Dallas Criminal Defense Lawyer Blog

December 29, 2022

Defendant in Texas Drug Case Appeals Conviction, Arguing It Resulted from Violation of Discovery Rules, False Evidence, and Insufficient Evidence

In a recent Texas criminal case, the defendant appealed the trial court decision, arguing that his conviction was the result of discovery violations, and false evidence, and was based on insufficient evidence. The defendant was convicted of possession of a controlled substance in Penalty Group 2, in an amount greater than or equal to one gram but less than four grams. The trial court then sentenced him to six years of incarceration.

Facts of the Case

The defendant was arrested for possessing vape cartridges containing what law enforcement officers believed to be THC. Following his arrest, the officers sent the confiscated cartridges to a laboratory under contract with the State of Texas. Ultimately, evidence and testimony from members of the laboratory resulted in the successful conviction of the defendant by the State. In particular, the laboratory’s director, Kelly Wouters, played a vital role in the State’s case.

While Wouters testified as a surrogate witness for the work and analysis performed by other people in the laboratory, questioning by the State gave the impression that Wouters himself had performed certain aspects of the hands-on analysis and tasks. When pressed on the issue, Wouters stated that he was in charge of supervision for those tasks, though he admitted that he was not personally in a position to know if a worker was violating protocols. Additionally, Wouters attempted to establish through his testimony that he personally participated in the laboratory quality control measures when it came to the analysis of the evidence in this case. In fact, he was not present for the lab testing or the implementation of quality control measures when it came to the examination of evidence in this case. Additionally, the State did not identify the specific employees that conducted the laboratory analysis that Wouters claimed to be responsible for.

The defendant’s attorney emphasized the importance of the laboratory records to the State, but the existence of additional laboratory workers was revealed only just prior to the beginning of the trial and the State downplayed the role that those workers played in the testing process. Additionally, based on testimony by an expert witness called by the defendant, the 39-page laboratory packet provided by the State was “grossly insufficient” and “significantly lacking” when it came to making meaningful conclusions from the data. Finally, the State’s laboratory expert testified that due to chemical tendencies, the content within the pods would convert to the illegal THC that was being tested for.

December 13, 2022

State of Texas Successfully Appeals Unfavorable Decision in DWI Case

by Robert Guest

In a recent case before the Texas Court of Appeals, the State asked the court to reconsider an originally unfavorable verdict. After a defendant had been charged with driving while intoxicated, he quickly filed a motion to suppress incriminating statements he made to police officers after the incident. The lower court granted this motion, deciding the defendant’s statements to police officers could not be introduced at trial. On appeal, however, the State argued this decision was unconstitutional; ultimately, the higher court agreed and reversed the lower court’s decision.

Facts of the Case

According to the opinion, a 911 caller one evening reported that he had seen a car crash into a utility pole and immediately drive away. The caller told the 911 operator that the car’s driver, who turned out to be the defendant in this case, had emerged from his car to survey the damage, and he appeared to be bleeding from his ear. The caller followed the defendant to his house to check on him, giving the 911 operator the defendant’s address.

Soon, police officers arrived at the defendant’s home and knocked on the door. The defendant answered, and he was holding a cloth to his bleeding ear. The officer asked the defendant several questions, and the defendant was eventually asked to take field sobriety tests. Soon after, the defendant was arrested for driving while intoxicated. At the station, the defendant’s blood alcohol concentration came through as .173, well over the legal limit of .08 in Texas.

December 1, 2022

Court of Appeals Affirms Trial Court Decision in Favor of the State in Texas Drug Case

by Robert Guest

In a recent Texas drug case, the court of appeals affirmed the trial court decision, holding that the trial court did not abuse its discretion, that the trial court’s denial of the motion for a new trial was not so clearly wrong as to lie outside that zone within which reasonable persons might disagree, and that the evidence presented was sufficient for the trial court to find appellant guilty of the charged offense. The appellant was charged with possessing two vape cartridges containing THC and entered a plea of not guilty and waived his right to a jury.

