Court Opinion

ID: 9755362
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 20:35:38.368856+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:06.461893
License: Public Domain

ALMA L. LÓPEZ, Justice,
dissenting.
The majority has gone to great length to save the order revoking Calderon’s community supervision. But interpreting section 22 of the Code of Criminal Procedure to mean that only probationers who are confined have a right to a hearing simply makes no sense. Under this interpretation, a probationer who is confined has more rights than a probationer who is not confined!
The right to due process embodies a premise that has never been questioned in our constitutional system, that “a person cannot incur the loss of liberty for an offense without notice and a meaningful *560opportunity to defend.” Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 314, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979). A person cannot defend himself without the opportunity to be heard. While we can argue about what constitutes a loss of liberty, we cannot argue about whether a defendant can be heard without a hearing. Without a hearing, a defendant, in whatever stage of a criminal proceeding he stands, cannot be heard.
Section 22 addresses this fundamental due process concern by authorizing the trial court to extend a defendant’s term of community supervision only after a hearing and “after determining that the defendant violated a condition of community supervision.” See Tex.Code CRiM. PROC. Ann. art. 42.12, § 22(a)(2) (Vernon Supp. 2000). By doing so, section 22 protects a defendant who has complied with the conditions of his community supervision by preventing the trial judge from acting arbitrarily by extending the term of a defendant’s community supervision without finding that the defendant violated a condition of his community supervision. Any other reading of section 22 is inconsistent with any measure of due process and renders section 22’s requirement for a finding that the defendant violated a condition of probation meaningless. Although the majority recognizes the potential for abuse in extending a probationer’s period of supervision without a hearing or a finding that the probationer violated a condition of community supervision, it addresses the problem, in two footnotes that will never be read, by encouraging trial judges to afford defendants the opportunity to be heard, and assuming that the Legislature was aware that trial courts extend the supervisory period without a hearing as a matter of course.
The record in this case does not reflect that the trial court found that Calderon “violated a condition of community supervision” or that the trial court conducted a hearing. See id. art. 42.12, § 22(a)(2). The record simply reflects that on January 3, 1997, the terms and conditions of Calderon’s community supervision were extended until May 27, 1998. This action is reflected in the document entitled “Terms and Conditions of Community Supervision.” Other than that document, the record is devoid of any reference to the extension of Calderon’s original term — the record does not contain even an annotation on the court’s docket sheet. Thus, the record suggests that the probation officer, not the State, determined that Calderon’s period of community supervision should be extended. Surely, this was not what the legislature intended.
For a trial court to acquire jurisdiction to revoke a defendant’s community supervision, the State must file with the trial court, before the expiration of the supervision period, a motion to revoke alleging the defendant violated the terms of the community supervision agreement. See Brecheisen v. State, 4 S.W.3d 761, 763 (Tex.Crim.App.1999). Here, the State filed a motion to revoke Calderon’s community supervision on May 29, 1997, two days after the original supervision term ended. Because the record in this case does not reflect that a hearing was conducted prior to the extension of Calderon’s community supervision, and because the record does not indicate that the trial court determined that Calderon violated a condition of supervision prior to May 27, 1997, when Calderon’s original supervision term was to have ended, I would find that the trial court lacked jurisdiction to revoke Calderon’s community supervision on January 26, 2000. As a result, I would determine the judgment revoking Calderon’s community supervision is void. See Ex parte Lewis, 934 S.W.2d 801, 803 (Tex. App.-Houston [1st Dist.] 1996, no pet.). I *561would vacate the order and dismiss the cause.