Navarro v. State, 01-11-00139-CR
| Decision Date | 30 August 2012 |
| Docket Number | NO. 01-11-00140-CR,NO. 01-11-00139-CR,01-11-00139-CR,01-11-00140-CR |
| Parties | MIGUEL ANGEL NAVARRO, Appellant v. THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee |
| Court | Texas Court of Appeals |
On Appeal from the 240th Judicial District Court
Fort Bend County, Texas
After the juvenile court waived jurisdiction1 and certified appellant, Miguel Angel Navarro, to stand trial as an adult in criminal district court, a jury foundappellant guilty of the offenses of murder2 and aggravated assault3 and assessed his punishment at confinement for ninety-nine years. In his first and second issues, appellant contends that the juvenile court erred in transferring the case to criminal district court and not holding a hearing on his motion to suppress evidence. In his third, fourth, and fifth issues, appellant contends that the trial court erred in not suppressing certain evidence and instructing the jury.
We affirm.
After appellant, then fifteen years of age, was charged with the murder of Matthew Haltom4 and the aggravated assaults of Joe Eodice5 and Joel Arnold, the State filed a Petition for Discretionary Transfer in the juvenile court, requesting that it waive its jurisdiction and certify appellant to stand trial as an adult in criminal district court.
Before the transfer hearing, appellant moved to suppress certain statements that he had made to police officers. The State argued that the juvenile court wasnot required to consider the motion because a transfer hearing is "only a baseline finding as to whether or not [the juvenile court believes] that there is probable cause" that appellant committed the offense. The juvenile court agreed that appellant was not entitled to a hearing on his motion, and, at the conclusion of the transfer hearing, it granted the State's petition.
At trial, Mackenzie Haltom, Matthew Haltom's sister, testified that on December 26, 2007, her brother had a "bonfire" party at their parent's house. When she arrived at the house, she found 40 to 50 people standing around the bonfire in the back yard. Ten to fifteen more people, who Mackenzie and Matthew did not know, arrived approximately thirty minutes later. Matthew became upset, "swearing and yelling," and asked the new arrivals to leave several times. Although the new arrivals agreed to leave, they only relocated from the back yard to the front yard. When Matthew learned that they had not left the property, he walked to the front yard with a group including Arnold and Eodice. Matthew and his friends then argued with the new arrivals, demanding that they leave the property. The argument escalated until somebody threw a beer bottle at Matthew, after which the two groups started fighting.
During the fight, Mackenzie saw Eodice "in a fetal position" with two people attacking him. Later, after the fight had subsided, she saw Matthew, bleeding profusely, collapse onto the ground. While she was waiting foremergency assistance, she noticed Eodice "laid down on the street" bleeding and Arnold "bent over holding his back." After paramedics arrived to take the three young men to a hospital, Mackenzie learned that Matthew had died of stab wounds.
Sarah Strelecki testified that on December 26, 2007, she was at her cousin's house when her cousin's boyfriend, Eric Hernandez, arrived in a car to pick them up. They met with a few friends, including Jeremy Cano, Victor Olivo, and Eric's cousin, Antonio Hernandez, who invited them to a party. Eric, following Cano's car, drove Strelecki and her cousin to the party, and they arrived at the Haltoms' house in a group of "eight or ten" people. Matthew approached Strelecki's friends and asked them to leave because there were "too many people" with them that he was unfamiliar with. Strelecki and her cousin retreated to Eric's car, but others in the group started "yelling vulgar things" and "screaming." The conflict escalated until "people started punching" each other. Eric returned to the car and attempted to drive away from the fight, but the street was "too crowded" for them to leave. In the car's headlights, she saw someone, later identified as appellant, holding a knife behind his back while "watching the fight" and "moving side to side." On cross-examination, Strelecki admitted that she had not seen appellant stab anyone.
Olivo, a friend of appellant's since they were in first grade together, testified that he rode to the Haltoms' house with Cano and Antonio. When they arrived at the party, Olivo saw appellant exit the back yard with a group of people who had just been asked to leave. During the fight, Olivo saw appellant on the ground "getting jumped." Appellant had a knife in his hand and "pull[ed]" someone down with him." Olivo later told a police officer that he had seen appellant stab a "white guy." After the fighting had subsided, Olivo got into Cano's car with appellant and several others. He noticed blood on appellant's sleeve and hands, and appellant stated that he had stabbed two people during the fight.
