Court Opinion

ID: 9779066
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 21:35:00.546031+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:33:20.562773
License: Public Domain

BROOKSHIRE, Justice,
dissenting.
The majority has remanded the case because of the refusal of the trial court to grant a new trial to the Appellant based upon the discovery and proffering of allegedly newly discovered evidence. The record on the motion for new trial was carefully hammered out by opposing counsel. The main thrust of the Motion for New Trial, from the standpoint of the accused, is based upon the testimony of Franklin “Butch” Fielder, Jr.
Mr. Fielder testified that in November, 1983, he was working for a drilling company. He worked until about midnight, when the shift changed. On November 11, 1983, he got off around midnight. In his crew were David Kirkendall, Marvin Segrest and Mark Segrest. The record on the Motion for New Trial is consistent that the foreman and crewmen started having a few beers, maybe 3 or 4 per man, after they left the drilling site. They went to a nightclub in Beaumont called Sugar’s. It was an after-hours club. It took about 30 minutes or a little more to drive from the drilling rig to Sugar’s and this group stayed at Sugar’s for about 45 minutes. The club closed at about 1:45 A.M. to 2:00 A.M. The crewmen had some more drinks at Sugar’s and the basic thrust of Fielder’s testimony is that he noticed a woman who came in Sugar’s wearing blue jeans that he said, in his opinion, was Lisa Wilber. This young woman or “girl”, after she entered Sugar’s, went to the juke box and apparently changed the record. This, in turn, stopped another girl, who was on the stage dancing in what has been described as “black light.” The girl who was already on the dancing stage when the juke box music was changed, stopped dancing and came down and talked to the girl who Fielder identified as Lisa. The dancer changed the music one more time. Then Fielder talked to the girl who came in after Fielder and his crew arrived, urging her to dance. By that time, the record showed that each of the crew had at least one additional drink each — maybe 2 or 3. Sugar’s was described as a dark nightclub. The girl came in with 2 men but neither one of these men looked anything like the Appellant, according to Fielder.
After a short time passed, Fielder and his group encouraged or enticed the girl to *113dance; that is, the girl that resembled Lisa. The girl who, in the opinion of Fielder, was Lisa danced close to closing time. In this type of club, the lights go on at closing time, being 2:00 A.M., but the bar clocks are usually set about 15 minutes early, making 1:45 A.M. the actual closing time.
A couple of days after this occurrence at Sugar’s, Fielder read about a missing girl in the newspaper and viewed something about this missing girl on T.V. The newspapers and T.V. carried her picture. The missing girl was, of course, Lisa Wilber. Fielder’s testimony, in capsule, concerning the identity of the missing girl, Lisa Wil-ber, being the girl he observed at Sugar’s, was:
“A. It’s her or I believe that was. You know the girl that I seen in the paper and the girl that I seen in the club that night were the same girl.
“Q. This girl you saw in the club close to closing time was Lisa Wilber.
“A. I believe it was.”
At some point later in time, Fielder discussed this matter and the identification issue, he said, with Marvin and David. David asked Fielder if he had contacted the police but Fielder had not done so. Although Fielder was of the opinion the girl he saw at Sugar’s was Lisa Wilber, and although he had formed his opinion about 2 or 3 days after Lisa’s disappearance, he did not report the same to any official person until after the trial on the merits was had. Fielder then contacted Appellant’s attorney. Fielder had mentioned that he had seen Lisa Wilber in the bar on the night of her disappearance to his wife but to no other person other than his crew. The record shows that the disappearance of Lisa occurred on or about November 11-12, 1983. However, Fielder did not contact the attorney for the Appellant until about November 14, 1985, about 2 years later.
On cross-examination, Fielder said that they arrived at Sugar’s about 1:00 A.M. Fielder thought the girl resembling Lisa had had something to drink and she was feeling good. He could not remember what type of makeup she had on or what type of jewelry she was wearing. Fielder said that although, 3 days after the disappearance, he realized that the girl at Sugar’s was, in his opinion, Lisa, he did not contact the police and he did not know about the $5,000. reward money. He said, generally, that he did not want to get involved at that time.
The next witness for Appellant was David Kirkendall. He testified that maybe the crew had had about 3 drinks per man at Sugar’s. He said the girl in question was wearing denim jeans and when she later danced, she danced in her socks. She danced underneath the black lights. He remembered that this girl wore a distinctive top. This top had stripes across it and the black lights picked up those stripes. David said he had seen the pictures of Lisa in the paper and also some television coverage of Lisa Wilber. Later, he viewed a videotape of Lisa Wilber, taken when she was alive. He was with an Assistant District Attorney or an Investigator when he viewed the videotape. He was asked:
“Q. Can you tell me, do you feel like the girl you saw in that bar and the one you saw in that video and even on these pictures, do you feel like they are one and the same person?
