Ingerson v. State
| Decision Date | 27 October 2016 |
| Docket Number | NO. 02-11-00311-CR,02-11-00311-CR |
| Citation | 508 S.W.3d 703 |
| Parties | Fred Earl INGERSON, III, Appellant v. The STATE of Texas, State |
| Court | Texas Court of Appeals |
David L. Richards, Fort Worth, TX, for Appellant.
Robert T. Christian, District Attorney; Megan Chalifoux, Assistant District Attorney for Hood County, Granbury, TX, for State.
PANEL: DAUPHINOT and MEIER, JJ.19
EN BANC
MEMORANDUM OPINION1
A jury found appellant Fred Earl Ingerson, III guilty of the offense of capital murder and assessed his punishment at life without parole in the Institutional Division of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. The trial court sentenced him accordingly. In four points, Ingerson argues that the evidence is insufficient to support the jury's verdict; that the trial court erred by allowing the State to introduce extraneous-offense evidence; and that the trial court erred by not allowing him to introduce evidence that "another person may have had a motive to commit the killings." We will reverse and render a judgment of acquittal.
On June 28, 2008, Robyn Richter and Shawna Ferris were found dead in the parking lot of the Miyako Japanese Restaurant in Granbury, Hood County, Texas. They were discovered in the front seats of a GMC Envoy—Richter in the driver seat and Ferris in the passenger seat. Each had suffered a single gunshot wound to the head and had been shot from the passenger side of the vehicle.
The Granbury Police Department and the Texas Rangers performed an extensive investigation of these murders. It was not until March of 2010 that law enforcement obtained a warrant for Ingerson's arrest.
The State called forty-six witnesses in its presentation of its case in chief, and the defense called seven witnesses. The State called four rebuttal witnesses. We will briefly identify the testimony of each witness in order to thoroughly consider the sufficiency-of-the-evidence question raised by Ingerson in his first point.
State's Witness Kenneth Barnes :
The first witness was Kenneth Barnes, who testified that he is an employee in the City of Granbury's IT Department and said that his duties in the IT Department included recovering video data from surveillance systems. Barnes said that he gathered video from the Little Miracles Creative Learning Center's surveillance system on June 30, 2008, and that this data constituted State's Exhibit 1. According to Barnes, the video contained in State's Exhibit 1 captured video spanning from 11:30 p.m. on June 27 to 12:30 a.m. on June 28. While on the stand, Barnes did not mention Ingerson's name.
State's Witness Shelly Roop :
The second witness to testify was Shelly Roop. Roop averred that she was the former owner of the Little Miracles Creative Learning Center and testified to the reliability of the daycare's video system. She also did not mention Ingerson.
State's Witness Russell Grizzard :
Witness number three was Russell Grizzard, who testified that he is a detective with the Granbury Police Department. Grizzard averred that he was the first detective to arrive at the scene who took photographs of the bodies. He said that he made an initial search of the scene and that he looked for but found no shell casings. Grizzard stayed at the crime scene until the crime scene investigation team arrived. After the car was opened, Grizzard averred that he found Richter's cellphone. According to Grizzard, the last outgoing call shown on the cellphone was made at 11:52 p.m. and lasted until 11:53 p.m., which Grizzard said he believed showed that the time of death was after 11:53 p.m.
Grizzard averred that a fellow investigator, Richie Haught, had interviewed "everyone [who] was at the bar at Miyako's the night before" the murders were discovered. According to Grizzard, based on Haught's initial interview with Ingerson, it was determined that investigators "needed to talk to [Ingerson] a second time." Grizzard said that he and Texas Ranger Danny Briley went to Ingerson's home, but that Ingerson was not there. Grizzard said that while there, however, Briley spoke to Ingerson by telephone. By Grizzard's account, Ingerson agreed to go to the Granbury Police Department and was interviewed on Saturday, June 28, 2008.
During this interview, Grizzard said that he asked Ingerson what he was wearing while he was at Miyoka on the night before the bodies were discovered. Grizzard testified that Ingerson gave him permission to retrieve the pants he said he had worn from a local cleaners. Based on this, Grizzard said that Haught called the owner of the cleaners, who agreed to retrieve Ingerson's pants.
