Court Opinion

ID: 9674947
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 04:37:40.376208+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:30.365062
License: Public Domain

OPINION DISSENTING TO DENIAL OF APPELLANT’S MOTION FOR REHEARING ON STATE’S PETITION FOR DISCRETIONARY REVIEW
CLINTON, Judge.
The indictment in this cause alleged that appellant caused serious bodily injury “by striking” his victim “in the head with a blunt instrument the nature of which is unknown to the Grand Jury.” The jury charge tracked the indictment in this respect. In his argument in the court of appeals that the evidence was insufficient to support the jury’s verdict, appellant urged, inter alia, that although there was evidence the victim suffered blunt trauma injury to the head, there is no indication in the record that the injury was caused when the victim was struck in the head with a blunt instrument— never mind by whom — as alleged in the indictment. Although it could be clearer, the majority opinion in the court of appeals held that it is in this respect that the evidence is insufficient. See Criner v. State, 816 S.W.2d 137, at 143 (Tex.App. — Beaumont 1991).
On original submission on State’s petition for discretionary review, this Court reversed, holding that the court of appeals misconceived the correct legal test for gauging sufficiency of the evidence. In conducting its “outstanding-reasonable-hypothesis” analysis, contended the majority, the court of appeals failed to require that there be some evidence to support the alternative hypothesis. The court of appeals “merely argued, somewhat unpersuasively, that the record before them contained no direct evidence to show how appellant inflicted serious bodily injury upon the victim.” Majority op. at 87. But this Court on original submission conducted no independent analysis to demonstrate that the evidence is not insufficient to show the particular manner and means of inflicting serious bodily injury alleged in the indictment — which is, after all, what appellant contended, and the court of appeals held below. Instead, the Court was content to endorse the frantic dissenting opinion of Justice Brookshire, an opinion that, for all of its ten pages in the Southwestern Reporter, still manages to ignore the actual basis for the majority’s decision in the court of appeals. Criner v. State, supra, at 144-154 (Brook-shire, J., dissenting).*
*88In Ms motion for rehearing appellant now “challenges” this Court to canvass the record for any evidence that would support a rational finding beyond a reasonable doubt that the victim was in fact struck with a blunt instrument. I have done so. Although the medical testimony indisputably shows the victim suffered blunt trauma injury to the head, I find no evidence, medical or circumstantial, to show how that injury came about. Specifically, there is nothing in the record to lead a factfinder to prefer the theory that the assailant struck the victim in the head with a blunt instrument, as opposed to, e.g., striking the victim’s head against a hard object. The circumstantial evidence presented in this case provides as much basis to believe the latter theory as it does the former. See Nelson v. State, 848 S.W.2d 126, at 138-39 (Tex.Cr.App.1992) (Clinton, J., dissenting).
Therefore I cannot agree that the court of appeals majority in any way distorted the “reasonable alternative hypothesis” analysis to conclude the circumstantial evidence was insufficient. Judge White recently opined that “[i]n applying the ‘reasonable alternative hypothesis’ analysis, ‘[t]he correct procedure involves accepting the inculpatory circumstances ... and then asking if there is a reasonable hypothesis other than guilt which would also account for such circumstances.’ Girard v. State, 631 S.W.2d 162, at 164 (Tex. Cr.App.1982).” Gunter v. State, 858 S.W.2d 430, 439 (Tex.Cr.App.1993) (rehearing denied May 12,1993). In this case all of the circumstances taken together do not coalesce to exclude the hypothesis that the victim’s head was struck against a hard object, as opposed to the hypothesis her head was struck with a blunt instrument. The evidence here lends precisely as much support to either theory. Stated another way, that the victim’s head was struck against a hard object is just as much “supported by ... credible evidence” as the allegation that appellant struck her head with a blunt instrument. Majority op. at 86. “TMs is no more than to say that as to [the alleged manner and means of inflicting serious bodily injury], the State has failed to carry its burden of production.” Nelson v. State, supra.
It might be argued that there is no semantic difference between an allegation that the victim’s head was struck with a blunt instrument and proof that her head was struck against a hard object. Such an argument avoids the unpalatable remedy of acquittal. But it was neither broached by the State in its petition for discretionary review, nor does it form any part of this Court’s analysis, such as it is, on original submission.
In the landmark decision in Ardía v. State, 834 S.W.2d 357 (Tex.Cr.App.1992), we opined:
“Like this Court, the courts of appeals are duty-bound to uphold the constitution and laws of this State and of the Urnted States. So long as it appears that they have discharged that duty conscientiously by impartial application of pertinent legal doctrine and fair consideration of the evidence, it is our duty in turn to respect their judgments. Our principal role as a court of last resort is the caretaker of Texas law, not the arbiter of individual applications.”
Id., at 360. Particularly in the last several years the Court has noticeably improved in practicing what Arcila preached. Nevertheless, there is one context in which the Court has lacked that laudable restraint. We seem to grant a disproportionately high number of State’s petitions for discretionary review to review decisions of the courts of appeals holding the evidence to be legally insufficient, and for no other reason than that we disagree with the lower court’s particular application of the law to the facts. For all the Court’s gloss in its opinion on original submission, the instant cause is but an example. Given that in our discretionary review capacity our “principal role as a court of last resort is the caretaker of Texas law,” one wonders why the court would go out of its way to rectify some flaw, real or invented, in the application of an “analytical construct” we have in any event jettisoned. Geesa v. State, 820 S.W.2d 154 (Tex.Cr.App.1991).
I dissent.

 The gist of Justice Brookshire’s dissent is that the evidence is sufficient to support a jury conclusion that it was appellant who somehow caused the blunt trauma injury to the victim's head. This Court believes the evidence supports no other inference, and I agree. See text, post. But this observation is ultimately unresponsive to the court of appeals’ holding that the evidence fails to show the specifically alleged manner and means by which that injury was inflicted. Neither Justice Brookshire nor this Court has yet addressed the basis for decision in the court of appeals.