Court Opinion

ID: 9645532
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 21:27:51.976145+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:29.204401
License: Public Domain

ROBERTSON, Justice,
concurring.
I concur in the judgment affirming the conviction. However, I believe that addressing the merits of the issues appellant presents in this appeal violates the time honored principle that courts do not academically determine issues not necessary to the disposition of a case, nor issue advisory opinions. As the supreme court stated in Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968): “The issue is not the abstract propriety of the police conduct, but the admissibility against [appellant] of the evidence.”
Prior to trial appellant filed various motions, including:
1. DWI Motion to Suppress;
2. Motion to Produce Exculpatory and Mitigating Evidence;
3. Motion to Require Witness Statements be Made Available for Cross-Examination;
4. Motion to Shuffle Jurors;
5. Motion to Permit Counsel for Defendant to Make Opening Argument Prior to State’s Case in Chief;
6. Motion to Direct Court Reporter to Record Specified Testimony;
7. Motion to Compel Election;
8. Accused’s Motion for Discovery in DWI Prosecution;
9. Motion for Copies of Court’s Charge to be Made Available to Each Member of the Jury;
10. Motion to Allow Jurors to Take Notes; and
11. Motion for Extension of Voir Dire Time.
A careful examination of the record reveals that the only motion the trial court attempted to rule upon was the DWI Motion to Suppress. In that motion appellant requested the court to suppress: (1) the post-arrest audio and video recorded interview between appellant and the police officers, and (2) the chemical test for intoxication. During a very brief proceeding before the trial court in which both appellant and the state were seeking to solidify the court’s ruling on the motion, the following occurred:
MR. TRICHTER (appellant’s counsel): For the record, if I may, specifically, we are complaining about the introduction of the breath-test, evidence of the breath-test, the result. We are complaining about the introduction of the video-tape that the — is ‘State’s Exhibit Numbers One and Two’. After the time Mr. Garcia hangs up the telephone wherein the video-tape, it’s clear he just finished talking to his counsel, Ron Norwood. Further, we object to any statements made by Mr. Garcia after he invokes his right to have an attorney. Further, we also object to any observation of the officer with reference to the video-taped exercises after he invoked his right to the presence of counsel.
THE COURT: Your objections are overruled.
MS. HAYDEN (state’s counsel): For the record, any of these — substance of the motion he has presented in his motion involving the intoxilyzer will be ad*236dressed at trial if they come up again. As far as the introduction of the intoxi-lyzer result.
THE COURT: Okay. Is it — it’s the Court’s the Court will now rule upon or already ruled upon the admissability [sic] of the defendant. For the purpose of the motion to supress I am railing [sic] it all admissable [sic]. On the case in chief it may be something else.
MR. TRICHTER: The problem — I don’t know how to voir dire the jury unless you tell me which statements are su-pressed [sic] and those which are not supressed [sic].
THE COURT: Alright. In all probability I will rale that all of the audio will be— will not be admitted. None of the audio will be permitted after he exercised his right to the attorney. All of the video will be. Does that answer your question?
MR. TRICHTER: What the Court is saying the entire vieo [sic] ‘State’s Exhibit Number One and Two’ will admitted into evidence. The video and not the audio. That would also include the showing of him, Garcia, doing exercises?
THE COURT: Yes.
MR. TRICHTER: Does the Court’s ruling also including [sic] the statement made by the defendant prior to the video being made?
THE COURT: You’re talking about statements made on the video?
MR. TRICHTER: Of the video-tape.
MS. HAYDEN: At the scene.
MR. TRICHTER: At the scene where he requests counsel.
THE COURT: I don’t have enough on that to rale. If its shown that it was made while under arrest and maybe not res gestae maybe I will deny them.
MR. TRICHTER: I understand, Your Honor. The motion itself is more broad than what you have just ruled upon. There’s also an argument made in the motion with reference to an unreasonable search and seizure.
MS. HAYDEN: No evidence has been presented to that particular part of the motion.
MR. TRICHTER: We would agree there hasn’t been.
THE COURT: I can’t rale on that at this time.
MR. TRICHTER: We would as [sic] the Court for a ruling on that.
THE COURT: Well, it’s denied. Anything else?
MR. TRICHTER: The defendant has nothing further, Your Honor.
