used in Article V, § 24 (removal of county officers).
Having lately experienced arbitrary governance approaching tyranny, apparently the Framers deemed meaning of the term “official misconduct” so commonly understood that they felt no need to define it in §§ 4 and 24, or elsewhere in the Constitution. See Gallagher v. State, 690 S.W.2d 587, at 592 (Tex.Cr.App.1985); also id. at 595 (dissenting opinion), and Emerson v. State, 727 S.W.2d 267 (Tex.Cr.App.1987) (dissenting opinion at 269 ff).
Thereafter revisers included in revised civil statutes of 1879 the definition of “official misconduct” applicable in civil removal proceedings involving county officers only; that definition and other provisions for removal proceedings were carried forward in every revision of civil statutes and are now found in V.T.C.A. Local Government Code, Title 3, Chapter 87, Subchap-ters B & C, § 87.011 ff. Talamantez v. State, supra.
Meanwhile the Legislature was proscribing certain conduct in penal codes, so that contemporaneous with civil statutes authorizing removal of county officers there were numerous criminal statutes which applied to violations of specifically prescribed duties and functions of particular state and county officers of government. This sort of statutory hodgepodge continued to challenge the bench and bar until 1974. See, e.g., cases discussed and cited in Talamantez v. State, supra; Gallagher v. State, supra; Emerson v. State, supra (dissenting opinion).
In 1973 the Legislature confronted its jumbled creations headon in an evident effort to resolve recurring problems manifested through litigation. Knowledgeable commentators close to its endeavors explained the changes and consequences in § 39.01. Official Misconduct, viz:
“This section replaces a large number of Texas statutes, most of which applied to violations of specific duties by specified public servants, e.g., Penal Code arts. 87 (misapplication of public money), 416 (neglect in drawing juries), 397 (commissioner failing to attend court), 422 (officer refusing to give data). It proscribes generally misfeasance and non-feasance in public office, but only when the public servant intends to benefit himself or harm another, and it provides a uniform mens rea requirement and penalty structure.
******
This sections broadens the coverage of prior law to embrace the comprehensive category of public servant, which includes, in addition to officers and em*190ployees of government, [others identified in V.T.C.A. Penal Code, § 1.07(a)(30) ].
The five subdivisions of this section describe the different ways in which the offense may be committed. The public servant is responsible for unauthorized exercise of his power, acts beyond his power, failure to perform a mandatory duty, violation of law relating to his office, and theft of public property under his control.”
Practice Commentary.2
Because § 39.01 specifically defined those acts constituting “criminal official misconduct” by public servants, for the bench and bar to continue to resort to a definition of “removal official misconduct” on the part of county officers would appear to be contrary to expressed legislative intent.
On or about June 27, 1985, when she allegedly committed criminally negligent homicide, appellant was a deputy sheriff, at best a “public servant,” rather than a “county officer” within the meaning of then effective Article 5973. See former article 5970, R.C.S.1925, namely:
“All district and county attorneys, county judges, commissioners, clerk of the district and county courts and single clerks in counties where one clerk discharges the duties of district and county clerk, county treasurer, sheriff, county surveyor, assessor, collector, constable, cattle and hide inspector, justice of the peace and all county officers now or hereafter existing by authority either of the Constitution or laws, may be removed from office by the judge of the district court for ... official misconduct[.]”
Notice that each named officer occupies an elected office. See now a similar enumeration of offices in V.T.C.A. Local Government Code, § 87.012.
Furthermore, by then former § 39.01 had been reduced to simpler terms, viz:
“(a) A public servant commits an offense if, with intent to obtain a benefit or with intent to harm another, he intentionally or knowingly:
(1) violates a law relating to his office or employment; or
(2) misapplies any thing of value belonging to the government that has come into his custody or possession by virtue of his office or employment.
(b) An offense under Subsection (a)(1) of this section is a Class A misdemeanor.
(c) An offense under Subsection (a)(2) is [a class of misdemeanor or degree of felony according to ‘the value of the use of the thing misapplied’].”
The criminally negligent conduct appellant allegedly engaged in may not be converted to “official misconduct” under § 39.01 by the further allegations that she operated a motor vehicle “in her official capacity as a Harris County Sheriffs Office Deputy” and then describing it as “negligently” operating “her official police vehicle” while she “was not responding to an emergency call.” See majority opinion, at 1. The requisite specific intent “to obtain a benefit or ... to harm another,” is not alleged, nor do the acts that are alleged “violate[] a law relating to [her] office or employment,” or tend to show she “misap-plie[d] any thing of value belonging to the government^]”
For those reasons then I agree with the courts of appeals “that the two indictments purporting to charge appellee with criminally negligent homicide involving official misconduct, did not confer jurisdiction on the district court.” Similarly, I also agree *191with the majority here that the district court was not a court of competent jurisdiction under Article V, § 8 and Article 4.05, and for the reasons given by the majority I further agree that it was not under Article V, § 12(b).3
Accordingly, I concur in the judgment of the Court.
McCORMICK, P.J., joins.

. All emphasis here and throughout this opinion is mine unless otherwise indicated.

. In § 39.02, the Legislature also created the offense of “official oppression," one not contained in prior law. There were, however, specific penal statutes prohibiting certain oppressive activities, mostly relating to law enforcement. This section replaces "these ad hoc statutes with a general offense of official oppression that applies to all public servants.” Practice Commentary.
This Court has determined that "official oppression” is "within the ambit of the phrase ‘official misconduct’ as that term is used in Article V, [former] § 8 of the Texas Constitution and Article 4.05, V.A.C.C.P.,” meaning that it is "a misdemeanor involving official misconduct” over which a district court has jurisdiction. Gallagher and Emerson, both supra. We are not concerned here with such an offense, and thus do not address that jurisdictional matter.

. Demonstrated once again that not every broad statement of law is always inclusive nor free of ambiguity. That "presentment of [a charging instrument] invests the court with jurisdiction of the cause," id., § 12(b), overlooks a basic proposition in our jurisprudence, and other common law jurisdictions: jurisdiction of a trial court depends on other elements as well, viv general, personal, subject matter, and power to enter the particular judgment. Garcia v. Dial, 596 S.W.2d 524, at 527-528 (Tex.Cr.App.1980); Hultin v. State, 171 Tex.Cr.R. 425, 351 S.W.2d 248, at 255 (1961); Morrow v. Corbin, 122 Tex. 553, 62 S.W.2d 641, at 644-645 (1933); Cleveland v. Ward, 116 Tex. 1, 285 S.W. 1063, at 1069 (1926).