[DEFENSE
COUNSEL]: Objection, Your Honor, argumentative.
[THE COURT]:
Overruled.
Q. Is that
what you want this jury to believe, that [Detective] Lusty made up
a bunch of this stuff and just got you to sign this?
A. I don't
believe he's a crooked cop.
Appellant
also testified on cross-examination.
Q. [PROSECUTION]:
All of a sudden, you give a detailed statement within hours of
murdering these people, and now you're coming in to disclaim that
you don't remember the details that's in that statement. Somebody
must have told you that or made that stuff up and had you sign it.
A. [APPELLANT]:
I remember where I went when I got in the vehicle, stuff like that,
but as far as the confession itself, that on paper, that I don't
recall.
Q. So you
very well could have told all this to [Detective] Lusty, you just
don't remember telling him that?
A. Yes,
that's true.
Q. Okay. So
at the time of this when he takes the statement that evening of
August the 4th, you could have remembered all these
details?
A. I don't
think so.
Appellant
presented other evidence that he had no criminal record and that,
before his crack cocaine addiction, he was considered by many to
be a responsible, law-abiding citizen. Family, friends and co-workers
of appellant testified that they were shocked when they heard that
appellant had murdered his family because they did not believe
that appellant was capable of committing such an act.
Appellant
also presented expert testimony (Simon) that appellant suffered "mild"
brain damage from the crack cocaine that he ingested over the
course of about two years. Appellant presented the testimony of
another expert (Nace) who testified that the shootings were the
result of a "cocaine-induced delirium" during which appellant was
not fully aware and not in control of what he was doing. This
expert also testified that he did not think that appellant would
be a continuing threat to society.
Q. [THE
DEFENSE]: Doctor, what happened to [appellant] when he took
cocaine back on August 4th of 2002.
A. [NACE]:
He had not used cocaine for 10 days prior to August the 4th,
and this was a Sunday. Went to church with his family, and at some
point after church-he had been struggling with the desire for
cocaine for days, and asked his wife could he just get $10 worth.
She eventually relented, gave him $10. She kept all the money
because he knew that, and she knew that if he had money, then the
temptation to buy cocaine would be there which is common in the
case with people caught up in this. So he didn't keep any of the
money. Anyway, she gave him $10. He bought the crack cocaine. And
she said, You have to smoke it outside. Okay? So he smoked it
outside. I think it was around about 5:30 or so, walked back into
the house to the bedroom, then his wife came in the bedroom and
said, You didn't [say] hello to my sisters, and said-he said, Well,
I don't-I don't want them to see me like this. And he had
described that his-he felt his face was puffy and he felt he
looked funny from smoking the cocaine so she left the room and
then shortly thereafter-and he doesn't have memory for a good bit
of this-got the gun that was in the house, and the shootings took
place after that.
And what he
recalled was hearing gunshots in his head, and then after he left
the house and got in his truck, he felt some-something-knew
something had gone wrong and he should return home. What he could
recall, shooting one daughter, couldn't recall whether people were
exactly what-how it happened. And he was in a-cocaine-induced
delirium, delirious state produced by the cocaine where there was
a serious change in brain functioning.
Q. Doctor, a
cocaine-induced delirium, is that a medically recognized decease
[sic]?
A. Yes, it
is.
Q. And is it
found in the DSM IV?
A. It is.
Q. Would you
explain to the jury briefly what the DSM IV is?
A. The DSM
IV is a book that catalogues all the different psychiatric
disorders, from depression, schizophrenia addictions and so on.
They're all kind of listed there and described and kind of the
criteria for each disorder are laid out.
Q. And that
is a medically recognized diagnosis?
A. Yes, it
is.
Q. All right.
Doctor, a delirium is not a rational state, is it, or-
A. No, a
delirium is a very serious mental state provoked by different
things, but certainly drugs of abuse can produce a delirium.
Cocaine is well known to do that. What happens is the person's
level of consciousness is-is disrupted. It's changed. And they are
in a position where they aren't as aware of what they're doing.
They're not as aware of their environment. They are not able to
sometimes shift their attention from what they're doing. They're-they
get irritated, excited, aggressive with certain types of delirium.
Their
thinking processes change at the same time. Typically, they won't
have good memory for parts of what's going on or what has happened.
