Murphy v. State

• Decision Date: 25 June 2003
• Docket Number: No. 74,145.,74,145.
• Citation: 112 S.W.3d 592
• Parties: <B>JEDIDIAH ISSAC MURPHY, Appellant</B> <B>v.</B> <B>THE STATE OF TEXAS.</B>
• Court: Texas Supreme Court

Page 1

112 S.W.3d 592

JEDIDIAH ISSAC MURPHY, Appellant v. THE STATE OF TEXAS.

No. 74,145.

Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas.

Delivered June 25, 2003.

ON DIRECT APPEAL FROM DALLAS COUNTY.

Holcomb, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Meyers, Price, Keasler, and Cochran, JJ., joined. Keller, P.J., concurred in the result with respect to Point of Error Number Three and otherwise joined the opinion of the Court. Johnson, J., filed an opinion, in which Womack and Hervey, JJ., joined, that concurred in the result with respect to Points of Error Numbers Seven and Eight and otherwise joined the opinion of the Court.

OPINION

Appellant was convicted in June 2001 of capital murder. Tex. Penal Code Ann. §19.03(a). Pursuant to the jury's answers to the special issues set forth in Texas Code of Criminal Procedure Article 37.071, §§ 2(b) and 2(e), the trial judge sentenced appellant to death. Art. 37.071 §2(g).(¹) Direct appeal to this Court is automatic. Art. 37.071 §2(h). Appellant raises twenty points of error. We affirm.

In his first point of error, appellant claims the trial court violated his rights under the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution by limiting his voir dire questioning pertaining to the State's burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that appellant posed a future danger. In a pretrial hearing, appellant sought permission from the trial court to ask prospective jurors the following two questions:

Would victim character testimony cause you to reduce the State's burden of proof on Special Issue Number 1?

Do you promise the Court that you would not do so?

The State objected on the ground that the questions sought commitments from the jurors. The court sustained the State's objection. Appellant argues that his questions simply inquired whether prospective jurors would hold the State to its burden of proof notwithstanding the presence of evidence of the victim's character.

A trial court has broad discretion over voir dire, including the propriety of particular questions. Barajas v. State, 93 S.W.3d 36, 38 (Tex. Crim. App. 2002). A trial court's discretion is abused only when a proper question about a proper area of inquiry is prohibited. Id.

The trial court did not abuse its discretion in disallowing the questions. Appellant did not state how "victim character testimony" would be defined nor did he state whether or not venirepersons would be informed of this area of law before being asked such questions. Cf. Chambers v. State, 903 S.W.2d 21, 29 (Tex. Crim. App. 1995)(stating venireperson not shown biased or prejudiced against the law unless the law is first explained to them). A proper explanation of the law is essential before asking a question upon which a challenge for cause due to bias against the law might be based. See id. Prospective jurors would need to be informed that the standard of proof by which the State must prove its case remains constant; it may not be increased or reduced depending upon the presentation of a certain type of evidence. In addition, because the standard of proof by which the State must prove its case is not affected by the presentation of any certain type of evidence, the trial court could reasonably have concluded that the questions would be confusing or misleading. Point of error one is overruled.

In his second point of error, appellant asserts the same argument he made in point of error one under Article I, Section 10 of the Texas Constitution. However, because appellant does not argue that the Texas Constitution provides, or should provide, greater or different protection than its federal counterpart, appellant's point of error is inadequately briefed. See Heitman v. State, 815 S.W.2d 681 (Tex. Crim. App. 1991). Point of error two is overruled.

In his third and fourth points of error, appellant claims the trial court abused its discretion by granting the State's challenge for cause against venireperson Alena Treat, in violation of Article 35.16 and the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The trial court granted the State's challenge for cause against Treat on the ground that she would require proof of another murder or attempted murder before finding appellant would commit criminal acts of violence that would pose a continuing threat to society. Appellant relies on the reasoning in Garrett v. State, 851 S.W.2d 853, 859 (Tex. Crim. App. 1996), and cites Witherspoon v. Illinois, 391 U.S. 510 (1969), to argue that Treat's views about the death penalty would not have prevented or substantially impaired her ability to follow the court's instructions or the law and her juror's oath.

