Court Opinion

ID: 9771918
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 17:00:18.38866+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:38:02.743942
License: Public Domain

ONION, Judge
(concurring).
*924I reluctantly concur. Appellant entered a plea of guilty before the jury. “It is well established that a plea of guilty to a felony charge before a jury admits the existence of all facts necessary to establish guilt and, in such cases, the introduction of testimony by the State is to enable the jury to intelligently exercise the discretion which the law vests in them touching the penalty to be assessed.” Darden v. State, Tex.Cr.App., 430 S.W.2d 494 and cases there cited.
This is not, of course, the rule where a trial by jury is waived and a plea of guilty to a felony is entered before the trial judge. In such cases the prosecution is under the burden of introducing evidence sufficient to show the guilt of the accused as charged. Article 1.15, V.A.C.C.P. Burks v. State, 145 Tex.Cr.R. 15, 165 S.W.2d 460.
The rule in a felony plea of guilty before the jury does not, however, prevent the State from introducing all relevant evidence to enable the jury to decide what punishment should be assessed. Beard v. State, 146 Tex.Cr.R. 96, 171 S.W.2d 869.
In the case at bar, in addition to the guilty plea, the State introduced evidence as to every element of the case consisting of some three hundred pages of record. It was further stipulated that the clothing and personal effects that the deceased had on his person prior to his death were in fact the deceased’s. Nevertheless, the State called the deceased’s wife as a witness over the strenuous and repeated objections of appellant’s counsel. Certainly the fact that the witness was the deceased’s wife, that she was a cripple or had been previously injured years before, or that her testimony was cumulative would not render her an incompetent witness. Still, it is difficult to believe that the State was more concerned with presenting her cumulative testimony than in exhibiting her physical condition to the jury. This is particularly true when it is considered that the State elicited from her: “Q. Who have you had to help you since your husband was murdered? A. I moved to my sister’s up in Ingram, Texas,” and then sought to show that the deceased’s brother was an instructor at the University of Mississippi.
While the State is certainly not to be commended for such action, I am unable to convince myself that this instance of irrelevant, immaterial and possibly inflammatory testimony standing alone is of sufficient magnitude to require a reversal of this cause. Ramos v. State, Tex.Cr. App., 419 S.W.2d 359; Salazar v. State, Tex.Cr.App., 397 S.W.2d 220; Cavarrubio v. State, 160 Tex.Cr.R. 40, 267 S.W.2d 417; Chapman v. State, 136 Tex.Cr.R. 285, 124 S.W.2d 112.
I concur.
MORRISON, J., joins in this concurrence.