Wolfe v. State
| Decision Date | 15 February 2017 |
| Docket Number | NO. PD–0292–15,PD–0292–15 |
| Citation | 509 S.W.3d 325 |
| Parties | Jennifer Banner WOLFE, Appellant v. The STATE of Texas |
| Court | Texas Court of Criminal Appeals |
David A. Pearson, Attorney at Law, Lakeside Plaza, Fort Worth, TX, for appellant.
Tanya S. Dohoney, Assistant District Attorney, Fort Worth, TX, Stacey Soule, State's Attorney, Austin, for the State.
In this opinion, we address whether expert testimony on the subject of abusive head trauma is reliable. Jennifer Banner Wolfe, appellant, presents this issue in her petition for discretionary review following her conviction in a bench trial for first-degree-felony injury to a child after an infant under her care sustained serious internal head injuries. The primary evidence presented at appellant's trial was the testimony of the State's three expert witnesses, each of whom opined that the complainant's injuries were indicative of intentionally inflicted impact, also known as abusive head trauma, rather than accidental injury or a preexisting medical condition as appellant had suggested. Appellant objected to the State's experts' testimony on the basis that it was unreliable, but the trial court overruled her objection. On discretionary review, appellant challenges the court of appeals's ruling upholding the admissibility of this evidence on two bases. First, appellant contends that the court of appeals erred by concluding that the experts' testimony on abusive head trauma"based solely on a constellation of symptoms" was sufficiently reliable so as to render it admissible under the rules of evidence. Second, appellant contends that the court of appeals incorrectly determined that her appellate challenge to the reliability of the experts' testimony on abusive head trauma did not fairly include the issue of whether the expert testimony was unreliable "given this specific injured party's history."1
With respect to appellant's contention challenging the reliability of the experts' testimony of abusive head trauma based solely on a constellation of symptoms, we agree with the court of appeals's assessment that the experts' testimony was sufficiently reliable so as to warrant a conclusion that the trial court did not abuse its discretion by admitting that evidence, and we thus overrule appellant's complaint as to this matter. With respect to appellant's contention that the court of appeals erred by declining to consider this particular complainant's history in conducting its reliability analysis, we conclude that the court of appeals's analysis reflects that it did consider whether the experts' opinions were reliable in light of this complainant's particular injuries. Further, to the extent that appellant complains that the court of appeals improperly declined to consider the complainant's medical history of prior bleeding in the brain as a basis for rejecting the reliability of the State's experts' testimony, we conclude that appellant did not rely on the complainant's history of prior bleeding as a basis for arguing that the experts' opinions were unreliable, and thus the court of appeals did not err by declining to address that issue. Finding no error in the court of appeals's analysis, we overrule appellant's grounds for review, and we affirm the court of appeals's judgment upholding appellant's conviction.
Appellant ran an in-home daycare and was a licensed child-care provider. One morning, one of the children in appellant's care, seven-month-old Jack, sustained internal head injuries that caused him to lose consciousness.2 After appellant called 911, fire department officials arrived on the scene and began giving Jack CPR. By the time paramedics arrived, Jack's skin had turned blue, he did not have a pulse, and he was not breathing. Appellant told paramedics that, after feeding Jack, she had set him down on a foam-padded floor, he was crying and screaming loudly, and then he "just fell back unconscious."3 While he was being transported in the ambulance, as a result of CPR and other advanced life-support procedures, Jack's pulse and spontaneous breathing resumed. By the time he reached the hospital, Jack was awake and crying.
The doctors who examined Jack at the hospital determined that he needed immediate surgery to stop bleeding in his brain. Jack's injuries included a subdural hematoma, retinal hemorrhaging, and brain swelling—symptoms sometimes referred to as the "triad" of symptoms associated with abusive head trauma.4 He had no fractures, bruising, or other external physical injuries. A pre-operative CT scan of Jack's brain showed the presence of two older stages of blood in his brain as well as new bleeding, indicating that there had been bleeding in his brain in the past. Dr. Roberts, a pediatric neurosurgeon, performed an emergency craniotomy to evacuate the hematoma and to alleviate pressure in Jack's brain.
Appellant was charged with the offense of first-degree-felony injury to a child. The indictment alleged that she knowingly caused serious bodily injury to Jack by shaking him and/or by striking him against a hard surface. Appellant pleaded not guilty. She waived her right to a jury trial and the case proceeded to a bench trial.
In anticipation of the likelihood that the State would present expert testimony at trial, appellant filed a pretrial motion to determine the admissibility of that evidence. In her motion, she requested a hearing pursuant to Rules of Evidence 702, 703, and 705, as well as Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc. ,5 to determine the experts' qualifications and the reliability of the evidence. The trial judge granted appellant's motion for a hearing as to each of the State's expert witnesses.
Appellant's counsel then asked the trial court for a "running objection to any mention of [ ] shaken baby syndrome." She further requested that the trial court carry the motion with the trial and make a ruling on her motion after hearing all the experts' testimony in the case.7 The trial court agreed to carry appellant's motion with the trial.
In its case in chief, the State offered into evidence the testimony of three expert witnesses. The first of these witnesses was Dr. Roberts, the pediatric neurosurgeon who had performed Jack's craniotomy. Dr. Roberts stated that he had been actively practicing pediatric neurosurgery for approximately four years and that he had treated "many" children under the age of five who had suffered head trauma.8 He testified that Jack had presented with a subdural hematoma, or bleeding beneath the brain's dura, brain swelling, and compression of the brain that was "worrisome for surviving." While performing Jack's craniotomy, Dr. Roberts discovered that Jack had what was likely an avulsed bridging vein that had been pulled off the point where it ordinarily would connect to the sagittal sinus, resulting in brisk bleeding that was in turn causing compression of the brain.9 Dr. Roberts agreed with the suggestion that an avulsion of a bridging vein does not just happen within the course of everyday life, but instead would require some sort of force to cause it. Specifically, he stated, that, in the typical case, the cause will be "high-energy impact[ ] where force is sufficient to move the brain far enough away from the covering of the brain to stretch those bridging veins and tear them or avulse them." Although he indicated that Jack's injuries could not have been caused by shaking alone, Dr. Roberts stated that the injuries could have been caused by shaking plus impact or striking Jack against a hard surface, such as the floor. When asked how he could explain the lack of external injuries to Jack in light of his opinion that some impact was necessary to cause Jack's injuries, Dr. Roberts indicated that, if the "surface was a non-marking surface, say, something softer than concrete, we would not necessarily have to have a bruise, or it may not be evident as a bruise." He also found it significant that Jack had retinal hemorrhaging and retinal tearing, or retinoschisis. He stated that Jack's combined symptoms were "all classically associated with high-energy input to the head." He indicated that, typically, there would have to be acceleration and deceleration in order to cause the types of injuries that Jack presented with and that his injuries did not "fit the story" of Jack merely falling backwards onto a padded surface from a seated position. Dr. Roberts opined that, "in a normal, healthy brain, we see car accidents or falls from second-story windows to cause those types of injuries." As a result, it was his opinion, based on the "constellation" of symptoms, that Jack's injuries were caused by non-accidental trauma. Specifically, Dr. Roberts stated, "[B]ased on our history of seeing other non-accidental traumas with these exact same constellation of symptoms, then we would diagnose this as a ... subdural hematoma due to trauma and given the story, non-accidental because the story does not match the—the story doesn't match what I'm seeing clinically." Dr. Roberts agreed with the suggestion that his opinion...
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