MS. HAYDEN: The State has one other position if this is just raised at trial in regards to the statement made by the defendant outside the video. Is the Judge holding now you will wait until trial and more evidence is presented on that issue?
THE COURT: At this time it is not ad-missable or anything else. You will have to hear the facts at that time in order to make a ruling.
MS. HAYDEN: The State has nothing further.
THE COURT: Does that solve everything for today?
MR. TRICHTER: I think it does, Your Honor. I’d like a little time to speak with my client and see what his feelings are, now.
THE COURT: Okay.
Subsequently, appellant entered a plea of guilty and punishment was assessed in accordance with a plea bargain agreement. No evidence, even that which the court refused to suppress, was adduced before the court.
Based upon the above proceeding I have difficulty in finding that the ruling of the trial court was definitive and final, thereby authorizing our review. However, since the state does not challenge it, I will assume the ruling sufficient and address what I consider to be the more basic issue: Whether this court should address the merits of appellant’s contentions.
The information in this cause contained two paragraphs. The first charged the offense by reason of appellant “not having the normal use of his mental and physical faculties by reason of the introduction of alcohol into his body” and the second *237charged the offense by reason of appellant “having an alcohol concentration of at least 0.10 in his breath.”
Thus, even if the trial court had granted appellant’s motion and suppressed all of the video interview and the results of the chemical test, the state still could have proceeded to trial and secured a conviction on the first paragraph of the information.
During oral argument appellant’s counsel forcefully maintained that Tex.Code Crim.Proc.Ann. art. 44.02 (Vernon 1979) places no restriction upon what “matters which have been raised by written motion filed prior to trial” are appealable. Counsel further argued that there is no requirement that the motion be dispositive of the case. He then asserted that even though appellant entered a plea of guilty and no trial resulted, an adverse ruling on any of the pre-trial motions, even the motions concerning selection of the jury and trial procedure before the jury, would be appeal-able. I do not agree. Article 44.02 is not to be so broadly interpreted.
While the court of criminal appeals has never been presented with this exact issue, it has recognized that one of the purposes of article 44.02 “is to encourage guilty pleas where a search and seizure (or other pre-trial motion) is the only matter that the defendant wishes to pursue.” Isam v. State, 582 S.W.2d 441 (Tex.Crim.App.1979) (emphasis added). Certainly, article 44.02 was not intended to be the vehicle by which an accused can appeal an adverse ruling on any motion filed prior to trial. If the law was as broad as appellant contends the court could not have reached the result it did in Ferguson v. State, 571 S.W.2d 908 (Tex.Crim.App.1978). There, in addressing an adverse ruling on a pre-trial motion to suppress evidence the court relied upon its reasoning in Stiggers v. State, 506 S.W.2d 609 (Tex.Crim.App.1974) and held: “Where no evidence obtained as a result of the search is introduced into evidence, no error with respect to such search is presented for review.”1
I believe the recent unanimous opinion of the court of criminal appeals in McGlynn v. State, 704 S.W.2d 18 (Tex.Crim.App.1986) (en banc) dictates the result we should reach in this case. There, an appellant also asserted error in the trial court’s denial of her motion to suppress evidence. However, the court pointed out that the “record in this case simply does not show that anything the officer seized was methylphe-nidate, much more than it was the same methylphenidate, to which she pleaded guilty to possessing.” The court then concluded: “unless and until we are confident about what fruits of a search have somehow been used, the Court need not decide whether the search was constitutionally permissible.”
This same rationale should apply here. Unless and until it is shown that the evidence sought to be suppressed was essential to, and was used, or would be used, in the resulting trial, the appellate court need not determine whether the trial court ruling was erroneous. To hold to the contrary would leave this court academically to determine non-issues and that is not the intent of article 44.02. Accordingly, we should hold that in order to appeal a ruling on a motion filed prior to trial under the provisions of article 44.02, the ruling complained of must be on a motion that, if granted, would have disposed of the case.
I concur in the judgment affirming the conviction.

. While a portion of Ferguson has been subsequently overruled by Morgan v. State, 688 S.W.2d 504 (Tex.Crim.App. 1985), this rule was left intact.