Court Opinion

ID: 9857432
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 14:34:11.666349+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:42:21.778645
License: Public Domain

OPINION ON STATE’S MOTIONS FOR REHEARING
CLINTON, Judge.
Leave to file motion for rehearing was granted the State in these causes and they *471were consolidated in order for us to determine whether the “standard for appellate review” is the same for circumstantial evidence cases and direct evidence cases.
The question of sufficiency of evidence to sustain a state criminal conviction implicates the Fourteenth Amendment. Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 n. 12, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 2789 n. 12, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979), “announced ... the constitutional minimum required to enforce the due process right” to be free from conviction except on proof beyond a reasonable doubt. The Court then reasoned:
“[T]he critical inquiry on review of the sufficiency of the evidence to support a criminal conviction must be not simply to determine whether the jury was properly instructed, but to determine whether the record evidence could reasonably support a finding of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. But this inquiry does not require a court to ‘ask itself whether it believes that the evidence at the trial established guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.’ Wood-by v. INS, 385 U.S. [276,] at 282 [, 87 S.Ct. 483, at 486, 17 L.Ed.2d 362]. Instead, the relevant question is whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. See Johnson v. Louisiana, 406 U.S. [356,] at 362 [, 92 S.Ct. 1620, at 1624, 32 L.Ed.2d 152]. This familiar standard gives full play to the responsibility of the trier of fact fairly to resolve conflicts in the testimony, to weigh the evidence, and to draw reasonable inferences from basic facts to ultimate facts. Once a defendant has been found guilty of the crime charged, the fact-finder’s role as weigher of the evidence is preserved through a legal conclusion that upon judicial review all of the evidence is to be considered in the light most favorable to the prosecution. The criterion thus impinges upon ‘jury’ discretion only to the extent necessary to guarantee the fundamental protection of due process of law. [Footnotes omitted and emphasis added.]”
443 U.S. at 318-319, 99 S.Ct. at 2788-2789.
Although Jackson was setting a standard for review of state convictions by federal courts, the due process requirements that it announced were based expressly on the Fourteenth Amendment. They are binding on the states and constitute a minimum standard for our sustaining a conviction. “Under [In re] Winship, [397 U.S. 358, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1970),] which established proof beyond a reasonable doubt as an essential of Fourteenth Amendment due process, it follows that when such a conviction [that was obtained even when no rational trier of fact could have found guilt beyond a reasonable doubt] occurs in a state trial, it cannot constitutionally stand.” 443 U.S. at 317-318, 99 S.Ct. at 2788. “[S]tate appellate review undoubtedly will serve in the vast majority of cases to vindicate the due process protection that follows from Winship....” 443 U.S. at 322, 99 S.Ct. at 2791.
It follows that circumstantial evidence should not be tested by an ultimate “standard for review” different from direct evidence; the standard in both kinds of cases is whether “any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Accord Griffin v. State, 614 S.W.2d 155 (Tex.Cr.App.1981).
Still, we are unable to devise or discover any reason, compelling or otherwise, for abandoning the utilitarian “exclusion of outstanding reasonable hypotheses” analysis for applying the above “standard for review” in circumstantial evidence cases. By the nature of circumstantial evidence, in order to determine it rationally establishes guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, a process of elimination must be used. Illustrative is Taylor v. State, 653 S.W.2d 295 (Tex.Cr.App.1983). We there cited the Jackson “standard for review;” in actually assessing the evidence, no method other than a process of eliminating the guilt of others under the evidence could be fashioned to effectively conclude the evidence rationally es*472tablished Taylor’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. See also Girard v. State, 631 S.W.2d 162 (Tex.Cr.App.1982). Stated in the converse, if the evidence supports an inference other than the guilt of the appellant, a finding of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt is not a rational finding.
Moreover, scrutiny of the analysis suggested in the motions for rehearing (that the focus of our inquiry should be on “any evidence which could rationally support the verdict”) reveals it to be functionally indistinguishable from that specifically rejected by the Supreme Court in Jackson, supra, as violative of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Finally, as the motions for rehearing persuasively argue, this Court’s opinions have never held the circumstantial evidence analysis constitutes a different standard for review from that to be ultimately applied in direct evidence cases.* If the State’s evidence supports an inference other than a finding of the essential elements of the crime, then no trier of fact could rationally find the accused guilty beyond a reasonable doubt — and this is true irrespective of the character of the evidence.
In sum, we are convinced there are no better analytical guidelines for assaying whether a rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt in any given conviction had upon circumstantial evidence than those we currently employ.
The State’s motions for rehearing are overruled.
ONION, P.J., concurs in result.
MILLER and CAMPBELL, JJ., not participating.

 It is true that some opinions of the Court have quoted language apparently originating from the pen of an author or editor of Texas Jurisprudence to the effect that in circumstantial evidence cases an appellate court will “review the evidence in light of the presumption that the accused is innocent,” 18 Tex.Jur. § 309, p. 432.
Literally and technically inaccurate, the statement is revealed as a writer’s attempt to convey the notion that the State’s burden of adducing proof beyond a reasonable doubt is but a conceptual corollary of the presumption of innocence, and a failure to produce that evidentiary quantum operates to absolve the appellant. [See Hill v. State, 118 Tex.Cr.R. 73, 38 S.W.2d 787 (Tex.Cr.App.1931); Castro v. State, 115 Tex.Cr.R. 291, 29 S.W.2d 760 (Tex. Cr.App.1930); Jones v. State, 111 Tex.Cr.R. 172, 11 S.W.2d 798 (Tex.Cr.App.1928) (Opinion on State’s Second Motion for Rehearing); Jackson v. State, 101 Tex.Cr.R. 169, 274 S.W. 585 (Tex.Cr.App.1925); Mathis v. State, 100 Tex. Cr.R. 509, 272 S.W. 204 (Tex.Cr.App.1925); Fitts v. State, 98 Tex.Cr.R. 146, 264 S.W. 1006 (Tex.Cr.App.1924); Wales v. State, 86 Tex. Cr.R. 183, 217 S.W. 384 (Tex.Cr.App.1919); Wilkie v. State, 83 Tex.Cr.R. 490, 203 S.W. 1091 (Tex.Cr.App.1918); Hampton v. State, 1 Tex.Ct.App. 652 (1877), which are cited for the mentioned inaccurate proposition at 24 Tex. Jur.2d, § 742, p. 425, n. 13 (1961).]