Ruffin v. State, No. 10-06-00215-CR (Tex. App. 9/23/2009)
| Decision Date | 23 September 2009 |
| Docket Number | No. 10-06-00218-CR.,No. 10-06-00216-CR.,No. 10-06-00219-CR.,No. 10-06-00220-CR,No. 10-06-00222-CR.,No. 10-06-00221-CR.,No. 10-06-00215-CR.,No. 10-06-00217-CR.,10-06-00215-CR.,10-06-00216-CR.,10-06-00217-CR.,10-06-00218-CR.,10-06-00219-CR.,10-06-00220-CR,10-06-00221-CR.,10-06-00222-CR. |
| Parties | STEPHEN RUFFIN, Appellant, v. THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee. |
| Court | Texas Court of Appeals |
Appeal from the 52nd District Court, Coryell County, Texas, Trial Court Nos. 17796, 17797, 17798, 17799, 17800, 17801, 17802, and 17803.
Reversed and remanded.
Before Cheif Justice GRAY, Justice REYNA, and, Justice DAVIS (Chief Justice GRAY dissenting with note).*
On original submission, we affirmed Stephen Ruffin's convictions for aggravated assault on a public servant and found that expert testimony of a mental abnormality offered to negate the mens rea element was properly excluded because Ruffin was neither prosecuted for homicide nor pursuing an insanity defense. See Ruffin v. State, 234 S.W.3d 224 (Tex. App.-Waco 2007, pet. granted). The Court of Criminal Appeals reversed, finding the expert testimony relevant, and remanded for a Rule 403 analysis and a harm analysis if applicable. See Ruffin v. State, 270 S.W.3d 586, 595-97 (Tex. Crim. App. 2008). We reverse and remand.
Ruffin was charged with shooting at officers during a standoff on his property. At trial, he sought to admit expert testimony from Dr. William Carter to show that he suffered from a mental abnormality and did not know he was shooting at police officers. The trial court not only excluded the testimony because Ruffin had not raised an insanity defense and was not being prosecuted for homicide, but found: "[U]nder 403 it would be more confusing to the jury because they would intend to interpret it as an insanity defense which has not been raised." Ruffin contends that the trial court failed to explain why the evidence was more prejudicial than probative and "simply invoked Rule 403 in support of its belief that, as matter of law, [] Ruffin should not have been permitted to offer mental impairment evidence to negate mens rea because to do so was inherently confusing."
We agree that the trial court's ruling is based on an erroneous conclusion. See Ruffin, 270 S.W.3d at 597. Nevertheless, we must uphold the trial court's ruling if it is "correct under any theory of law applicable to the case," "even if the trial court gave the wrong reason for its ruling." Armendariz v. State, 123 S.W.3d 401, 404 (Tex. Crim. App. 2003). We, therefore, proceed with our Rule 403 analysis.
Under Rule 403, relevant evidence may be excluded where its "probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, confusion of the issues, or misleading the jury, or by considerations of undue delay, or needless presentation of cumulative evidence." TEX. R. EVID. 403. When conducting a Rule 403 analysis, the trial court must balance: (1) the inherent probative force of the proffered item of evidence; (2) the proponent's need for that evidence; (3) any tendency of the evidence to suggest decision on an improper basis; (4) any tendency of the evidence to confuse or distract the jury from the main issues; (5) any tendency of the evidence to be given undue weight by a jury that has not been equipped to evaluate the probative force of the evidence; and (6) the likelihood that presentation of the evidence will consume an inordinate amount of time or merely repeat evidence already admitted. Gigliobianco v. State, 210 S.W.3d 637, 641-42 (Tex. Crim. App. 2006); Newton v. State, No. 10-06-00160-CR, 2009 Tex. App. LEXIS 6534, at *9-10 ().
Carter opined that Ruffin suffers from "major depression with psychotic features," including "considerable irrationality," delusions, paranoia, and "lack of contact with reality." He explained "delusional thinking" to mean "beliefs that aren't based in reality," but a delusional person often believes that the delusions are true. Ruffin believed he was communicating with aliens and was an heir to the English throne. Carter further explained that a paranoid person believes that "people are out to get him" and is suspicious and mistrustful. According to Carter, Ruffin "interprets what [people] say and do according to his irrational or paranoid thinking, so his response to them is going to be based on his own irrationality as opposed to the other person's more rational state of being." He reviewed the recording of Ruffin's conversation with the police negotiator, whom Ruffin believed was a doctor. Carter believed that Ruffin was paranoid, irrational, hearing and seeing things, and unaware of the affect of his behavior on others on the night of the offense. He opined that Ruffin's condition "diminished his capacity to make rational judgments."
