Court Opinion

ID: 9654779
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 18:50:41.081619+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:13.388017
License: Public Domain

OPINION ON APPELLANT’S MOTION FOR REHEARING
MORRISON, Judge.
New counsel has entered this case since our original opinion was prepared. For *72the first time, it is now urged that the trial court should have conducted a hearing prior to trial on the question of appellant’s competency to assist her counsel in her defense. Reliance is had upon the opinions in Townsend v. State, Tex.Cr.App., 427 S.W.2d 55; Morales v. State, Tex.Cr.App., 427 S.W.2d 51, and Pate v. Robinson, 383 U.S. 375, 86 S.Ct. 836, 15 L.Ed.2d 815.
This is how the matter arose. At a pretrial hearing, appellant’s counsel dictated to the court reporter a request for a pretrial hearing on appellant’s competency. The court said he would consider holding a hearing on the issue of competency during the trial on the merits, or prior to the trial on the merits, before the jury which was to try the case. The state consented to a separate hearing prior to the main case, before the jury which was to try the case. At this juncture, the state announced to the court that appellant’s counsel had, after indictment, illegally secured admission of appellant into the Big Spring State Hospital where those in authority had found her sane.
The court then stated that, in light of these facts, he saw no benefit to be gained by appointing someone to examine her. The question of sanity or competency was never raised during the trial on the guilt issue. In the court’s charge, sanity was not mentioned, and no objection was raised.
At the hearing on punishment, appellant called a clinical psychologist who testified that he had examined appellant and concluded that she needed hospitalization and treatment for her emotional troubles. He also stated that she was not psychotic or schizophrenic at that time, but that when she got excited she became schizophrenic and unable to distinguish between reality and fantasy.
In rebuttal, the state called Dr. Krei-meyer who stated that appellant entered the Big Spring State Hospital on a voluntary commitment in July and on September 10th of the same year she was discharged. He expressed his opinion, as a psychiatrist who had interviewed appellant, that she knew the nature and consequences of her act and the difference between right and wrong. He stated that she probably could not benefit from further treatment. Two lay witnesses, who had observed her in jail, stated that they had observed no indications of insanity. Again, there was no mention of sanity in the charge and no objection was made.
While the jury was out of court considering punishment, this colloquy occurred between the court and appellant’s counsel:
“COURT: Mr. Fugit, when we had a pre-trial on October 1st you read to the Court the copy of a motion which you had made which would request a trial in advance of the main trial on the issue of present insanity. The motion hadn’t been filed up to that time and wasn’t filed then but was received and filed by the Clerk on October 3rd. Now, the request wasn’t at any time thereafter made to the court for a hearing on that issue in advance of this trial, and, in fact, you told me that you did not want to hear it in advance and did not expect to raise the issue in the trial of the case. Is that correct?
“MR. FUGIT: That is correct, Your Honor.
“COURT: All right, thank you. That’s it.”
No effort has been made prior to sentencing or during the course of this appeal to pursue the relief available to appellant under Sec. 4 of Article 46.02, V.A.C.C. P., which provides for a hearing on competency after guilt has been determined.
We cannot therefore conclude that the question of competency or sanity was raised.
*73Appellant’s new counsel raised the question of proof of venue and asserts that an issue was made in the trial by a motion for dismissal at the conclusion of the state’s evidence. As is set out in the original opinion, the robbery was a continuing thing which lasted for hours. The owner of the vacant house in which he found Mr. Caden-head testified that the house was in Concho County. In addition, the sheriff of Con-cho County testified that both the house and the gas station where the abductors and their hostage stopped for gas were located in Concho County. This testimony was sufficient to show that the continuing offense was being committed in Concho County, and that venue was proper in that county, Mann v. State, 148 Tex.Cr.App. 403, 187 S.W.2d 665.
Appellant next takes issue with our holding on the question of the failure to change venue. She asserts that we are faced with the same problem which we had in Mason v. State, Tex.Cr.App., 375 S.W.2d 916, which was reversed by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in Pamplin v. Mason, 364 F.2d 1.We do not agree. In Pamplin, a hearing on the motion for change of venue was denied. In the instant case, there was full hearing on the issue. Further, Pam-plin involved the first racial demonstration in the community and had serious racial overtones not present in this case.
In Irvin v. Dowd, 366 U.S. 717, 81 S.Ct. 1639, 6 L.Ed.2d 751, cited by appellant, the pre-trial publicity reached much greater proportions than did that in the case at bar. In Irwin, the prosecutor and police officials issued press releases, which were intensively publicized, stating that the defendant had confessed to six murders.
Appellant also cites Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U.S. 333, 86 S.Ct. 1507, 16 L.Ed.2d 600. The publicity in that case, both before and during the trial, was extremely inflammatory and prejudicial, and the facts were vastly different from the facts under consideration here.
Appellant’s motion for rehearing is overruled.