Facts of the Case

According to the opinion, the appellant was encountered by police officers as they responded to a criminal trespass call from an L.A. Fitness location in August 2019. One of the police officers performed a consent search of the appellant’s personal property and discovered a small box containing two THC vape cartridges in his fanny pack. The labeling on the box indicated that the content was created with medical cannabis. The police officer took the evidence to the police station, where it was inventoried. Following the completion of a drug lab submission form, the evidence was sent to Armstrong Forensic Laboratory (Armstrong) for analysis. Armstrong was asked to test the fluid for controlled substances, including delta-9 THC, one of the isomers of THC. In Texas, a delta-9 THC concentration threshold of 0.3 percent distinguishes whether a substance is hemp, which is legal, or not. Dr. Kelly Wouters, Armstrong’s director, testified that the fluid in each vape cartridge tested positive for delta-9 THC above the threshold amount.

The State introduced into evidence a lab report prepared by Wouters and a case filed, which contained bench notes, raw analytical data, calibrations on quality control methods, and backstops to ensure the testing was performed correctly. The defense counsel questioned Wouters on cross-examination regarding a number of things, including the chain of custody for the evidence at Armstrong. Wouters testified that the case file did not include any chain of custody details, but the names of four or five individuals at the lab who could have touched the evidence and information regarding who received and analyzed the samples could be made available. The names were made available to the defense counsel, but no further questions were asked about the work performed and nobody else from the lab was called to testify. The trial court found the appellant guilty of THC possession as charged in the indictment and sentenced him to six years of confinement.

November 15, 2022

Texas Court Rejects State’s Appeal, Affirming Judge’s Decision to Grant Defendant’s Motion to Suppress

by Robert Guest

In a recent case involving a motion to suppress evidence stemming from a traffic stop, a Texas Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court decision, holding that the police officer did not have reasonable suspicion to stop the defendant. The defendant was pulled over after the police officer claimed that the truck crossed the white line into an adjacent lane briefly. At trial, a grand jury returned an indictment charging the defendant with fraudulent possession of identifying information and forgery of a government instrument. The defendant subsequently filed a motion to suppress the evidence collected during the initial traffic stop.

Facts of the Case

According to the opinion, David Alfaro, an officer with the City of Corpus Christi Police Department, was the sole witness for the prosecution. Officer Alfaro testified that he observed a U-Haul truck parked at a fast food restaurant in Corpus Christi around 1:19 A.M. Officer Alfaro stated that he had received a notice to be on the lookout for a U-Haul truck that had been involved in multiple local burglaries. As a result, he followed the U-Haul in his marked patrol car onto the I-37 highway before observing the U-Haul truck’s fires cross the line into the adjacent lane briefly. Officer Alfaro then initiated a traffic stop based on his suspicion that the defendant failed to maintain the vehicle in a single lane.

At trial, the court admitted Officer Alfaro’s dash-cam video footage. The footage depicts the defendant’s U-Haul traveling in the center lane of a three-lane highway. The U-Haul truck is the only vehicle visible in the footage for the duration of the video. The passenger side rear tire of the U-Haul truck can be seen briefly straddling the lane divider after rounding a curve. The U-Haul truck then moves towards the opposite lane divide, remaining in its lane. Officer Alfaro then activated his patrol lights and initiated the traffic stop. The trial court found that Officer Alfaro lacked reasonable suspicion to stop the defendant and granted the defendant’s motion to suppress.

October 20, 2022

Commercial DNA Testing Technologies are Accepted by Texas Courts

by Robert Guest

Criminal investigators and prosecutors have always used whatever technology is available to assist them in finding and prosecuting alleged criminal activity. Technology has come a long way in the past century. Instead of using magnifying glasses and dusting for fingerprints, today’s detectives utilize cutting-edge technology to identify and prosecute criminal suspects. The advent of DNA technology in the past 40 years has revolutionized criminal investigation. New technologies are not always reliable, however, and “junk science” has been used in the past by prosecutors when securing illegitimate convictions. The Texas Court of Appeals recently addressed a defendant’s challenge to a relatively new method of DNA analysis.

