Dang v. State
| Decision Date | 31 October 2002 |
| Docket Number | No. 14-00-00560-CR.,14-00-00560-CR. |
| Citation | 99 S.W.3d 172 |
| Parties | Tuan Anh DANG, Appellant, v. The STATE of Texas, Appellee. |
| Court | Texas Court of Appeals |
Mike DeGeurin, Houston, for appellant.
Donald W. Rogers, Houston, for appellee.
Panel consists of Justices ANDERSON, HUDSON, and FROST.
MAJORITY OPINION
A juvenile court certified fifteen-year-old appellant Tuan Anh Dang as an adult. After the juvenile court transferred appellant to the trial court, he was indicted and tried for capital murder. The jury found appellant guilty, and the trial court assessed appellant's punishment at confinement in the state penitentiary for life. On appeal, appellant asserts the trial court erred: (1) in not suppressing his oral statement because it allegedly was taken in violation of the Texas Family Code; (2) in refusing requested jury instructions; and (3) in limiting closing argument to twenty minutes. We affirm.
On January 5, 1999, Binh Nguyen, the complainant, was working a shift from 4:00 p.m. to midnight as a machinist at a business owned by Son Dang, appellant's father. Tan Pham, another machinist at Dang's business, was to begin his shift at midnight. Typically, the employee in the building kept the door locked from the inside and would unlock the door for the next arriving employee. Pham arrived at work at 11:45 p.m. and knocked on the door. Binh did not answer. Pham noticed the doorknob had holes around it. Peering through a hole in the door, Pham saw Binh lying on the floor with his head toward the door. Pham went home, called Dang (the shop owner), and asked him to come to his house. When Dang arrived, Pham told him what he had seen. Dang called the police and then the two of them went to the shop.
Officer Kerr Richards of the Houston Police Department received a call from the police dispatcher at 12:11 a.m. on January 6, 1999, to go to the machine shop. When he approached the building, he saw that a side door was open. As he maneuvered through the yard, Richards noticed a body lying inside the front section of the building. Richards immediately advised the dispatcher to send an ambulance. Through the same open doorway, Richards also observed an Asian female walking from the location of the body toward the east side of the building, and two Asian males in the back section ransacking some desks. Richards was not able to see into the front section of the building. Concerned that a fourth person might be in the front part of the building, Richards returned to his police car to call for help. As he retreated, Richards heard three gun shots coming from inside the building. Believing he was under fire, Richards dove behind his police car. Richards then saw an Asian male come to the side door and pull it shut.
Unaware of the danger, Son Dang, the shop owner, and Tan Pham pulled into the shop parking lot. Officer Richards immediately advised them to move across the street because the scene was not secure. Other police officers arrived within a few minutes and set up a perimeter around the building. Shortly thereafter, SWAT officers arrived and took charge of the scene.
Police later apprehended appellant and Linda Nguyen1 outside the building. Officers recovered a semiautomatic cartridge from appellant's front pants pocket and ten empty nine-millimeter shell casings from his back pocket. The police placed appellant and Linda in separate police cars. This occurred sometime between 1:30 a.m. and 1:50 a.m. Shortly thereafter, the police captured Quynh Tran and Kenneth Tran2 and placed them in separate police cars.
Homicide investigators, Sergeant G.J. Novak and Officer Henry Chisolm, arrived at the crime scene at 3:00 a.m. and 3:30 a.m., respectively. No one had access to the building until 3:10 a.m., when SWAT officers relinquished control of the crime scene. Novak interviewed Linda, Quynh, Kenneth, and appellant separately as each sat in a separate police car. Novak interviewed appellant last at 3:45 a.m. At approximately 4:00 a.m., Novak had these four individuals transported to the homicide office at 1200 Travis in downtown Houston.
At 5:45 a.m., Sergeant Ted Bloyd met appellant at the homicide office. Bloyd left appellant in the homicide office's family room to attend the interviews of Linda and Quynh. Based on information he learned in those interviews, Bloyd considered appellant a suspect. At 7:20 a.m., Bloyd returned to the family room and found appellant asleep on a couch. Bloyd woke appellant and informed him that he was now considered a suspect. Bloyd then took appellant to a magistrate for the administration of his legal warnings. Very soon thereafter, Bloyd and appellant returned to the homicide office, where, at 8:36 a.m., Bloyd reminded appellant of his legal warnings and recorded appellant's oral statement. The interview ended ten minutes later.