Cano, an acquaintance of appellant's, testified that he drove to the Haltoms' party with Olivo and Antonio. When the fighting started, Cano entered his car because he did not want to get involved, but his exit was blocked by the crowd. Before he could drive away, appellant entered the car. Cano noticed that appellant had blood on his clothing, and appellant stated that he had "stabbed" approximately "five people," including "two blacks." The group returned to Cano's house, where appellant produced his knife, which also had blood on it. Later, appellant claimed that he had stabbed only two people.
Giovanni Lopez, who had previously known appellant through his brother, testified that he was invited to the party, where he saw appellant standing by the bonfire in the back yard. During the fight, someone punched Lopez, and he fellbackwards into a ditch in front of the yard. Several people followed Lopez into the ditch, including an African-American male who had punched him. Appellant followed them into the ditch and told Lopez, "I got you," which, Lopez thought, meant that appellant had stabbed the African-American male. When leaving the Haltoms' house, Lopez got into the car with appellant, Cano, and Olivo. He saw that appellant had a knife in his hand and a blood stain on his own shoe.
The State then moved to introduce into evidence appellant's oral and written statements previously made to the police officers and a knife that had been retrieved from appellant's house. Appellant objected and moved to suppress both the statements and the knife, and the trial court held a hearing on his motion.
During the hearing on appellant's motion to suppress evidence, Fort Bend County Sheriff's Department ("FBCSD") Detective D. McKinnon testified that he was assigned to investigate the stabbings at the Haltoms' house. After Cano indicated that appellant might have information about the incident, McKinnon visited appellant's house to "try to make contact with him." He arrived at the house with three other police officers and knocked on the door, which "swung open" because it was ajar. A small child, later identified as appellant's five-year-old brother, stood in the middle of the living room, and, when McKinnon asked if any adults were home, the child responded, "No." McKinnon then "decided to enter the house to check the welfare of the child." He asked the child if appellantwas home, and the child pointed towards a bedroom door. McKinnon knocked on the bedroom door, and appellant answered, looking "like he had just woken up." Inside the bedroom, McKinnon saw a knife lying on appellant's bed. He asked appellant if he knew where his parents could be found, but appellant did not know. Several other police officers attempted to locate someone who could care for appellant's brother while McKinnon stayed at the house. As McKinnon waited for appellant's mother to return home, he asked appellant if he knew why police officers had come to the house, and appellant started to cry. McKinnon asked if he was involved in a fight at the Halstoms' house, and appellant admitted that "he might have stabbed a couple of people."
When appellant's mother, Maria Salazar, arrived at the house, McKinnon, through an interpreter, Detective M. Cox, asked Salazar for consent to search appellant's room because appellant had been "involved in an incident." Salazar orally consented to the search and signed a written consent form that authorized the police officers to search her "[h]ouse . . . [,] including appellant's bedroom," and to seize "any letter, the papers, the materials of any—that can be used against me in a criminal proceeding." The police officers then searched appellant's bedroom and seized the knife on appellant's bed, articles of clothing, and a small amount of marijuana. McKinnon later took recorded and written statements from appellant.
Salazar testified that on the morning of December 27, 2006, she went to work and left appellant to watch her younger son at home. She called appellant when she arrived at work, but "an officer took [the telephone] away from him" and told her that she "had to come home." When she arrived, the officers told her she could not enter the house, and she waited outside for approximately one hour. An officer handed her a piece of paper, which she signed, but she did not understand it very well. When she saw the officers, who had told her that they were "going to get a pair of pants" from appellant's bedroom, "moving things around" and "picking up everything," she asked them to stop because it became apparent that the officers were looking for more than clothing.
The trial court concluded that there was "nothing unlawful about the officers going into that home" and it was "entirely appropriate for the officers to inquire of a consent to search the home." Although it found that the written consent form signed by Salazar was "superfluous to the...
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