Brown v. State
| Decision Date | 18 July 1984 |
| Docket Number | No. 1123-83,1123-83 |
| Citation | 672 S.W.2d 487 |
| Parties | Junior BROWN, Appellant, v. The STATE of Texas, Appellee. |
| Court | Texas Court of Criminal Appeals |
Jack P. Martin, Ralph H. Brock, Lubbock, for appellant.
Mac Smith, Dist. Atty. and Daniel W. Carney, Asst. Dist. Atty., Weatherford, Robert Huttash, State's Atty., and Cathleen R. Riedel, Asst. State's Atty., Austin, for the State.
Before the court en banc.
OPINION ON APPELLANT'S PETITION FOR DISCRETIONARY REVIEW
Trial was before the jury upon appellant's plea of not guilty of aggravated robbery. After finding appellant guilty, the jury further found the enhancement allegations in the indictment to be true, and punishment was fixed at life.
The conviction was affirmed by the Court of Appeals for the Second Supreme Judicial District in Brown v. State, 659 S.W.2d 499 (Tex.App.--Fort Worth 1983). We granted appellant's petition for discretionary review in order to examine the Court of Appeals' holding that the evidence is sufficient to corroborate the testimony of the accomplice witness, Tommy Glynn McLoud.
McLoud testified that he, Wesley Patterson, and appellant met in Weatherford on December 15, 1981, and planned a robbery to take place the following morning. Appellant drove the two men by the victims' residence in a pickup truck that evening, and Patterson was instructed to return to cut the telephone line leading to the residence. The next morning appellant drove McLoud and Patterson back to the area, and after viewing the intended target again, dropped them off "about a block up the street" from the victims' residence. McLoud and Patterson were bearded and wore blue stocking caps, or "toboggans," and appellant was clean shaven. At approximately 9:00 a.m., under a pretext of buying jewelry, McLoud and Patterson entered the residence and robbed the 84-year-old complainant and her 93-year-old husband at gunpoint of cash, jewelry, a coin collection, and other items. The couple was placed in a closet while the residence was ransacked. McLoud looked out of the living room window periodically to make sure appellant was in the vicinity, and saw appellant parked at the nearby Cherry Park. Approximately 45 minutes after they had entered the house, McLoud lost sight of appellant and he and Patterson decided to leave the residence to look for him. They failed to find appellant after walking around the neighborhood and decided to split up. McLoud walked back to Cherry Park, saw a police car, and fled into a nearby residence where he was apprehended.
The complainant testified that two men entered her home on December 16, and robbed her at gunpoint. After the robbers left, she attempted to call the police but the phone line had been cut.
Appellant contends the evidence is insufficient to corroborate the testimony of McLoud, an accomplice witness.
A conviction cannot be had upon the testimony of an accomplice witness unless corroborated by other evidence tending to connect the defendant with the offense committed; and the corroboration is not sufficient if it merely shows the commission of the offense. Art. 38.14, V.A.C.C.P.
The test to determine the sufficiency of the corroboration is to eliminate from consideration the evidence of the accomplice witness and then examine the testimony of other witnesses to ascertain if there is inculpatory evidence which tends to link the accused with the commission of the offense. Meyers v. State, 626 S.W.2d 778 (Tex.Cr.App.1982). All the facts and circumstances in evidence may be looked to for corroboration, Paulus v. State, 633 S.W.2d 827 (Tex.Cr.App.1982), and the corroborative evidence may be circumstantial or direct. Id. Furthermore, it is not necessary that the corroboration directly link the accused to the crime or be sufficient in itself to establish guilt. Id; Reynolds v. State, 489 S.W.2d 866 (Tex.Cr.App.1972).
The non-accomplice testimony which corroborates McLoud's testimony regarding appellant's complicity in the robbery consists of the testimony of Reginald Henderson and Officer Jonathan Hutson. Henderson, who lived across the street from Cherry Park, testified that at about 8:15 a.m. on December 16, he saw a black and gray pickup truck stopped at a stop sign next to his house. Three men were in the truck, two with beards and stocking caps, and one clean shaven. He saw the "same pickup" shortly thereafter parked at Cherry Park, with one man in it. A short time later, he saw the truck parked on the other side of the...
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