Court Opinion

ID: 9596478
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:50:09.476638+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:20:13.965195
License: Public Domain

MURRY B. COHEN, Justice,
concurring.
Article 44.04(b) of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure is unconstitutional for the reasons stated in In re Beck, 26 S.W.3d 553 (Tex.App.—Dallas 2000, orig. proceeding). The Court of Criminal Appeals held that mandamus was not the proper remedy in Beck, but it did not question the merits of the Dallas court’s conclusion that the statute was unconstitutional. See State ex. rel. Hill v. Court of Appeals for the Fifth District, 34 S.W.3d 924, 928 (Tex.Crim.App.2001).
How could it? A statute that requires an appellant to stay in jail longer because he has appealed violates the United States Constitution. Pruett v. Texas, 468 F.2d 51, 55 (5th Cir.1972) (failure to give credit for good time acquired pending appeal violates equal protection), aff'd in part and modified in part, 470 F.2d 1182 (5th Cir.) (en banc), aff'd, 414 U.S. 802, 94 S.Ct. 118, 38 L.Ed.2d 39 (1973); see also Robinson v. Beto, 426 F.2d 797, 798 (5th Cir.1970); Ex parte Canada, 754 S.W.2d 660, 667 (Tex. Crim.App.1988) (failure to give credit for time served while parole revocation pending violates due process). Article 44.04(b) is worse than those statutes in Pruett, Robinson, and Canada. It requires an appellant who is free on probation to go to jail just because he appealed.
The trial judge, Hon. Brian Rains, has made this case moot by setting bail pending appeal, despite the plain prohibition of bail contained in article 44.04(b). That ruling implies that article 44.04(b) is unconstitutional. Otherwise, I presume Judge Rains would have followed it and persisted in his order of no bail.
*335I commend Judge Rains for setting bail. Trial judges, like appellate judges, are bound to decide whether statutes are constitutional and, if they are not, to act accordingly.