Geesa v. State, 290-90

• Citation: 820 S.W.2d 154
• Decision Date: 06 November 1991
• Docket Number: No. 290-90,290-90
• Parties: Douglas Alan GEESA, Appellant, v. The STATE of Texas, Appellee.
• Court: Court of Appeals of Texas. Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas

Page 154

820 S.W.2d 154

Douglas Alan GEESA, Appellant, v. The STATE of Texas, Appellee.

No. 290-90.

Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas,

En Banc.

Nov. 6, 1991.

Allan K. Butcher, Fort Worth, for appellant.

Tim Curry, Dist. Atty. and C. Chris Marshall, Loretta Stauffer, Fred Rabalais, Kimberly Kaufman, Asst. Dist. Attys., Fort Worth, and Robert Huttash, State's Atty., Austin, for the State.

Before the court en banc.

OPINION ON STATE'S PETITION FOR DISCRETIONARY REVIEW

MALONEY, Judge.

Appellant was convicted by a jury on an indictment charging the offense of Unauthorized Use of a Motor Vehicle, V.T.C.A. Penal Code, § 31.07. The indictment contained enhancement paragraphs charging two prior felony convictions; punishment was assessed by the jury at 40 years' confinement in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Institutional Division. On appeal, in an unpublished opinion, the Court of Appeals reversed the conviction on the basis of insufficient evidence and remanded the case to the trial court to enter a judgment of acquittal. Geesa v. State, No. 2-88-140-CR (delivered February 21, 1990).

This Court granted the State's petition for discretionary review to determine (1) whether this Court should reject the "reasonable-hypothesis-of-innocence analytical construct" utilized in review of circumstantial evidence cases; and (2) whether the Court of Appeals erred in finding the evidence insufficient in this case.

We find (1) that the analytical construct is not valid in light of this Court's earlier decision to abrogate the circumstantial evidence charge, see Hankins v. State, 646 S.W.2d 191 (Tex.Cr.App.1983) (opinion on rehearing); and (2) that a definitional instruction on "reasonable doubt" is required in light of our decision to abandon the analytical construct.

The State argues that the use of the "reasonable hypothesis analytical construct" conflicts directly with the command of Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979); that it distorts the meaning of "proof beyond a reasonable doubt"; and that it continues to imply that circumstantial and direct evidence are inherently different.

The appellant argues that the conscious choice of this Court to use the "reasonable hypothesis analytical construct" is a reasonable method of achieving the realization of Jackson, and is consistent with both the rule of Jackson and the manner in which Texas has decided the issue of sufficiency of the evidence in circumstantial evidence cases for the last 125 years.

In determining that we should bring to an end the requirement that in circumstantial evidence cases, appellate courts must utilize the "reasonable hypothesis analytical construct", we revisit its history and source. ¹

I. History of the "Analytical Construct"

At least as early as Elizabeth v. State, 27 Tex. 329 (1863), juries in Texas courts have been instructed on the law of circumstantial evidence. ² However, that instruction was repudiated in Hankins v. State, 646 S.W.2d 191 (Tex.Cr.App.1983) (opinion on rehearing). It was explained in Hankins that discontinuance was justified by the reasoning and holding of Holland v. United States, 348 U.S. 121, 75 S.Ct. 127, 99 L.Ed. 150 (1954), a tax evasion case involving the net worth method of proof. Hankins, 646 S.W.2d at 197. In Holland, the Supreme Court held that where the trial court charged the jury on the elements of the offense, the presumption of innocence, the Government's burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt (which included a full definition of reasonable doubt), the length and nature of the net worth method of proof and the character of circumstantial evidence in general, it was not necessary for the trial court to add to the charge that "because the proof was circumstantial, the Government must exclude every other reasonable hypothesis than the guilt of the defendant."