They will also have perceptual disturbances. For example, in his
case, he was hearing gunshots for-going off in his head, the noise
of the gunshot for days and had some other sort of flashes going
through his mind which he couldn't quite understand. Delirium
typically does not last very long, at least not a cocaine delirium.
Q. Did I
hear you say that he heard the gunshots in his head for days
afterward?
A. Yes.
Q. Doctor,
as a result of your interviews, of various documents that you have
read, as a result of your experience and training in the field of
addictive behavior in the general field of psychiatry, have you
reached a conclusion as to whether [appellant] is a danger, a
continuing threat to society?
A. I don't
think he is a continuing threat.
Q. Why is
that, sir?
A. What
happened on August 4th was the result of his cocaine
addiction and triggering brain events beyond his control. And he
has no history of being a danger to society. Prior to that he had
a good work record for the most part, at least prior to his
addiction. He was not-he didn't have a criminal history. He wasn't
presenting a danger to anybody, and there is no reason to think he
would, if he's not addicted to cocaine.
Nace
testified on cross-examination that he "would expect bad things
could happen to" appellant if appellant "got back to a repetitive
pattern of cocaine use."
Q. [PROSECUTION]:
And if he were to get ahold of a dime rock of cocaine again and
take these two or three hits off of this, we could have another
catastrophe on our hands?
A. [NACE]:
We don't know that for sure because he's been off cocaine for
eight to nine months now. If he got back to a repetitive pattern
of cocaine use, I would expect bad things could happen to him.
The
prosecution's expert (Coons) provided testimony from which a jury
could infer that appellant would be a continuing threat to society.
Coons also attributed the murders to appellant's frustration and
anger and not to a "cocaine-induced delirium."
A. [COONS]:
-Lusty, and others, these officers who arrested him and so forth-put
that all together and you look at the history that he's giving-given,
adding it all together, the history that comes from him runs like
this: That he smoked the crack cocaine in the backyard. People-he
heard people in the house talking. He walked in, walked past them.
I believe I said hi. Went straight to the bedroom to lay down on
the bed, turned on the TV, looking at the ceiling. His wife came
in and said, That was rude. Why didn't you greet them, essentially.
Didn't want them to see me this way. While I was lying on the bed,
my body started wanting more crack. I knew if I asked my wife for
more money to buy crack, she wouldn't let me have it. I knew she
would argue with me about the money just like we did in the past.
And all
that's in his original statement to Detective Lusty. And what that-what
that is, is a person who is-who is thinking it over, deciding what
he wants to do, dealing with his problem, which is, I want some
more cocaine, and thinking through, Well, I can't get it from my
wife. She's not going to give me the money, she's going to get in
an argument with me, etcetera, just like we did in the past. And
then he talks about how, I got up off the bed and went to my
closet. I got my Ruger 9mm gun. The gun was already loaded.
Within 20
minutes or less, according to him and others-I believe someone
else put it at about 15 minutes, he comes out, walks into the
living room, Where my family was. And he said in the original
statement to which was given a few hours after this offense, that,
I started shooting while they were all sitting on the couch. And
he said that he did not recall who he shot first. I ran out of
bullets. I went back into the bedroom. I got another clip. I
walked back in the living room. My daughter Crystal saw me with my
gun. She started running away. I chased after her, and I shot her.
Went back in the bedroom.
I got my
wife's small plastic purse, got in the car, drove to Wynnewood
Shopping Center, tried to get some money from an ATM machine. I
didn't have the right code. I drove off, and the police stopped
me. They requested his ID. He said-replied, Sure. He was read his
rights, told them he understood them. Where is the gun? This is
6:33 p.m. This is within a half an hour after this offense, I
believe, something on that order-6:33 p.m.-6:10 I guess was the
best guess, so that's 23 minutes after the offense.
Where is the
gun? I left it in my house on the table. That's a reflection that
he recalls where he put the gun at the time that this offense was
going on. And he gives as an explanation, I couldn't handle the
stress. And that's his explanation for having done what he did,
which is an indication that he did have an understanding of what
he did. I got tired of my life is another statement about-he asks
at 7:45 about his-his baby, and at 8:15, I can't believe I did
that. This is his-his rendition at different times of what
happened there.
