Acuna v. State
| Decision Date | 26 January 2023 |
| Docket Number | 13-21-00402-CR |
| Parties | RICARDO ACUNA, Appellant, v. THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee. |
| Court | Texas Court of Appeals |
Do not publish. Tex.R.App.P. 47.2(b).
On appeal from the 347th District Court of Nueces County, Texas.
Before Chief Justice Contreras and Justices Longoria and Silva
Appellant Ricardo Acuna was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to life imprisonment without possibility of parole. See Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 19.03(a)(2). On appeal, he argues by one issue that the evidence adduced at trial failed to sufficiently corroborate the testimony of his alleged accomplice. See Tex. Code Crim. Proc. Ann art. 38.14. We affirm.
A Nueces County grand jury returned an indictment alleging that Acuna, acting alone or together with Ismael Castillo and/or Ariana Carbajal, intentionally caused the death of Deandre Mathis by shooting him with a firearm, and was then and there in the course of committing or attempting to commit robbery or burglary of a habitation. See Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 19.03(a)(2).
At trial, Detective Brenda Garza testified she was called to investigate a shooting at a house on Coleman Avenue in Corpus Christi at about 12:30 p.m. on March 14, 2018. By the time she arrived at the scene, two individuals who had been shot-Mathis and Christopher Vincent-were being taken to the hospital. Mathis later died from his injuries, but Vincent recovered.
Garza obtained recordings from surveillance cameras located across the street from the house where the shooting took place. The recordings show a person, not visibly armed, wearing a loose black long-sleeve shirt, blue jeans, and white shoes walking toward the house and entering the house at around 11:54 a.m. About a minute later, a different person dressed in black armed with a rifle, can be seen exiting a tan Buick and entering the house. Shortly afterward, two individuals can be seen leaving the house and departing in the Buick.
Garza also obtained surveillance footage from Danny's Tire Shop, about a mile away from where the shooting took place. The recording shows the tan Buick arriving at the tire shop at around 10:38 a.m. and departing at 11:07 a.m. on the day of the shooting. Based on the license plate, Garza was able to determine that the Buick had been reported stolen. Garza stated that, though she could not identify the driver of the Buick, she was able to identify its front-seat passenger as Acuna because of the tattoos on his forehead and arms. The back-seat passenger was identified as Castillo, also based on his facial tattoos. Garza also obtained surveillance footage from a convenience store in Mathis, which depicted Acuna together with Carbajal the day after the shooting.
Police recovered fingerprints and blood from the crime scene inside the house; however, the fingerprints and blood did not match with either Acuna or Castillo.
Vincent testified that he lived in the house on Coleman Avenue with Mathis and David Garza, the house's owner. He said Mathis made money by selling synthetic marijuana out of the house. On the morning of March 14, 2018, Garza left the house at around 11:00 a.m. and asked Vincent to clean his living area. At around 11:45 a.m., as Vincent was sweeping, he heard someone knock on the door. Mathis answered the door, and "the individual on the other side of the door backed [Mathis] into the house with a gun to his head." According to Vincent, the intruder was wearing a dark-colored hoodie and had a tattoo "[o]n his right eye," and the gun was a silver-colored nine-millimeter pistol. The man was not wearing a mask, hat, or glasses.
Vincent testified he dropped his broom, put his hands up, and told the intruder to take whatever electronics were in the house. At that point, the gunman "grew frustrated, and the gun just went off" while it was aimed at Mathis. Vincent could not tell if that shot hit Mathis, and he did not see blood at the time. After the shot, Mathis began struggling with the assailant. As Vincent attempted to intervene, "this other person . . . came in with a rifle and pointed it at [him]." Vincent testified: "I was just in shock, and it just went off, and I got hit with it." Vincent stated that man with the rifle was "heavyset" and was wearing a dark "greenish" hoodie and a green bandana for a mask over his nose and mouth. He could not see whether the man had any tattoos on his face. He later heard three to four more shots, and he saw the man with the rifle make his way to the back of the house. As both assailants left the house through the front door, Vincent heard Mathis say that he had been shot.
