Court Opinion

ID: 9676830
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 05:35:29.851889+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:51.596537
License: Public Domain

OSBORN, Justice,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent.
*277I would require the same showing of Ms. Morales that the Court of Criminal Appeals required of Mario Tovar Cervantes, namely a showing of harm.
There is no dispute about the instruction given by the trial court in this case at the time the Appellant entered her plea of guilty. The court instructed as required by Article 26.13(a)(1) (2) and (3), but not as to (4) concerning deportation and naturalization. In Ex parte Gibauitch, 688 S.W.2d 868 (Tex.Crim.App.1985), the Court noted that when an admonishment is incomplete or incorrect there is a prima facie showing of a knowing and voluntary plea of guilty. The opinion notes that the burden then shifts to the defendant to show that he entered the plea without understanding the consequences of his action and thus was harmed. In the case now before the Court, there was as stated in the majority opinion, an admonition, but an incomplete one. There is no showing of harm. Without that showing, the majority either presumes harm or has shifted the burden to the state to show no harm.
Clearly, in Ex parte Cervantes, 762 S.W.2d 577 (Tex.Crim.App.1988) there was a showing of harm at the hearing on the application for writ of habeas corpus. The Appellant in this case would have that same right if the judgment in this case is affirmed, but the court should not presume harm at this stage of the proceeding when harm has not been shown.
I believe the court should follow Sims v. State, 783 S.W.2d 786 (Tex.App.— Houston [1st Dist.] 1990, no pet.) and Foster v. State, 817 S.W.2d 390 (Tex.App.—Beaumont 1991, no pet.). In each of those cases the admonition as required by Article 26.-13(a)(4) was omitted and the courts held without a showing in the record that the accused was not a United States’ citizen there was no reversible error in the guilty plea and the judgments were affirmed.
As an alternative to an outright reversal where no harm is shown, I would, as a minimum, abate the appeal and direct the trial court to conduct a hearing to determine whether the incomplete instruction has caused harm to the Appellant.