“A. No, sir. I sure don’t.
“Q. What differences do you note?
“A. Her hair was different. I judge height by my height. She was a little bit taller than me. That girl there, she looks, the one in the video looked probably my height and the other girl was a little bit taller than her.”
It is true that some of the probative force of David’s testimony was shaken, to a degree, by other questions. He testified, generally, that the black lights, the strobe lights and the flashing lights and surrounding atmosphere, in Sugar’s, changed any person’s looks a “bunch”. He testified that Sugar’s was very dark and had little light in it other than black light until closing time. David conceded that, back in November of 1983, he felt that the girl he saw in the bar and the girl whose picture he saw in the media as the missing Lisa Wilber were the same person, but that after he had seen the live videotape of Lisa *114he definitely changed his mind. He said the videotape was a better picture. He had a chance to see the whole body of Lisa, clad, of course, in the videotape and he could see the size of her body and the size of her head. He acknowledged that the videotape, that was in the possession of the District Attorney’s office, was the evidence that changed his mind. He seemed to remember that they were in Sugar’s a minimum of 20 minutes when the white lights were turned on at closing time. The girl in question arrived after the crew did and the crew was in Sugar’s about 15 minutes or something like that when they first noticed the girl in question. David characterized Mr. Fielder, whose nickname was “Butch”, as being a kind of agitator. When asked what kind of personality Butch Fielder had “in these joints”, he answered:
“A. Yes, sir. He has got a bad attitude. There is ladies in the courtroom, so I won’t say what.”
The next witness was Marvin Segrest. It would serve no useful purpose to extend this dissent. Marvin Segrest had also seen the video tape of Lisa Wilber, when she was alive, and he simply did not believe that the girl in Sugar’s and Lisa were one and the same person. He testified that Lisa, in his opinion, had a “real large nose” and the girl in the afterhours club did not. Marvin acknowledged that Lisa and the girl in Sugar’s looked similar and that there was a resemblance, but he made this answer:
“A. No, I don’t believe she is the same one that was in the bar. To go even further the girl he showed me on the video had a real large nose. Her facial features just — they weren’t the same you know to what I seen her on the video that Mr. Trahan showed to me.
“Q. Have you ever seen the picture of Lisa in the paper or one as big as that up close even?
“A. That is the first one I have seen that close up.
“Q. Does she have a rather large nose?
“A. She does have a large nose in my opinion.
“Q. The girl at the bar didn’t?
“A. I don’t think so, no, sir.
“Q. Not one that you would notice?
“A. No, sir, not one that I would notice like hers.”
I think that the trial judge had not only the right, but the duty, to observe the mannerisms, demeanor, tenor, facial expressions and tone of the answers given by the witnesses. The different witnesses told different stories or accounts of what happened at Sugar’s that night in relationship to whether the girl at Sugar’s that danced the final dance was one and same as Lisa Wilber. Under ruling case law, I think that he had discretion; indeed, a good deal of discretion. He was in a superior position to judge the truthfulness, credibility, “believability” and the weight and force to be given to the testimony of the various witnesses on the Motion for New Trial. He decided adversely to Appellant. No abuse of his discretion is shown.
The district judge could have carefully considered and weighed the effects of the several beers and few drinks that each of the three witnesses consumed. As well, he could have considered the lack of adequate lighting conditions in the after-hours club known as Sugar’s. He could have considered the distorting effect of the black lights or the strobe lights. He could have considered the inconsistencies in the evidence given by the witnesses on the Motion for New Trial.
Furthermore, he could have considered that, by logical reasoning, the girl who resembled Lisa arrived at Sugar’s about 25 minutes, or maybe more, before actual closing time when the regular lights went on. Sugar’s usually closed about a quarter before 2:00 A.M., or 1:45 A.M. He could have reasoned that the girl who arrived at Sugar’s got there at about 1:00 o’clock A.M., or 1:10 A.M., or 1:15 A.M. Furthermore, there is evidence in the record that the authentic Lisa was actually seen on the parking lot of Doc Holiday’s Club as late as 1:30 A.M. or later. By logical reasoning, the trial judge, under the entire record, could have concluded that Lisa was still at Doc Holiday’s parking lot when the girl *115that resembled Lisa arrived at Sugar’s. Hence, the girl at Sugar’s was not Lisa.
Furthermore, since Fielder admitted that he recognized the girl at Sugar’s as being the same girl in the newspaper pictures and T.V. pictures 3 days after her disappearance, why did he wait until after the trial on the merits to come forward? The record shows that Lisa was missing the night of November 11-12, 1983. The case went to trial in November of 1985.