Grizzard testified that Ingerson initially told him that he believed that he had left Miyako at about 10:50 to 11:00 p.m. on Friday. Grizzard said that Ingerson corrected that timeframe when he was told about statements from other people who were at the bar having said that it was around 11:30 p.m. and that Ingerson conceded that that was the more correct time of his departure, saying he left with everyone else when the bar closed. Grizzard testified that the Little Miracles's surveillance video showed a car similar to Ingerson's drive by its location within minutes after the last outgoing call on Richter's cellphone.
Later, while at Ingerson's home, Grizzard said that he and Briley obtained permission to search Ingerson's car. No weapons were found in the car. They also asked to look at the weapons in Ingerson's home. According to Grizzard, one of the weapons there was a .44 Special Smith & Wesson revolver. Grizzard said that although they were looking for a .38 Colt Special or a .357 Colt, no such gun was found at Ingerson's home.
Grizzard testified that he knew he was looking for a Colt .38 Special or .357 Magnum revolver as he was searching for the murder weapon because of an examination of a projectile found in the back of the vehicle where the bodies were found. According to Grizzard, he had been told this by Calvin Story.2
Grizzard testified that during the time Story was asked to examine evidence, he sent Story a .38 Special caliber Colt model Cobra revolver that was in the possession of the Granbury police at that time for examination. By Grizzard's account, this gun was obtained from David Hill, who was arrested for a D.W.I., and it was seized as evidence and put in the police department's safekeeping. Story concluded in his report that he was unable to identify or eliminate the Cobra revolver as having fired the bullet found at the scene of the murders.3
Grizzard testified that Ingerson reported that he had talked with Richter and Ferris after he came out of the restaurant on Friday, June 27. Grizzard said that his investigation confirmed this in that Ingerson's palm prints and fingerprints were found on the vehicle.4 However, Grizzard testified that although there was an extensive investigation by investigators taking hair and fiber samples and DNA, there was no biological evidence collected at the crime scene or at Ingerson's home that connected him by forensic evidence to the murders aside from the palm prints and fingerprints. Grizzard did say that investigators found several other palm prints and fingerprints on the vehicle that have never been identified. Grizzard also said that none of the two victims' biological material—including hair, blood, or DNA—were recovered from any of Ingerson's shoes or clothing that investigators tested, including the pants that Ingerson voluntarily allowed investigators to retrieve from the cleaners.
Grizzard also testified that during his investigation he received "information that there were a couple of people [who] made the remark" that they had killed the two women. Specifically, Grizzard said that one person "for sure did make a remark that he killed the girls" and that another person had informed investigators that the murders were related to the "Aryan Circle" but that the informant also said that the murders involved another gang, "Tango Blast." Grizzard also said that he received information that the Aryan Brotherhood had committed the murders. Grizzard said that he did not pursue a lead regarding the Aryan Circle because the information he obtained was that the women were killed with a shotgun and he knew definitely that they were not. Grizzard said that Christopher Tibbs, the individual who claimed to have killed the two women, was investigated and that it was determined that Tibbs did not know relevant details about the murders and that he had lied about his involvement in the murders "to look tough in front of some other people."
State's Witness Michael Mathew :
Michael Mathew, who testified that he was sixty years old at the time of trial and a resident of Kingman, Indiana, was the fourth witness. Mathew testified that he was involved in a 1999 transaction in which Ingerson purchased guns from a gun dealer named James Elrod.5 Mathew said that he delivered two guns to Ingerson at the same time and that he took a check, which had been written on a company account, from Ingerson to pay for them. Mathew said that he then delivered that check to Elrod. Mathew said that one of the guns that he delivered to Ingerson was a Colt and that he remembered that it was because "[y]ou just didn't see many little Colts like that at the time."
State's Witness James Elrod :
James Elrod was the fifth witness. Elrod confirmed that he sold a .38 Special bobbed-hammer gun to Ingerson in 1999 through Mathew. He said that he bought the Colt .38 Special revolver at Darrel's Guns, a gun shop in Indiana. During Elrod's time on the stand, the State introduced State's Exhibit 17. Part of State's Exhibit 17 contained a photocopy of the check that Ingerson used to pay for the two guns. Elrod described for the jury how on the check's memo line the word "Door" is written. Elrod said that he knew that the check was written as such at the time and that he "didn't like it" but that...
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