Court Opinion

ID: 9659938
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 21:59:07.146811+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:13.250023
License: Public Domain

MANSFIELD, J.,
delivered the dissenting opinion.
In Boykin v. State, 818 S.W.2d 782 (Tex. Crim.App.1991), we held;
Where the statute is clear and unambiguous, the Legislature must be understood to mean what it has expressed, and it is not for the courts to add or subtract from such a statute [citations omitted].... There is, of course, a legitimate exception to this plain meaning rule; where application of a statute’s plain language would lead to absurd consequences that the Legislature could not possibly have intended, we should not apply the language literally. [Emphasis added.]
Boykin, supra, at 785.
Texas Code of Criminal Procedure Article 26.13(a)(4) provides:
(a) Prior to accepting a plea of guilty or a plea of nolo contendere, the court shall admonish the defendant of:
(4) the fact that if the defendant is not a citizen of the United States of America, a plea of guilty or nolo contende-re for the offense charged may result in deportation, the exclusion from admission to this country, or the de*660nial of naturalization under federal law.
We have held that failure to give the Article 26.13(a)(4) admonishment is harmless error where the record shows the defendant is a United States citizen. Cain v. State, 947 S.W.2d 262, 264 (Tex.Crim.App.1997); Matchett v. State, 941 S.W.2d 922, 926-930 (Tex.Crim.App.1996) (plurality op.). Our holding in Cain rests upon the fact that a United States citizen cannot be deported for any reason, including for conviction of a criminal offense. Accordingly, failure to give a defendant who is a U.S. citizen the Article 26.13(a)(4) admonishment at the time of pleading guilty or nolo contendere is harmless error per se under Texas Rule of Appellate Procedure 44.2(b), or its predecessor, Rule 81(b)(2).
Though the majority in Cain did not expressly utilize our holding in Boykin to ascertain legislative intent underlying Article 26.13(a)(4), the result would have been the same had it done so. See, Cain, supra, at 266-267 (Mansfield, J. concurring). Clearly, it would have been an absurd result — never intended by the Legislature — to hold that a defendant who is a United States citizen and therefore not subject to deportation should have his conviction reversed on appeal because he was not admonished as to the possibility of totally inapplicable deportation consequences as a result of his plea of guilty or nolo contendere.
Turning to the instant case, the record establishes that appellant, at the time he pled guilty, was not admonished as to the possible consequences of his plea under federal immigration law as required by Article 26.13(a)(4). The record also reflects appellant was not a citizen of the United States. Furthermore, the record shows, based on his own testimony, appellant was residing in this country illegally, i.e., he was an illegal alien.
Under applicable federal law, an illegal alien is subject to deportation at any time. Therefore, he could not have been harmed by the trial court’s failure to admonish him regarding deportation. See 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(7)(1997) and 8 U.S.C. § 1251 (a)(1)(1997). To reverse appellant’s conviction for failure to give him the Article 26.13(a)(4) admonishment when he was already subject to deportation as an- illegal alien is an absurd result that the Legislature could not have possibly intended. Conceptually, the majority’s opinion is logically inconsistent with our holding in Cain: in Cain we held it harmless not to give the admonishment to a defendant who cannot be deported; in the present case we hold it to be reversible error not to give the admonishment to a defendant who is already deportable as an illegal alien, whether or not he pleads guilty or nolo contendere to the charged offense. In either instance, the failure to give the admonishment is harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.
The majority notes that a person who is deported as an illegal alien lacking proper documents is treated, for purposes of potential future legal reentry into the United States, differently than a noncitizen (legal or illegal) who is deported due to conviction of a crime of violence or aggravated felony under federal immigration law. See 8 U.S.C. § 1227; 18 U.S.C. § 16; 8 U.S.C. § 1101(43)(F). See also, Almendarez-Torres v. U.S., — U.S. -, 118 S.Ct. 1219, 140 L.Ed.2d 350 (1998). Article 26.13(a)(4), however, is a general admonishment that does not inform the noncitizen pleading guilty or nolo contendere that the consequences under federal immigration law of his plea differ greatly depending on the offense to which he has pled. For example, a plea of guilty to the offense of theft may bar him from legal reentry into the United States for a few years, whereas a plea of guilty to the offense of aggravated sexual assault may forever bar his legal reentry into the United States. The majority opinion can easily be read to require offense-specific admonishments; the implication is strong that a conviction upon a plea of guilty or nolo contendere where the current, general admonishment has been given may be subject to attack on appeal or by post-conviction application for habeas relief as having been involuntarily and unintelligently made.1 Any such change to Article *66126.13(a)(4) is a policy matter best left to the Legislature; we should not “go there.”
With these comments, I respectfully dissent.

. Left open is the question of whether a nonciti-zen convicted upon a plea of guilty or nolo *661contendere may in a post-conviction application for habeas relief, successfully claim ineffective assistance of counsel if counsel failed to inform him what the effect of conviction for that offense may be as to deportation and legal reentry under federal immigration law.