Court Opinion

ID: 9369550
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-02-09 08:10:56.313075+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:16:15.750472
License: Public Domain

In The
                             Court of Appeals
                    Seventh District of Texas at Amarillo

                                   No. 07-21-00194-CR

                 CHRISTOPHER MICHAEL ANDRADE, APPELLANT

                                            V.

                          THE STATE OF TEXAS, APPELLEE

                          On Appeal from the 181st District Court
                                  Randall County, Texas,
               Trial Court No. 28888B, Honorable Titiana Frausto, Presiding

                                   February 2, 2023
                            MEMORANDUM OPINION
                    Before QUINN, C.J., and PARKER and DOSS, JJ.

      A jury convicted Christopher Michael Andrade of indecency with a child by sexual

contact and assessed him a twenty-year prison sentence.           He now challenges his

conviction and sentence through five issues. We affirm.

      Issues One and Two

      Through his first two issues, appellant complains of the trial court’s failure to hold

hearings before admitting two categories of evidence.         The first was evidence of

extraneous sexual offenses against the child victim, and the hearing was purportedly

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required by article 38.37, § 2-a(2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure. TEX. CODE CRIM.

PROC. ANN. art. 38.37, § 2-a(a) (stating that before evidence described under article

38.37(b) may admitted, the trial judge must conduct a hearing to decide if the supporting

evidence is enough to illustrate whether the defendant committed the extraneous offense

beyond reasonable doubt). Appellant did not object to the lack of a hearing.

       The second concerned the admission of outcry testimony, which may be received

subject to the trial court’s finding the statement is reliable after conducting a hearing. Id.

art. 38.072, § 2(b)(2). The purported outcry testimony in question is that of the victim’s

father. Again, appellant did not object to the lack of a hearing. Indeed, he did not even

object to the testimony as hearsay or unauthorized outcry.

       Having failed to object to the missing article 38.37, § 2-a(2) hearing, appellant

waived that complaint. See Corporon v. State, 586 S.W.3d 550, 560 (Tex. App.—Austin

2019, no pet.) (holding that the defendant waived his complaint about the lack of an article

38.37 hearing by failing to object); Carmichael v. State, 505 S.W.3d 95, 103 (Tex. App.—

San Antonio 2016, pet. ref’d) (involving article 38.37 and holding the same). And, though

objecting to improper outcry as hearsay may suffice to preserve a complaint about an

omitted article 38.072, § 2(b)(2) hearing, see Laredo v. State, 194 S.W.3d 637, 640 (Tex.

App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 2006, pet. ref’d), one must still object to the testimony. Id. at

640–41; accord Citizen v. State, No. 13-14-00379-CR, 2015 Tex. App. LEXIS 1203, at

*21 (Tex. App.—Corpus Christi Feb. 5, 2015, no pet.) (mem. op., not designated for

publication) (stating that a “complaint regarding the failure to hold a reliability hearing

under article 38.072 is forfeited if it is not raised at trial and if there is no objection to the

outcry testimony”). Appellant did neither and, consequently, waived this complaint, too.

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       Issues Three and Four

       Appellant’s next two issues also involve the admission of outcry. The testimony in

question is that of the forensic interviewer whom the State designated as its outcry

witness. Allegedly, the trial court erred in admitting it because the interviewer was not the

first person over eighteen to which the child victim revealed the assault; allegedly, her

father was.   Furthermore, according to appellant, the court again failed to hold the

requisite hearing before allowing the examiner to impart outcry testimony. We overrule

the issues.

       We begin with the allegation about the omitted hearing. The record illustrates that

appellant objected to the interviewer’s testimony as hearsay. Assuming arguendo this

preserved his complaint, the trial court afforded the parties opportunity to argue their

respective positions. So too did it recess the proceeding to read legal authority cited by

the State, reconvene the proceeding, and thereafter overrule appellant’s objection. This

mode of action was tantamount to a bench conference, which has been held to satisfy

the need for a hearing. See Zarco v. State, 210 S.W.3d 816, 831 (Tex. App.—Houston

[14th Dist.] 2006, no pet.) (and cases cited therein).

       As for the other aspect of his complaint, appellant believed the victim’s father was

the true outcry witness, not the interviewer. This was so because he was the first person

to whom the victim disclosed the assault, or as argued below, the first person to whom

she said appellant “raped” her. Again, the State designated the forensic interviewer as

its outcry witness and made the trial court aware of that during its hearing. So too did it

explain that the appropriate outcry witness is the individual to whom the victim said the

“why, when, and where” of the incident, that is, to whom the victim detailed the incident.

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On the other hand, the child told her father that appellant “raped” her, according to

appellant. Nothing is said within appellant’s brief of the child’s relating to her father any

details of the “rape.” Nor did appellant so argue at the hearing.

        The State correctly contends that the outcry witness is the first person to whom the

victim detailed the offense in some discernible way. Maturino-Rodriguez v. State, No. 07-

21-00289-CR, 2022 Tex. App. LEXIS 7338, at *6–7 (Tex. App.—Amarillo Sept. 28, 2022,

no pet.) (mem. op., not designated for publication). The disclosure must be more than

words providing a general allusion that something in the area of child abuse happened.

Lopez v. State, 343 S.W.3d 137, 140 (Tex. Crim. App. 2011).

        Here, appellant does not deny that the child told the forensic interviewer of the

details underlying what she (the child) called rape. 1 Though a general allegation of being

“raped” may carry greater connotation than something like “he touched me,” the details

remain within the listener’s imagination. They are not imparted by the speaker. At the

very least, such an interpretation of the word’s use would be reasonably debatable. And,

that is all which is needed to insulate the trial court’s decision from attack, given the

standard of review. It is one of abused discretion. Vidrio v. State, No. 07-19-00369-CR,

2020 Tex. App. LEXIS 6490, at *5–6 (Tex. App.—Amarillo Aug. 14, 2020, no pet.) (mem.

op., not designated for publication). Moreover, discretion is not abused so long as the

decision falls within the zone of reasonable disagreement as does the one at bar. See

id.

        1As the child said: “I, like, kind of knew what the word raped meant, but as far as I knew it was like
forced sexual contact, and that’s what it was, so that’s, like, my best way of putting it at that point.”

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      Issue Five

      Lastly, appellant contends that the prosecutor engaged in multiple instances of

improper jury argument, rendering infirm the punishment levied. We overrule the issue.

      We were informed of several examples of the alleged improper argument. Yet,

appellant objected to none of them below. According to the Court of Criminal Appeals,

“[e]ven an inflammatory jury argument is forfeited if the defendant does not pursue his

objection to an adverse ruling.” Hernandez v. State, 538 S.W.3d 619, 622–23 (Tex. Crim.

App. 2018). That is, preservation of the complaint includes uttering an objection and

obtaining an adverse ruling. Because appellant failed to do so, he waived his fifth issue.

      Having overruled each issue, we affirm the trial court’s judgment.

                                                       Brian Quinn
                                                       Chief Justice

Do not publish.

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