Vincent said the man with the rifle shot him in the abdomen, causing a collapsed lung and broken rib which required surgery. Vincent also stated that, as the gunmen were exiting, the first man looked back towards him and "randomly" shot him in the calf with his handgun. Police presented a photo lineup to Vincent while he was recovering in the hospital, but he was unable to identify either of the two assailants, and he initially was unable to identify either assailant at trial. On cross-examination, Vincent acknowledged that he previously testified in Castillo's trial that Castillo was the man who shot him in the calf with the handgun. He was unable to identify the man with the rifle.
Pamela Mungia, Acuna's friend, testified that, on the day in question, Acuna called her and asked to come to her apartment in Mathis. He later arrived in the tan Buick with two other people, neither of which Mungia knew. Referring to photographs, she identified Acuna's associates as Castillo and Carbajal. The three spent the night there and left around noon the next day; however, they left the Buick there. Several days later, law enforcement came to impound the vehicle. Mungia testified she later found out that Acuna and his associates had left "several different types" of bullets in a sock on her closet shelf.
Mungia conceded that she informed police that Acuna was one of the men depicted in the surveillance videos from Coleman Avenue. She agreed that she also previously testified to that effect in Castillo's trial. However, at Acuna's trial, Mungia said she was unsure if Acuna was one of the men in the videos.
Carbajal, Acuna's cousin, testified that Acuna contacted her for the first time in eight years on March 13, 2018. That evening, he met her at a motel she was staying at in Corpus Christi, where they drank alcohol and used Xanax and methamphetamine. At around 1:00 a.m., Castillo arrived with his girlfriend. About ninety minutes later, the group left in Castillo's "brown Buick," which Castillo said he had borrowed from a friend, to go to another motel. Castillo later drove the group back to the hotel where Carbajal was staying, and he left with his girlfriend. At around 4:30 or 5:00 a.m., Castillo returned with a black handgun and an assault rifle. Castillo and Acuna then "started to have a conversation about needing to hit a lick and needing more drugs, and stuff like that." Carbajal stated that "hit a lick" means "go and rob somebody."
At around 7:00 a.m., the group left the motel in the Buick, with Carbajal driving. The guns which Castillo brought were in the back seat, along with gloves and a bulletproof vest. They went to Danny's Tire Shop "because [Castillo] said that there was a ball in the tire, and he needed to get it changed." Afterward, at Castillo's direction, they picked up two individuals named Roland and Victoria who "said that they knew a place where [they] could get some [methamphetamine]." Carbajal heard the group discussing "a house that they could hit." Roland and Victoria directed her to the house on Coleman Avenue. Carbajal drove past the house and went to a convenience store where Castillo purchased a ski mask. She then dropped off Roland and Victoria at their request and went back to the house on Coleman Avenue. Carbajal testified:
Carbajal stated that Acuna took the handgun from the backseat and Castillo took the rifle and body armor. She saw Acuna put a hat on as he got out of the car, and she confirmed that the man walking down the street in the surveillance video was Acuna. She heard about four gunshots, which surprised her because "[n]obody was supposed to get hurt," and she heard someone say: Acuna and Castillo then got back in the Buick and told Carbajal to drive away. According to Carbajal, when Acuna asked Castillo "what did you do that for?", Castillo "was just all laughs." She then drove to Mungia's apartment in Mathis, where the group intended to "stay . . . until [they] figured out what [their] next step was." According to Carbajal, Acuna told Mungia that they had robbed and shot someone. Later, she saw Castillo cleaning the Buick "with Clorox and a rag." She and Acuna later went to Dallas, and she was arrested when she returned to Corpus Christi.
Carbajal testified that she was also charged with Mathis's murder. In a plea bargain agreement with the State, she agreed to plead guilty and testify at Acuna's and Castillo's trials in exchange for a recommendation of ten years' imprisonment.[1]
Edgar Rodriguez, a trooper with the Texas Department of Public Safety, testified that officers attempted to initiate a traffic stop on March 27, 2018, on a vehicle in which Acuna was the passenger. The attempted stop, which was pursuant to an arrest warrant, led to a pursuit. According to Rodriguez "[o...
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