Garza v. State

• Decision Date: 31 January 2007
• Docket Number: No. AP-74935.,No. AP-75597.,AP-74935.,AP-75597.
• Citation: 213 S.W.3d 338
• Parties: Robert Gene GARZA, Appellant, v. The STATE of Texas.
• Court: Texas Court of Criminal Appeals

213 S.W.3d 338

Robert Gene GARZA, Appellant, v. The STATE of Texas.

No. AP-74935.

No. AP-75597.

Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas.

January 31, 2007.

Noel Gonzalez, Pharr, for Appellant.

Theodore C. Hake, Asst. Crim. D.A., Edinburg, Matthew Paul, State's Attorney, Austin, for State.

OPINION

PRICE, J., delivered the opinion of the Court in which KELLER, P.J., and MEYERS, JOHNSON, KEASLER, HERVEY, HOLCOMB, and COCHRAN, JJ., joined.

In December 2003, the appellant was convicted of two counts of capital murder.¹ Pursuant to the jury's answers to the special issues set forth in Texas Code of Criminal Procedure Article 37.071, sections 2(b) and 2(e), the trial judge sentenced the appellant to death for each count.² Direct appeal to this Court is automatic.³ The appellant raises five points of error. Finding no merit in any of these points of error, we will affirm the judgment of the trial court with respect to the conviction for capital murder.

STATEMENT OF FACTS

On the evening of September 4, 2002, Maria De La Luz Bazaldua Cobbarubias, Danitzene Lizeth Vasquez Beltran, Celina Linares Sanchez, Lourdes Yesenia Araujo Torres, Karla Espino Ramos, and Magda Torres Vasquez were working at Garcia's Bar in Donna, Texas. When the bar closed at midnight, Cobbarubias gave the other women a ride to their trailer home. She drove south on Business 83, turned onto Valley View Road, and then parked close to the women's trailer. Before anyone had a chance to get out of the vehicle, shots were fired. Cobbarubias, Beltran, Sanchez, and Torres sustained multiple gunshot wounds and died from their injuries. Ramos sustained gunshot wounds to her arm and leg, but survived. Vasquez did not sustain any physical injuries.

Alejandro Martinez of the Donna Police Department was the first officer to arrive at the scene. He determined that the shooting had actually occurred just outside the Donna city limits and contacted the Hidalgo County Sheriff's Office. Several witnesses told Martinez that a Chevrolet Blazer had been parked close to the trailer at the time of the shooting. The vehicle was white, had paper plates, and did not have any hubcaps.

Investigators with the Hidalgo County Sheriff's Office recovered sixty-one spent bullet casings from the trailer park, which were of two different sizes: 9 millimeter and 7.76 × 39 millimeter. Most of the casings were recovered from a driveway located directly behind where the victim's Pontiac Grand Am was parked. Investigators also impounded a Chevrolet Blazer a few miles from the trailer park. The vehicle was white, had paper plates, and did not have any hubcaps. It had been reported stolen a few days earlier. Several items of clothing that did not belong to the vehicle's owner were recovered from the vehicle, including a red bandana with white markings. The vehicle had run out of gas.

Juan Antonio Quintero, a neighbor, testified that he saw two people at the time of the shooting. One of them was short and "chubby" and the other one was tall and "skinny." Both of them were wearing black. He noticed that the short person was holding a gun that "looked like a TEC-9." He testified that he could not see their faces, but thought one of them "resembled" Vasquez's boyfriend, Jesse Munoz.

Carlos Villarreal, J.A. Quintero's guest, told investigators that he saw two people at the time of the shooting. One of them appeared to be between 5'10" and 5'11" and 160 pounds. The other person was 5'8" and 250 pounds. The State introduced the appellant's booking sheet which showed that the appellant was 5'11" and 160 pounds.

Investigator Juan Sifuentes testified that, because of information they had received, patrons at Garcia's Bar were suspected in the shooting. Ramos told investigators that Abraham Martinez Tienda, who had been in Garcia's Bar on the evening of the shooting, shot the women. Vasquez told investigators that she suspected her boyfriend, Juan Rudolfo Barrones, who had been in Garcia's Bar on the evening of the shooting. Another suspect was Antonio Francisco Conteras, because he had followed the victim's car to the trailer park on the evening of the shooting. Sifuentes testified that they investigated Tienda, Barrones, and Conteras, but could not find any evidence linking them to the shooting. They also investigated several other bar patrons and pursued tips they received from the Crime Stoppers program. However, this investigation did not lead anywhere, and after a few weeks they were left with no suspects.

