Court Opinion

ID: 9962946
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-04-24 09:17:51.899046+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:19:23.805329
License: Public Domain

In the
              Court of Appeals
Sixth Appellate District of Texas at Texarkana

                   No. 06-23-00200-CR

          JOSHUA ELLIS SUTTON, Appellant

                            V.

           THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee

         On Appeal from the 102nd District Court
                 Bowie County, Texas
             Trial Court No. 23F0056-102

      Before Stevens, C.J., van Cleef and Rambin, JJ.
       Memorandum Opinion by Justice van Cleef
                                 MEMORANDUM OPINION

         A Bowie County jury found Joshua Ellis Sutton guilty of aggravated assault with a

deadly weapon. See TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 22.02(a)(2) (Supp.). The jury assessed Sutton’s

punishment at twenty years’ imprisonment with a fine of $2,000.00. The trial court accepted the

jury’s assessment and sentenced Sutton in accordance with it.

         On appeal,1 Sutton raises three points of error: (1) the evidence was insufficient to show

there was bodily injury to the victim, (2) the 102nd Judicial District Court did not have

jurisdiction because his indictment was out of the 202nd Judicial District Court, and (3) his trial

counsel was ineffective for failing to move to quash his indictment for lack of jurisdiction. We

addressed issues two and three in Sutton’s companion case in cause number 06-23-00197-CR

and adopt those findings in this case. As a result, we will only address Sutton’s first point of

error.

I.       Factual Background

         As outlined in further detail in Sutton’s companion case in cause number 06-23-00197-

CR, Sutton was involved in a police chase that ultimately ended in him wrecking his vehicle into

Wisdom Animal Clinic. On January 9, 2023, at the time of that wreck, Kelly Wilson, an

employee of Wisdom Animal Clinic, was working.

         Wilson testified that the crash threw her across the room:

         I was in surgery waiting on a doctor to finish a dental and all of a sudden there
         was a big boom behind me. I flew across the room, had a pretty good bruise on
         my elbow. And I thought, whoa, what just blew up. And I ran [and] turned off

1
 In companion cause numbers 06-23-00197-CR, 06-23-00198-CR, 06-23-00199-CR, 06-23-00201-CR, and 06-23-
00202-CR, Sutton appeals five other convictions arising from the same set of facts at issue here.
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       the oxygen and when I came back there was a car in the building. So, it wasn’t
       anything that blew up, the car had hit the wall that I was leaned up against and
       stopped where I was sitting.

Despite being thrown across the room and having a “pretty good bruise on [her] elbow,” Wilson

also testified that she was not seriously injured: “Had . . . he not T-boned that cross wall he

would have taken me out. . . . I don’t know how I was not hurt.”

II.    Applicable Law

       Sutton claims there is insufficient evidence of “bodily injury” to Wilson under Section

22.02(a)(2) of the Texas Penal Code to support his conviction. In evaluating legal sufficiency,

we review all evidence in the light most favorable to the trial court’s judgment to determine

whether any rational jury could have found the essential elements of aggravated assault with a

deadly weapon beyond a reasonable doubt. See Brooks v. State, 323 S.W.3d 893, 912 (Tex.

Crim. App. 2010) (plurality op.). “Our rigorous legal sufficiency review focuses on the quality

of the evidence presented.” Priego v. State, 457 S.W.3d 565, 568 (Tex. App.—Texarkana 2015,

pet. ref’d) (citing Brooks, 323 S.W.3d at 917–18 (Cochran, J., concurring)). We examine legal

sufficiency in accordance with the Brooks opinion, while giving the jury deference fairly to

“resolve conflicts in testimony, to weigh the evidence, and to draw reasonable inferences from

basic facts to ultimate facts.” Hooper v. State, 214 S.W.3d 9, 13 (Tex. Crim. App. 2007)

(quoting Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979)).

       Legal sufficiency is “measured by the elements of the offense as defined by the

hypothetically correct jury charge.” Malik v. State, 953 S.W.2d 234, 240 (Tex. Crim. App.

1997). The hypothetically correct jury charge “sets out the law, is authorized by the indictment,

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does not unnecessarily increase the State’s burden of proof or unnecessarily restrict the State’s

theories of liability, and adequately describes the particular offense for which the defendant was

tried.” Id.

        Under Texas law, a person is guilty of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon if “the

person commits assault as defined in § 22.01 and the person . . . uses or exhibits a deadly weapon

during the commission of the assault.” TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 22.02(a)(2). An assault “as

defined in § 22.01” requires a person to “intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly cause[] bodily

injury to another.” TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 22.01(a)(1) (Supp).

III.    Analysis

        At issue in the present action is whether there is sufficient evidence to support a finding

that Sutton caused “bodily injury” to Wilson. In the Texas Penal Code, bodily injury is defined

as follows: “physical pain, illness, or any impairment of physical condition.” TEX. PENAL CODE

ANN. § 1.07(a)(8) (Supp.). “Any physical pain, however minor, will suffice to establish bodily

injury.” Garcia v. State, 367 S.W.3d 683, 688 (Tex. Crim. App. 2012). Further, “[a] fact[-

]finder may infer that a victim actually felt or suffered physical pain because people of common

intelligence understand pain and some of the natural causes of it.” Id. (citing Randolph v. State,

152 S.W.3d 764, 774 (Tex. App.—Dallas 2004, no pet.).

        Wilson testified that, as a result of Sutton’s car crashing into Wisdom Animal Clinic, she

was thrown across the room and had a “pretty good bruise on [her] elbow.” That evidence is

sufficient to support a finding of “bodily injury.” See Lane v. State, 763 S.W.2d 785, 787 (Tex.

Crim. App. 1989) (finding the evidence was sufficient to support a finding of bodily injury and

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recognizing a bruise on the victim’s “right wrist corroborate[d] the fact that she was indeed

injured to some extent in the struggle”). Indeed, “[t]he existence of a cut, bruise, or scrape on the

body is sufficient evidence of physical pain necessary to establish ‘bodily injury’ within the

meaning of the statute.” Arzaga v. State, 86 S.W.3d 767, 778 (Tex. App.—El Paso 2002, no

pet.). Accordingly, after reviewing Wilson’s testimony, we find there is sufficient evidence of

“bodily injury” to support the jury’s verdict.

IV.    Conclusion

       We affirm the trial court’s judgment.

                                                 Charles van Cleef
                                                 Justice

Date Submitted:        April 5, 2024
Date Decided:          April 19, 2024

Do Not Publish

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