During voir dire, Treat stated that her understanding of the phrase "criminal acts of violence" meant "the same type of crime" as the capital murder that the defendant would have been convicted of in the guilt phase. Treat maintained that the State would have to prove that the defendant would commit or attempt to commit another murder in order to prove future dangerousness. When questioned by the trial court, Treat stated that intentionally causing a person to become mentally disabled by giving them a drug that would put them into a coma would also rise to the level of a criminal act of violence but conceded later that even these circumstances essentially amounted to an attempted murder.

In Fuller v. State, 829 S.W.2d 191, 200 (Tex. Crim. App. 1992), cert. denied, 508 U.S. 941 (1993), the venireperson was challenged for cause on the ground that she would consider imposing capital punishment for serial murderers only. We said that "[b]ecause our law does not categorically reserve capital punishment only for those who have murdered before, neither may individual jurors in a capital murder case." We accordingly held that under these circumstances, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in granting the State's challenge for cause. Id. at 201.

In Garrett, 851 S.W.2d at 859, the trial court granted the State's challenge for cause against a venireperson who testified that he could never answer the future dangerousness issue affirmatively based solely on the facts of the capital offense. The venireperson was struck for harboring a bias or prejudice against the law upon which the State was entitled to rely. We reversed, explaining that each juror must decide for himself what amount of proof would constitute the threshold of beyond a reasonable doubt:

[T]hat the law permits jurors to find future dangerousness in some cases on the facts of the offense alone does not mean that all jurors must do so, or even consider doing so. A particular juror's understanding of proof beyond a reasonable doubt may lead him to require more than the legal threshold of sufficient evidence to answer the second special issue affirmatively. There is nothing unlawful about that; in fact, quite the opposite. As the trial judge himself explained to Bradley early in his voir dire, an individual juror must determine what proof beyond a reasonable doubt means to him, for the law does not tell him[.] . . . That an individual venireman would set his threshold higher than the minimum required to sustain a jury verdict does not indicate he has a bias or prejudice against the law.

Id. (emphasis added and footnotes and citations omitted).

In Rachal v. State, 917 S.W.2d 799, 811 (Tex. Crim. App.)(plurality opinion), cert. denied, 519 U.S. 1043 (1996), two venirepersons were challenged for cause by the State. Venireperson Terrell testified that even if she believed beyond a reasonable doubt that the State had proved future dangerousness, she would not answer the issue affirmatively unless the State also presented evidence that the defendant had a prior felony conviction. Id. Venireperson Adams testified that even if convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant would be a future danger, he would nevertheless require evidence that the defendant would kill another human being before he would answer the issue affirmatively. The defendant conceded that under Fuller, the venirepersons were properly challenged, but argued that Fuller had been overturned by Garrett. A plurality of the Court disagreed, holding that Fuller controlled and Garrett was distinguishable. Id. at 811.

A year later, a majority of the Court in Howard v. State, 941 S.W.2d 102, 129 (Tex. Crim. App. 1996)(op. on reh'g), cert. denied, 535 U.S. 1065 (2002), reaffirmed the reasoning in Garrett, holding that:(²)

A venireman who requires evidence of a prior murder has not demonstrated an inability to abide by the law if his requirement is predicated upon his personal threshold of reasonable doubt. The State must show more, viz: that the venireman's insistence on evidence of a prior murder will prevent him from honestly answering the special issue regardless of whether he was otherwise convinced beyond a reasonable doubt of future dangerousness, before it can be said it has met its burden to demonstrate the venireman cannot follow the law.

Id. Thus, under Howard, it is plain that prospective jurors may form their own definitions of proof beyond a reasonable doubt and they are not challengeable for cause based upon

the type and amount of evidence they require to reach that level of confidence. Id. at 127. Only if the venireperson would refuse to answer the issue "yes" unless a certain type of evidence is presented, even if the other evidence presented were sufficient to convince them of the special issue beyond a reasonable doubt, would the venireperson be challengeable for cause. Id. Accordingly, the trial court erred in granting the State's challenge for cause against Treat. Treat was entitled to determine for herself what future dangerousness meant to her. That she would require a murder or attempted murder did not render her challengeable for cause. Id.

But Treat's exclusion from the jury may not necessarily be cause for reversal. See Cain v. State, 947 S.W.2d 262, 264 (Tex. Crim. App. 1997)(stati...