In January 2003, Abraham Osequera and Marco Antonio Mendez told investigators that they believed that members from their criminal street gang, the TriCity Bombers, the "T.C.B.," could be involved. They gave investigators information pointing towards T.C.B. members Jesus Carlos Rodriguez and Mark Anthony Reyna. Also, investigators received information from J.A. Quintero and his aunt, Mercedes Quintero, implicating the T.C.B. Through further investigation, other T.C.B. members emerged as possible suspects including the appellant, Rudolfo Medrano, Guadalupe Guerra, and Ricardo Martinez.

The State's theory of the case was that J.C. Rodriguez, who was serving time for attempted murder, ordered "a hit" on Nora Rodriguez and M. Quintero because they had been called to testify against him, but that the wrong women were killed by mistake.⁴ N. Rodriguez testified that she and M. Quintero witnessed J.C. Rodriguez commit the attempted murder on March 31, 2001, and were called to testify about the incident. To support this theory, the State introduced a judgment showing that J.C. Rodriguez was sentenced to twenty years' imprisonment for an attempted murder committed on March 31, 2001.

On January 26, 2003, the appellant was taken to the Hidalgo County Sheriff's Office. After receiving Miranda warnings and signing a waiver, the appellant gave a statement describing his own involvement in "a hit" which "resulted in the death of four Donna [wo]mans." The appellant explained that the "hit was organized for us" and that someone left a four-door "Cutlas[s] or Regal" at Plaza Mall to be used in "the hit." The appellant was "hoping it would be left alone," but on September 5, 2002, he received instructions "that the hit was to be carried out that day." At approximately 7:00 p.m., Martinez picked up the appellant and Reyna in a four-door vehicle.⁵ The appellant saw that Martinez had an AK-47, a TEC-9, and a nine-millimeter handgun in the trunk of the vehicle. They picked up a fourth person, "Manny," and drove "around Donna to see the bar which was located on old [highway] 83."⁶ Then they left Donna to pick up a "second vehicle," which had been stolen. The appellant and Reyna got into the second vehicle and waited in the "middle of nowhere" until they saw "them" coming. They saw two vehicles pass by, a "Grand Am" and Manny's and Martinez's vehicle, and followed them to "a big house" or an "apartment complex." Martinez and Manny got out of their vehicle and started shooting. The appellant saw that Manny "shot as he ran" and Martinez shot "as he [stood]." After the shooting, they left the scene and abandoned the four-door vehicle "in the middle of no[w]here." Then they left the weapons in the trash where they could pick them up the next day. They drove around in the second vehicle for a while until it "broke down," and they left on foot. Finally, the appellant stated: "A[p]parently Rocha was mad `cause it wasn't done right."⁷

Medrano, who kept weapons for the T.C.B., told investigators that he knew where the weapons used in the Donna shooting were located. He directed investigators to a black box he kept in his grandparents' house. Also, he directed investigators to the residence of fellow T.C.B. member Robert Zamora, Jr. Zamora subsequently took investigators to his friend Nicholas Montez's residence. Firearms specialist Timothy Counce testified that a TEC-9 gun, which had been seized at Medrano's grandparents' house, fired eighteen of the nine-millimeter cartridge casings found at the scene. Further, Counce testified that he had been unable to "identify or eliminate" three Chinese-manufactured SKS military assault rifles, which had been seized at Montez's residence, as having fired the 7.76 × 39 millimeter cartridge casings found at the trailer park. The SKS rifles could appear to be AK-47 rifles to the untrained eye.

Detective Roberto Alvarez testified that the T.C.B. was a highly organized criminal street gang that was connected with various crimes including murder, robbery, assault burglary, and theft. Members identified themselves by the colors red and black; they often carried red bandannas, drove red cars, and wore red t-shirts. They commonly used a hand symbol and tattoos to show their affiliation with the gang. Alvarez testified that photographs depicting the appellant wearing red shirts and making the T.C.B. hand symbol confirmed his affiliation with the T.C.B., as did photographs of his tattoos. The tattoo photographs showed the words "Tri City Bomber" and the initials "T.C.B." on his chest, the words "tri" and "city" and a bomb with a fuse on his right shoulder blade, the initials "T.C.B." on his right leg, the nickname "bones" and a skull on his right arm, and a small bomb on his left arm. Over counsel's objection, the appellant was required to take off his shirt and display his tattoos to the jury.

FACTUAL SUFFICIENCY

In his fourth point of error, the appellant contends that the evidence was factually insufficient to support the jury's finding of guilt. In a factual-sufficiency review, we review all of the evidence in a neutral light, and we will set the verdict aside only if the evidence is so weak that the verdict is clearly wrong and manifestly unjust, or the contrary evidence is so strong that the standard of proof beyond a reasonable doubt could not have been met.⁸ A clearly wrong and unjust verdict occurs where the jury's finding is "manifestly unjust," "shocks the conscience," or...