Court Opinion

ID: 9858246
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 16:19:16.126984+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:53:40.985927
License: Public Domain

*499CLINTON, Judge,
concurring.
Disposing of appellant’s eleventh point of error, the majority holds that, reading the jury charge as a whole, it is clear that error in the failure of the trial court to limit the abstract definition of “intent” found in V.T.C.A.Penal Code, § 6.03(a), to that part of the definition that relates only to “result of conduct” was harmless. For this proposition the majority cites Hughes v. State, 897 S.W.2d 286 (Tex.Cr.App.1994). There we used an analysis reminiscent of that in Kinnamon v. State, 791 S.W.2d 84 (Tex.Cr.App.1990), to conclude that, though it was error not to limit the abstract definition of “intent” to “result of conduct” in charging the jury in a capital murder prosecution that involved no “nature of conduct” element, it was nevertheless harmless because, read as a whole, the jury charge adequately informed the jury that it must find it was the accused’s conscious objective to cause the death of the deceased before it could convict. It seems to me that neither Hughes nor the majority today fully apprehends the nature of the problem. I therefore write separately.
The source of the problem resides in an ambiguity inherent in the language of § 6.03(a) itself. That provision defines “intent” as it applies to elements of penal offenses going both to result of conduct and to nature of conduct. It reads:
“A person acts intentionally, or with intent, with respect to the nature of his conduct or to a result of his conduct when it is his conscious objective or desire to engage in the conduct or cause the result.”
Given the parallel structure of this sentence, it certainly seems on first impression that the purpose of the Legislature must have been alternatively to define “intent” vis-a-vis the result of conduct, viz:
“A person acts intentionally, or with intent, with respect to ... a result of conduct when it is his conscious objective or desire to ... cause the result”;
and also “intent” vis-a-vis the nature of conduct, viz:
“A person acts intentionally, or with intent, with respect to the nature of his conduct ... when it is his conscious objective or desire to engage in the conduct”.
Unfortunately, this is not the only way to read § 6.03(a), given the use of the word “or” as highlighted above. It is possible that the provision was meant to define “intent” in either of the following two ways. First:
“A person acts intentionally, or with intent, with respect to ... a result of conduct when it is his conscious objective or desire to engage in the conduct or cause the result”;
or, second:
“A person acts intentionally, or with intent, with respect to the nature of his conduct ... when it is his conscious objective or desire to engage in the conduct or cause the result.”
Although almost certainly not the way the Legislature contemplated that § 6.03(a) would be read, this is nevertheless a plausible reading of that provision, and one that jurors should be disabused of, especially upon request. For even if this Court were to authoritatively construe the ambiguity out of the provision, it would still be necessary to inform the jury of that construction. Article 36.14, V.A.C.C.P.
For this reason, giving the jury an abstract definition of “intent” in the literal language of § 6.03(a) is error. This is so even if the offense contains proscriptions against both nature of conduct and result of conduct. See Cook v. State, 884 S.W.2d 485, 489-490, n. 3 (Tex.Cr.App.1994); Hughes v. State, supra, 897 S.W.2d at 295-96. It is true that for such an offense the jury will need an abstract definition of intent both as it pertains to nature of conduct and as it pertains to result of conduct. But those definitions must be separated out in much the way Judge Malo-ney recommended in his concurring opinion in Cook, supra, at 494. Otherwise there is always the chance that, when it comes to decide whether the accused intended to cause the proscribed result, the jury may believe it is authorized to conclude that he did intend to cause the result simply because he intended to engage in the conduct that caused that result. Under the literal terms of § 6.03(a), without clarifying language, a jury that drew that conclusion would not be unreasonable. *500No amount of insistence in the application paragraph that the jury must find the accused specifically intended to cause the death of the deceased will solve the problem. The jury could still conclude it is authorized to find the accused intended to cause the result simply because he intended to engage in the conduct that caused it. For this reason I cannot join the majority’s Hughes harmless-error analysis.
Nevertheless I concur in the result. Appellant did not object to the jury charge on this or any related basis. The question, therefore, is whether he suffered egregious harm in the failure of the trial court to clarify the ambiguity in § 6.03(a). Almanza v. State, 686 S.W.2d 157 (Tex.Cr.App.1984) (Opinion on State’s motion for rehearing). Here it is reasonably clear he did not. There was ample evidence from which the jury could conclude that appellant did in fact intend to cause the death of the deceased. See majority opinion at 487. Final summation at the conclusion of the guilVinnocence phase of trial was almost exclusively a debate over the strength of the State’s evidence of identity. Only the State mentioned the issue of intent, and then, only in passing. Under the circumstances, even assuming the jurors noticed the ambiguity in the § 6.03(a) definition at all, it is most unlikely they would have found occasion to rely on it to justify their verdict. Viewing the entire record in the manner prescribed by Almanza, I see no egregious harm.
For this reason I concur in the majority’s disposition of appellant’s eleventh point of error, but not its rationale, and otherwise concur in the majority’s judgment.
MALONEY, J., joins.