The defendant in the recently decided case was arrested and charged with sexual assault after an investigation pointed to him as a suspect in the rape of a neighbor. Police recovered many pieces of evidence to link the suspect to the crime, and biological samples were taken from the defendant to compare with evidence left at the crime scene using DNA testing technology. During the trial, the prosecutor called an expert witness to discuss the results of the DNA testing. The DNA testing for this case was performed using a technology known as Y-STR testing. According to the witness’s testimony, the defendant’s DNA matched the semen recovered from the crime scene. The expert testified that the chances of the DNA being from another unrelated person from the suspect were 1/237,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. Based on the testimony from the expert, as well as the other evidence offered at trial, the defendant was convicted of the crimes.

The defendant appealed his conviction on several grounds, mostly arguing that the DNA testing was unreliable and that the Y-STR testing technology used by the prosecutor’s expert was not proven to be accurate. On appeal, the high court rejected the defense’s arguments, noting that settled Texas law accepts DNA testing as a reliable method of identification, and previous Texas Supreme Court decisions have allowed the admission of Y-STR evidence that was even less compelling than that offered in this case. As a result of the high court’s ruling, the defendant’s conviction will stand

October 12, 2022

Texas Defendant Loses Appeal in Murder Case with Appellate Court Lacking Jurisdiction to Rule on Issue

by Robert Guest

In a recent murder case coming out of a Texas court, the defendant unsuccessfully argued on appeal that the trial court abused its discretion by failing to grant either a motion to recuse or referring a request to the presiding judge of a case under Rule 18(f). The defendant was convicted of the offenses of murder and aggravated assault and was sentenced to 45 years of confinement for each of the convictions. The State argued that the appellate court lacked jurisdiction to rule on the issue, arguing for a dismissal of the defendant’s claim. On appeal, the appellate court ruled that the issue did not fall within the court’s jurisdiction, and subsequently rejected the claim.

Facts of the Case

In 2011, the defendant was convicted of both murder and aggravated assault and sentenced to 45 years of confinement for each of the offenses. The clerk’s record from the trial court stage indicates that the defendant filed a verified motion to recuse in both trial court cases. At the bottom of the defendant’s motion is the trial court’s signature, with a handwritten ruling granting the motion, as well as a date of signing. In response to this appeal, the State has filed a motion to dismiss the claim on the grounds that the appellate court lacks jurisdiction. The State argues that there is no right to appeal an order granting recusal and any attempt to appeal the failure to rule on a motion to recuse should be moot because the trial court granted the motion.

September 30, 2022

Texas Defendant Loses Appeal in Murder Case with Appeals Court Affirming His Conviction

by Robert Guest

In a recent murder case coming out of a Texas court, the defendant unsuccessfully argued on appeal that the trial court erred in denying his motions to suppress, a portion of the State’s DNA evidence linking him to the murder, and custodial statements made to law enforcement. In 2019, the defendant was sentenced to life imprisonment after entering an open plea of guilty of capital murder. On appeal, the court overruled the defendant’s challenges and affirmed the trial court decisions.

The Facts of the Case

According to the opinion, the defendant was arrested in 2019 for a murder committed in 1974 after the cold case was reopened. While the defendant was a suspect in the initial investigation, he was released after being given a polygraph test. After the case was reopened in 2019, various items from the crime scene were sent for testing at the Serological Research Institute (SERI) for DNA testing. When no matching profiles were found in the FBI database, the DNA profile was sent to a laboratory in Houston for forensic-grade genomic sequencing (FGGS). The FGGS test resulted in a match with the defendant’s profile.

Following the match, detectives conducted a trash run on the defendant’s home, collecting five bags of discarded trash to test for the defendant’s DNA. The DNA collected from the trash of the defendant matched the DNA profile produced by the FGGS DNA profile of items from the crime scene. The defendant was arrested and he admitted to detectives that he committed the murder, revealing the location of the murder weapon in the process.