Several of Ruffin's friends and family members testified to his mental state. They testified that Ruffin was obsessed with the color orange, burned his mother's paintings because they contained other colors, talked to the television and a cigarette lighter, removed electrical appliances from the home because they were "bugged," wore a t-shirt with aluminum foil taped to it because he was receiving signals from a tower, cut his friend's hand when the friend failed to say that orange was his favorite color, believed he was receiving secret messages from the television, fired a doctor when his family tried to seek help, refused to eat his mother's food because he believed she was poisoning him, separated a photograph of his mother and father, believed that women were "getting rid of the men," promised his nephew a thousand orange helicopters from his kingdom, believed he had a castle in Scotland, and believed he was an heir to the thrown. Deputy Carol Brown, Ruffin's friend, was present during the standoff and testified that Ruffin said some unusual things and stated that he was declaring martial law. Witnesses described Ruffin as "off in left field," having "lost his rocker," and in his "own world."
Ruffin testified that he first noticed a problem when he drove through town and saw that it was a "hippy town" painted in "psychedelic colors." He explained that people on television were talking to him and ridiculing him. He heard two voices in his head: one female and Christian, the other male and Muslim. The voices liked each other, but not Ruffin. He covered his head with aluminum foil to escape the voices. He believed that the colors blue and orange were a "mafia plan." He recalled cutting his friend's hand. He believed that his mother murdered his father and brother and thought the Christian girls were killing the men. He asked the Sheriff's Department for a badge because he believed he was the "supreme commander" of the world.
On the night of the offense, Ruffin thought he was being hunted by Muslims. He had heard voices laughing at him and thought someone was stealing from him. When Brown called out to him, he told her to go away, accused her of trespassing, and fired some shots. At some point, he heard a helicopter and believed it was an Apache helicopter, with missiles, being flown by his sister. He thought Muslims were in the bushes, so he fired in the direction of the voices. He believed there were hundreds of Muslims. In the morning, he was surprised to see police vehicles in front of his house. After his arrest, Ruffin believed that the girls in the jail were "witches" walking around with black teeth and laughing.
As the Court of Criminal Appeals noted, "The testimony proffered by Dr. Carter in this case is clearly relevant to the issue of whether appellant intended to shoot at police officers during the standoff or whether, because of a mental disease and the delusions that he suffered as a result of that disease, he believed that he was shooting at Muslims or some other figment of his mind." Ruffin, 270 S.W.3d at 596. Because Carter's testimony was admissible to rebut the mens rea element of aggravated assault on a public servant, the inherent probative value of the evidence was great.
We are not persuaded that the probative value of this evidence is minimized by the lay testimony admitted at trial:
Although the trial judge permitted numerous lay witnesses, including appellant himself, to testify to "observational evidence" concerning appellant's mental breakdown and delusions, that evidence was never put into a mental-disease context or its psychological significance explained.
Ruffin, 270 S.W.3d at 596-97 (emphasis added). Carter's testimony was needed to perform this very function.
While the testimony would certainly be prejudicial to the State's case, it would not be unfairly so in proportion to its probative value. See Vasquez v. State, 67 S.W.3d 229, 240 (Tex. Crim. App. 2002) (). Rather than suggesting a decision on an improper basis, Carter's testimony would place the evidence of Ruffin's mental state in the proper context and allow the jury to properly evaluate the probative force of the evidence. The evidence goes to the heart of the main issue in the case: whether Ruffin committed the charged offense. We cannot say that the jury would have been confused, distracted, or misled by this evidence. See Ruffin, 270 S.W.3d at 595 ().
Finally, the record does not suggest that the testimony would cause "undue delay" or "needless presentation of cumulative evidence." Carter's testimony is not cumulative of other testimony at trial. The bill of exception consumed approximately nineteen pages of the record, and Carter's testimony at the punishment phase of trial consumed about...
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