The Hankins Court, citing authorities showing that some twenty-one states and most of the federal circuits had abolished use of the circumstantial evidence charge since the Holland decision, went on to state:

Our holding today finds further support in the fact that there is but one standard of proof for criminal convictions and where the jury is properly instructed on that standard, a charge on circumstantial evidence is valueless and invites confusion. [citations omitted]. The constitutionally required burden of proof of criminal cases "is that the State establish all elements of the offense beyond a reasonable doubt." Crocker v. State, 573 S.W.2d 190 (Tex.Cr.App.1978) (Opinion on Rehearing). See Mullaney v. Wilbur, 421 U.S. 684, 95 S.Ct. 1881, 44 L.Ed.2d 508 (1975); In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1970).... Rather than aiding jurors in applying the reasonable doubt standard, an additional charge on circumstantial evidence focusing on the "reasonable hypothesis" theory serves only to distract jurors from examining the proper standard of proof as the primary focus of their deliberations.

Hankins, 646 S.W.2d at 199.

In 1979, twenty-five years after Holland but four years before Hankins, the Supreme Court decided Jackson v. Virginia, supra, and enunciated a single standard of review for testing the sufficiency of the evidence:

The 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.... The relevant question is whether after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution Jackson, 443 U.S. at 318, 99 S.Ct. at 2789.

any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.

After Jackson, but again before Hankins, in Griffin v. State, 614 S.W.2d 155 (Tex.Cr.App.1981), this Court recognized Jackson to be binding on the states as a minimum standard. Speaking for a panel of this Court, Judge Roberts stated:

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.

Griffin, 614 S.W.2d at 159. And in footnote 5:

Of course States are free to set higher standards of review. For example, this Court requires that juries be instructed not to convict on circumstantial evidence unless it excludes every reasonable hypothesis other than guilt although the federal constitution does not require a different treatment of circumstantial evidence. See Richardson v. State, 600 S.W.2d 818, 826 (Tex.Cr.App.1980) (Dally, J., dissenting, citing Holland v. United States ). This different treatment extends to appellate review as well.

Id. at 159.

And in Girard v. State, 631 S.W.2d 162 (Tex.Cr.App.1982), quoting language from Jackson, we stated:

Our task is not to ask whether we believe that the evidence at trial established guilt beyond a reasonable doubt; it 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. Griffin v. State, 614 S.W.2d 155, 159 (Tex.Cr.App.1981). In circumstantial evidence cases, this test is translated into the requirement that the evidence exclude every reasonable hypothesis other than guilt.

See also Allen v. State, 651 S.W.2d 267, 269 (Tex.Cr.App.1983) (finding circumstantial evidence in the case sufficient under Girard and Jackson ). ³

Griffin, Girard and Allen were decided before the abrogation of the circumstantial evidence charge by the Hankins decision and were predicated upon the fact that, in a circumstantial evidence case, the jury was instructed that they must find that the evidence negated every reasonable hypothesis other than that hypothesis establishing the guilt of the defendant before they could convict. See footnote 1, supra. The jury instruction on circumstantial evidence served as the standard by which they, as factfinder, were to judge the evidence. A reviewing court, in applying Jackson v. Virginia and viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the jury's verdict, needed only to determine if the jury acted rationally in finding the evidence sufficient in accordance with the instruction it was given. Once the jury instruction on circumstantial evidence was repudiated in Hankins, however, its function as a guide to juries in reaching their verdict was discontinued. ⁴ Shortly after Hankins was decided, this Court handed down Carlsen v. State, 654 S.W.2d 444; Freeman v. State, 654 S.W.2d 450; Denby v. State, 654 S.W.2d 457 and Wilson v. State, 654 S.W.2d 465 (Tex.Cr.App.1983) (opinions on State's Motions for Rehearing). These four cases, in identical opinions, held that even though it was no longer necessary to instruct juries on circumstantial evidence, the appellate court must still find that every other reasonable hypothesis raised by the evidence was negated, save and except that establishing the guilt of the defendant, if the conviction was to be affirmed in a circumstantial evidence case. The Court, therefore dispensed with the jury charge on circumstantial evidence on the one hand, and kept the "reasonable hypothesis analytical construct" for appellate review on the other. The opinions explained as follows:

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...