Court Opinion

ID: 9889695
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-10-11 08:09:29.917282+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:50:02.152687
License: Public Domain

In the
              Court of Appeals
Sixth Appellate District of Texas at Texarkana

                   No. 06-23-00179-CR

           DAVID JOSE SOMOZA, Appellant

                            V.

           THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee

          On Appeal from the 6th District Court
                Lamar County, Texas
                Trial Court No. 30016

      Before Stevens, C.J., van Cleef and Rambin, JJ.
       Memorandum Opinion by Justice van Cleef
                                   MEMORANDUM OPINION

        David Jose Somoza filed an untimely notice of appeal from his conviction of bail

jumping and failure to appear,1 for which he was sentenced to seventeen years’ incarceration.

We dismiss the appeal for want of jurisdiction.

        The trial court imposed sentence in this matter on June 28, 2023, and Somoza did not file

a motion for new trial. As a result, Somoza’s notice of appeal was due on or before July 28,

2023. See TEX. R. APP. P. 26.2(a)(1). Somoza’s notice of appeal was not filed until, at the

earliest, August 27, 2023, well past the deadline for filing such notice. Consequently, Somoza’s

attempt to appeal his judgment of conviction in this matter was untimely. The Texas Court of

Criminal Appeals has expressly held that, without a timely filed notice of appeal, we cannot

exercise jurisdiction over an appeal. See Olivo v. State, 918 S.W.2d 519, 522 (Tex. Crim. App.

1996); see also Slaton v. State, 981 S.W.2d 208, 209 n.3 (Tex. Crim. App. 1998) (per curiam).

        By letter dated September 5, 2023, we notified Somoza that his notice of appeal appeared

to be untimely and that the appeal was subject to dismissal for want of jurisdiction. We gave

Somoza twenty days to respond to our letter and to demonstrate how we had jurisdiction over the

appeal notwithstanding the noted defect. Somoza responded to our letter explaining that his trial

counsel failed to file a notice of appeal on his behalf after counsel advised Somoza that he had

done so. We are unable to remedy this problem given the current posture of this case.

1
 See TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 38.10(f). Somoza pled true to one enhancement paragraph, resulting in an enhanced
sentence. See TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 12.42.
                                                     2
        Because Somoza did not timely file his notice of appeal, we dismiss the appeal for want

of jurisdiction.

                                            Charles van Cleef
                                            Justice

Date Submitted:       October 5, 2023
Date Decided:         October 6, 2023

Do Not Publish

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