All of those
things reflect a perception of what happened, a recollection of
what happened, and all of those things notate against this being a
delirium. That's why I don't think it's a delirium. I think it's a
matter of anger. I think he was extremely frustrated with his
situation. He was married-he had a difficult relationship with his
wife, partly because he was continuing to use cocaine and not
being a husband and father. And-partly because of this Jonathan
problem that he had never gotten over.
And I think
that-if you look at the scene, you know this is-the first thing
that comes to your mind is anger. I mean, this was an angry
slaughter of people. And [appellant], I don't think, is in-I asked
him something about his anger, and I don't think he's in good
touch with his-with his angry and frustrated feelings about the
situation he was in. He didn't have a job. His-he didn't have any
money. He had a cocaine problem. He had made the wrong choice. He
didn't take his father's advice and go into this program and get
himself detoxified and off of it. Chose to stay on it. And this is
a result of it, a frustrated angry man.
During
closing jury arguments, the prosecution argued, among other things,
that anyone capable of murdering his family "is capable of
anything."
Is he going
to be dangerous in the future? I mean, you know, Mr. Miller, [appellant]
is not a violent man. That is just unbelievable. These people,
these bodies, the holes, his own flesh and blood, willing to do
that just because you're mad. Frustrated, stressful, willing to do
this, murder people like that. Anybody capable of doing that is
capable of anything, you know.
Appellant
argues that no rational jury could find beyond a reasonable doubt
that there is a probability that appellant would commit criminal
acts of violence that would constitute a continuing threat to
society because appellant's acts of murdering his family were an
aberration. He argues:
In the
instant cause, the evidence reflected that on August 4, 2002,
appellant . . . went from 0 to 60 in .01 of a second. He went from
a hard working, law-abiding (except for drug use) citizen and
devoted family man to a man capable of slaughtering five members
of his immediate family and nearly mortally wounding a sixth. This
offense is notable not only for its horror but for the striking
aberration from appellant's previous behavior.
We decide
that a rational jury could find beyond a reasonable doubt that
there is a probability that "a man capable of slaughtering five
members of his immediate family" would commit criminal acts of
violence that would constitute a continuing threat to society.
See Sonnier v. State, 913 S.W.2d 511, 517-18 (Tex.Cr.App.
1995) (jury could rationally conclude from the results of
defendant's isolated incident of rage in murdering a mother and
her two-year-old son that "his rage is of such an uncontrollable
and extreme nature that he is a continuing danger to society");
Dinkins v. State, 894 S.W.2d 330, 358-60 (Tex.Cr.App.),
cert. denied, 516 U.S. 832 (1995) (evidence that
defendant inflicted multiple gunshot wounds at close range to one
female murder victim and that he killed the other female murder
victim after hunting her down sufficient to support affirmative
answer to future dangerousness special issue). In addition, the
evidence supports a finding that appellant's murder of his family
was not an aberration or an isolated incident and that it was the
culmination of a pattern of abuse and threats directed by
appellant against his wife. And, appellant's own expert testified
that he "would expect bad things could happen to" appellant if
appellant "got back to a repetitive pattern of cocaine use." Point
of error two is overruled.
In point of
error one, appellant claims that the trial court erred at the
punishment phase "in overruling appellant's objection to the
admission of hearsay evidence and thereby deprived appellant of
his Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment right to the confrontation of
the witnesses against him." The evidence, which is the subject of
this point of error, is an August 1997 tape-recorded telephone
conversation between appellant and his wife while they were
separated over the Jonathan issue. The tape contains many
statements. About half of appellant's statements on the tape are
inaudible. Appellant complains about the following statements that
his wife made during the August 1997 tape-recorded telephone
conversation.
[APPELLANT]:
(Inaudible).
[APPELLANT'S
WIFE]: Why do you want to kill us?
[APPELLANT]:
(Inaudible).
[APPELLANT'S
WIFE]: What do you mean killed [sic] us? We haven't done anything
to you. You're the one that [sic] left.
Appellant
claims that these out-of-court statements by his wife were offered
for the truth of the matter asserted in them that appellant "was
threatening to kill more than just her, perhaps also his children
and/or family, which of course is what he eventually did." We note
(and believe it relevant in resolving this point of error) that
appellant also made a statement on the August 1997 tape
threatening to shoot his wife.