September 12, 2022

Domestic Violence Accusations and Firearm Ownership Rights

by Robert Guest

Criminal, statutes in Texas and nationwide have long included specific provisions to address domestic violence offenses. Early statutes were only able to protect spouses from the alleged abuse, but the laws have developed in a way that now includes cohabitating parents, and even dating partners who do not live together and share no children. The recent expansion of the definition of domestic violence under federal law to include “dating violence” may affect the civil rights of Texans who have been accused of domestic violence offenses. More specifically, a conviction may mean that you are prevented from legally owning a gun, despite your Second Amendment rights.

The Second Amendment to the U.S. The Constitution protects the rights of Americans to keep and bear arms. Although many challenges to the Second Amendment have failed over the years, the U.S. The Supreme Court has ruled that the federal government can restrict people who have been convicted of a domestic violence offense from owning firearms. Congress passed such a law in 1968, and it has been used to keep firearms out of the hands of those who have committed domestic violence. Over the years, courts have upheld this restriction on gun ownership, finding that it is a reasonable interpretation of the Second Amendment.

As the definition of domestic violence has expanded under both Texas and Federal law, the application of the federal law restricting gun ownership has become broader. Cases that in the past would not have qualified for a firearm restriction are now serving as the basis of a restriction. The federal law that restricts gun ownership is applied automatically to any person convicted of a state-level domestic violence offense or who is subject to a domestic violence-related protective order.

August 31, 2022

40-Year Sentence Affirmed in Assault Case Involving Children’s Scissors

by Robert Guest

The severity of charges that are brought for the crime of assault depends on many factors. If a weapon is used in an assault, the type of weapon used can aggravate simple assault charges, possibly resulting in a serious felony conviction and significant jail time for an offender. The Texas Court of Appeals recently released a decision in which they affirmed the defendant’s conviction and subsequent sentence for aggravated assault for an attack involving a pair of children’s scissors.

According to the facts discussed in the appellate opinion, the defendant was a long-term romantic partner of the victim and allegedly attacked her with scissors during an argument, cutting her on the arm and causing her to seek medical attention. Based on the injuries sustained in the fight, as well as threats and other abuse mentioned by the victim, the defendant was charged with aggravated assault. The charge was aggravated based on the relationship between the defendant and the victim, as well as the use of a deadly weapon, namely, the scissors.

The victim did not testify at trial, and the defense argued that the children’s scissors could not be considered a deadly weapon to aggravate the charges against him. The prosecution called witnesses who testified that the scissors could cause serious bodily injury if used with significant strength. It was up to the jury to decide if the scissors were to be considered a deadly weapon. Additionally, the prosecution admitted statements by the victim that the defendant repeatedly threatened to seriously hurt her if she ever reported the abuse to authorities. The jury found the defendant guilty of the aggravated assault charge, and he was sentenced to 40 years in Texas State Prison.

August 11, 2022

Texas Defendant Loses Appeal in Murder Case, Despite Lack of Representation During Interrogation Process

by Robert Guest

In a recent murder case coming out of a Texas court, the defendant unsuccessfully argued on appeal for the suppression of statements to police officers. Originally, the defendant was charged with and convicted of capital murder based on an incident from 2017. On appeal, the court ruled that the defendant’s rights had not been violated and that his original convictions should be affirmed.

The Facts of the Case

According to the opinion, the defendant was arrested after he was allegedly involved in a 2017 murder. In a statement to police officers immediately following the arrest, the defendant admitted to conspiring with three other individuals to rob the murder victim. He also admitted that eventually, the situation worsened and the group ended up shooting the victim and discarding him in a nearby river.

The defendant was charged with capital murder. In 2019, he filed a motion to suppress, and he asserted that the incriminating statements to law enforcement should not be entered into evidence. The trial court overruled the defendant’s motion to suppress. He was eventually found guilty and sentenced to life in prison. The defendant promptly appealed.