Court Opinion

ID: 9648281
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 14:12:35.511543+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:58.312392
License: Public Domain

TEAGUE, Judge,
dissenting.
Finding that I am unable to agree with the conclusion that the majority opinion reaches, that the trial judge did not err in excusing prospective venireperson Evelyn Reeves, I am compelled to file this dissenting opinion.
The record makes it clear that the State did not verbalize any challenge for cause to Reeves and the trial court did not articulate any reason why he was excusing Reeves. Article 35.16(a), V.A.C.C.P., expressly provides that “A challenge for cause is an objection made to a particular juror, alleging some fact which renders him incapable or unfit to serve on the jury.” Therefore, the excusal of Reeves should be decided on the basis of whether the trial judge improperly excused Reeves on his own motion, and not decided on whether the State properly challenged Reeves for cause.
A clear, rather than selective, reading of Reeves’ voir dire examination does not reflect or indicate to me that Reeves had such a fixed opinion regarding the death penalty that would have rendered her unfit to serve as a juror in this cause. In fact, a clear reading of her testimony only reflects that at the extreme Reeves was actually a conscientous person who I find, because of the strength of her convictions, would have been able both to fairly and impartially decide appellant’s guilt and answer the special issues. See and compare Circuit Judge Gee’s comments that he made on behalf of a panel of the Fifth Circuit and the En Banc Court in Burns v. Estelle, 626 F.2d 396 (5th Cir.1980); Burns v. Estelle, 592 F.2d 1297 (5th Cir.1979).
If it is the will of the Supreme Court of the United States that only persons similar to the likes of Adolph Eichmann and Josef Mengle are qualified to serve on capital murder cases, so be it. However, given the fact that a majority of the Supreme Court just recently in Gray v. Mississippi, — U.S. —, 107 S.Ct. 2045, 95 L.Ed.2d 622 (1987), reaffirmed Davis v. Georgia, 429 U.S. 122, 97 S.Ct. 399, 50 L.Ed.2d 339 (1976), which held that the exclusion for cause of only one juror with general objections to the death penalty renders the death sentence invalid, I do not believe that even the aggressive and assertive majority of that Court is actually ready for that day. In any event, as a matter of Texas constitutional law, I, for one, am certainly not ready for that day.
I respectfully dissent to the majority opinion’s improperly overruling appellant’s first point of error.