At appellant's trial, the State offered appellant's confession and the testimony of other witnesses to show that on the night of the murder, appellant and his friend, Quynh Tran, went to appellant's father's machine shop to steal money believed to be on the premises. Quynh, armed with a nine-millimeter pistol, and appellant attempted to enter through a side door routinely used by employees, but soon discovered the door was locked. However, Binh Nguyen was working in the shop. Recognizing appellant as the owner's son, Binh unlocked the door and permitted the youths to enter the building.
As Binh returned to his duties, Quynh told appellant to kill Binh because Binh would tell appellant's father they had been at the shop. Quynh handed the pistol to appellant. Appellant claims he could not bring himself to shoot the machinist, so he engaged the safety on the gun, pulled the trigger, and told Quynh the gun had jammed. Although ballistics tests indicated Binh was shot with two different pistols, appellant stated in his confession that Quynh alone shot Binh. In any event, Binh was shot several times.
Appellant claims that, immediately after the murder, Quynh and he quickly searched the premises. They discovered and took a nine-millimeter pistol appellant's father kept at the shop, but could find no money. While leaving the premises, Quynh fired several rounds at the side door in an attempt to make it appear the murder and robbery had been initiated by
a forced entry. Appellant said that when he saw Quynh shooting holes in the door, he thought, "This is fun ... I wonder if I can hit it." Appellant then used his father's gun to shoot at the door.
After an unsuccessful search for money, appellant and Quynh went back to their apartment to get a crowbar. Once at the apartment, they told Linda Nguyen what they had done and called in another friend, Kenneth Tran. Quynh told Kenneth, Kenneth noticed that Linda was crying and appellant was calmly wiping down a pistol with a towel. Believing his friends would reward him with a fair share of the money, Kenneth agreed to return to the shop and act as a lookout while appellant, Quynh, and Linda searched the premises for the elusive cache of money. It was while Linda, Quynh, and appellant were at the shop for the second time that evening that Officer Richards arrived on the scene.
The trial court denied appellant's motion to suppress the oral statement that he made at 8:36 a.m. on January 6, 1999. The State introduced that statement as evidence during appellant's trial for capital murder. Appellant requested jury instructions regarding the voluntariness of his oral statement and regarding alleged violations of the Texas Family Code by the police. The trial court charged the jury regarding the voluntariness of appellant's oral statement but refused appellant's other proposed jury instructions. The jury convicted appellant of capital murder, and the trial court assessed appellant's punishment at confinement in the state penitentiary for life.
Challenging his conviction for capital murder, appellant asserts the following issues on appeal:
(1) Did the trial court abuse its discretion by denying appellant's motion to suppress his oral statement, allegedly obtained in violation of sections 52.02 and 52.025 of the Texas Family Code? (first, second, and third issues);
(2) Did the trial court err in refusing appellant's requested jury instructions concerning compliance with sections 52.02(a), 52.02(b)(1), and 52.025(d) of the Texas Family Code? (fourth issue); and
(3) Did the trial court abuse its discretion in limiting closing argument to twenty minutes? (fifth issue)
Generally, we review a trial court's ruling on a motion to suppress under an abuse-of-discretion standard of review. Oles v. State, 993 S.W.2d 103, 106 (Tex.Crim.App.1999). However, in this case, the resolution of the suppression issues does not turn on an evaluation of credibility and demeanor, and the facts relating to the suppression issues are not disputed. Therefore, we apply a de novo review. See Guzman v. State, 955 S.W.2d 85, 89 (Tex.Crim.App.1997); Jeffley v. State, 38 S.W.3d 847, 853 (Tex.App.-Houston [14th Dist.] 2001, pet. ref'd). In determining whether the trial court's ruling on a motion to suppress is supported by the record, we generally consider only the evidence adduced at the hearing on that motion unless the suppression issues have been consensually relitigated by the parties during the trial on the merits. Rachal v. State, 917 S.W.2d 799, 809 (Tex.Crim. App.1996). Because the parties in this case consensually relitigated the suppression issues at trial, we will examine the trial evidence as well as the evidence from the suppression hearing.
Did the trial court abuse its discretion by denying appellant's motion to suppress...
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