TEX.CODE CRIM.PROC.ANN. art. 40.-03 (6) (Vernon 1979) provides, in relevant part:
“New trials, in cases of felony, shall be granted the defendant for the following causes, and for no other:
[[Image here]]
“(6) Where new evidence material to the defendant has been discovered since the trial. A motion for a new trial on this ground shall be governed by the rules which regulate civil suits....”
A leading case interpreting this statute is Carlisle v. State, 549 S.W.2d 698 (Tex.Crim.App.1977).
In Carlisle, the court wrote, at page 704:
“The trial court has considerable discretion in granting or denying a new trial on the basis of newly-discovered evidence. To show that the court abused its discretion by not granting a new trial, the record must reflect: (1) that the evidence was unknown to the movant before trial; (2) that the failure to discover it was not due to appellant’s want of diligence; (3) that its materiality was such as would probably bring about a different result on another trial, and (4) that it was competent, not merely cumulative, corroborative, collateral or impeaching. Hernandez v. State, 507 S.W. 2d 209 (Tex.Cr.App.1974); Myers v. State, 527 S.W.2d 307 (Tex.Cr.App.1975).” (Emphasis added)
.The trial judge could have decided that “(3)” and “(4)” had not been met, because he decided, basically, that the evidence and testimony on the hearing on the Motion for New Trial was not competent and would probably fail to bring about a different result upon another trial. Carlisle, supra, stands for the proposition that the trial judge has reasonably broad discretion in granting, or failing to grant, a new trial. I can certainly not say, under this record, that the trial judge abused his discretion in denying a new trial to the Appellant.
Query: If, ultimately, this case is retried and if another conviction is obtained by Texas against Appellant, then could yet another witness come forward two years after the retrial, with newly discovered evidence, and obtain another new trial? Query: How many times could this procedure take place?
Although TEX.CODE CRIM.PROC. ANN. art. 40.03 (6) (Vernon 1979) has been repealed (which repeal became effective on September 1, 1986); nevertheless, the material dates of this trial, the sentencing, the hearing on the motion and overruling of the same, were governed by art. 40.03 (6).
Furthermore, a trial court’s ruling denying a motion for new trial will not be overturned upon an appeal unless a clear abuse of discretion is shown. Eddlemon v. State, 591 S.W.2d 847 (Tex.Crim.App.1979). In Eddlemon, the court wrote, at page 850:
“... [T]his Court again upheld the denial of a new trial on lack of probable truth where there were discrepancies in the new evidence and circumstances which might cast a shadow on its veracity. ‘The probable truth of the new evidence is primarily a determination for the trial judge. Here, the judge saw the witnesses, observed their demeanor, and was required to determine the issue of their credibility.’ Id. at 483. [Williams v. State, 504 S.W.2d 477 (Tex.Cr.App.1974) ] Where the truth of the new evidence is properly contested, as it is here, this Court should not second-guess the factfinder in the best position to decide the issue. Compare Henson v. State, 150 Tex.Cr.R. 344, 200 S.W.2d 1007 (1946) with Williams v. State, supra.” (Emphasis added)
The majority addresses the constitutionality of TEX.CODE CRIM.PROC.ANN. art. 37.07 (4) (Vernon Supp.1987), dealing with the due process question and the doc*116trine of separation of powers. The author of the court’s opinion states that this court would uphold the constitutionality of that statute with Justice Burgess dissenting. See Boudreaux v. State, 723 S.W.2d 230 (Tex.App.—Beaumont 1986, no pet.) (Burgess, J., dissenting).
It is important to note, I think, that, on the question of the separation or division of powers between the Legislature and the Judiciary, TEX. CONST, art. V, sec. 31 (c) provides as follows:
“(c) The legislature may delegate to the Supreme Court or Court of Criminal Appeals the power to promulgate such other rules as may be prescribed by law or this Constitution, subject to such limitations and procedures as may be provided by law.’’ (Emphasis added)
This constitutional provision, as I construe it, specifically reserves to the Legislature the right to require the trial judges to give the mandatory parole law instruction. Hence, it is not merely a legislative act. It is a legislative act that flows from a constitutional grant of power created by the people and given to the Legislature in the Constitution, itself. Hence, there is no merit in the contention that the parole law instruction violates the separation of powers doctrine as between the legislative branch and the judicial branch. See Government Services Ins. Underwriters v. Jones, 368 S.W.2d 560 (Tex.1963).
By similar reasoning and analysis, I think that there is no merit in the contention that the parole law instruction violates the separation of powers doctrine as between the legislative branch and the executive branch.
I would vote to affirm the judgment and sentence below.