Court Opinion

ID: 9767856
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 05:30:58.215584+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:33.910761
License: Public Domain

DOUGLAS, Judge
(dissenting).
The majority reverses this conviction for the failure of the trial court to properly admonish appellant under Article 26.13, V. A.C.C.P. In doing so, part of the language in Ex parte Scott, Tex.Cr.App., 505 S.W.2d 602, is quoted as follows:
“The part of Article 26.13, supra, in question is that a plea of guilty should not be received unless that one . . is uninfluenced by any consideration of fear, or by persuasion.
In that case, the accused was admonished as to the range of punishment. As to the voluntariness of the plea, the following occurred:
“THE COURT: Have you been influenced by any delusive hope of pardon prompting you to confess your guilt ?
*10“DEFENDANT: No.”
The present case is distinguishable because in the ttial court, before accepting the plea of guilty, the trial judge asked: “Are you pleading guilty because you are guilty and for no other reason?” Appellant answered, “Yes, Sir.” This was not done in the Scott case.
In the present case the court also ascertained that appellant did not have any hope of pardon or promise of reward in order to get him to plead guilty.1
As in Mitchell v. State, 493 S.W.2d 174, and Espinosa v. State, 493 S.W.2d 172, this Court has noted that no magic words are required to comply with Article 26.13, supra. The judge had the appellant before him. The questioning of the appellant was sufficient to ascertain that neither persuasion nor fear caused the appellant to plead guilty.
The Scott opinion should not be construed as containing magic words that must be followed just as the exact wording of Article 26.13 does not have to be followed.
The language of Judge Learned Hand cited in Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U.S. 218, 93 S.Ct. 2041, 36 L.Ed.2d 854 (1973), should be applicable here. It is as follows:
“. . . We decline to follow what one judicial scholar has termed ‘the domino method of adjudication wherein every explanatory statement in a previous opinion is made the basis for extension of a wholly different situation.’ ”
The admonishment in the present case, although not in the exact terms of the statute, is sufficient.2
The judgment should be affirmed.

. It is noted that the concurring opinion, in its attempt to construe this opinion for some reason, leaves out the question by the court: “Has anyone held out any hope of pardon or promise of reward in order to get you to plead guilty? ”, and the answer, “No, sir.”

. The appellant was admonished more fully in another cause where he received a life sentence on the same day. This Court held in a per curiam opinion that it was sufficient.