[APPELLANT]:
I am leaving. I am fixing to hang up. I have nothing else to say.
If you have anything to say about my daughter call me-if not don't
call me.
[APPELLANT'S
WIFE]: You're not gonna know nothing about your daughter.
[APPELLANT]:
Why not?
[APPELLANT'S
WIFE]: If she gets sick or anything you don't worry about us.
We're not gonna worry about you. You look-
[APPELLANT]:
(Inaudible) you don't worry about me! My daughter worries about me
and I worry about her.
[APPELLANT'S
WIFE]: How do you know she worries, worries about you?
[APPELLANT]:
(Inaudible)
[APPELLANT'S
WIFE]: Look, she-
[APPELLANT]:
Well see, you're starting to piss me off again. You want me to go
shoot you right now? What's wrong with you man? Why do you act
that way? Why do you say these words to me? Jerk. Witch.
When he
testified at the punishment phase, appellant did not deny that he
made the statement on the August 1997 tape threatening to shoot
his wife. He testified that his wife probably said something that
caused him to threaten to shoot her.
Q. [PROSECUTION]:
So why are you telling her then about coming over and shooting her?
Why are you saying that you wish you never had these children? Why
are you saying that? That's not due to anger?
A. [APPELLANT]:
Well, that phone conversation, she probably said something that
did make me mad or-one way or another, that caused me to say it.
Q. So she
would make you mad enough to where you would go and say, you know,
Why don't I come over and shoot you and I wish I never had these
children?
A. At times
we would argue heavily, which the first time I slapped her which
that's what happened. A lot of times our arguments that we had,
like any other couple, would get real-real heavy. And a lot of
times, you know, I would tell her, you know, she wouldn't stop
arguing. A lot of times I would tell her, you know, You need to
see a counselor. You don't know when to stop when we argue heavily,
and, you know, to say that-I mean, if I hadn't heard it on the
tape, I wouldn't have believed it myself.
Q. And you
sure wouldn't admit to doing it in front of this jury?
[DEFENSE
COUNSEL]: Object to side bar remark, Your Honor.
Q. Is that
true?
[THE COURT]:
Overruled.
A. Can you
repeat that?
Q. That
would be another thing you could deny if we didn't happen to have
it on tape. You would never admit to this jury that you ever
threatened to shoot [your wife]?
A. I
wouldn't remember it, no, but I would not-I'm here to tell the
truth.
Q. How many
times do you think you told her that-or threatened her, to shoot
her? How many times would you tell her that?
A. I don't
know. I don't think I told her any unless I-you know, if I hadn't
heard that tape, I would say none.
Q. And
that's just quite a coincidence the one time that you happen to
threaten your wife, tell her you would shoot her, just happens to
be she had a tape recorder running. There is no other times?
A. No, sir.
Q. No other
times you mention that you wish you'd never had those children?
A. No, sir.
Q. How about
calling her a bitch and a whore, how often would you do that in
front of all-in front of her family?
A. In front
of her family, I don't believe any.
The trial
court overruled the following objection that appellant made to the
admission of the August 1997 tape.
[APPELLANT]:
Judge, first of all, it's hearsay. Second of all, it's not
complete. You cannot hear the entire recording. And without the
other end of the recording, we have no way of knowing the context
or what was said or anything else, because on at least the first-more
than 50 percent of this recording there's no voice that's audible
on the other end that can be identified.
Furthermore,
there's a voice somewhere in the middle of the tape, sounds like a
child. That voice has not been identified. We've got no evidence
in the record with regard to the recording device, how it was used,
who made it, whether it's been altered or anything else. And she
comes on at the very end and says when this conversation occurs,
August 12th, 1997, on a Tuesday. You can obviously hear
the tape has been cut off and then that it is added at the end. We
don't have any way of knowing it was made at the same time. And
there has been no testimony with regard to that either.
Furthermore,
Judge, this conversation is completely out of context. It was made
more than 5 years-or 5 years prior to the events of August the 4th,
2002. It's strictly done for inflammatory purposes. I submit that
the jury is going to be free to surmise the meaning behind these
words without an explanation. For instance, on page 6 of the
transcript that has been provided to the Court where there is the
mention of the word "Why do you want to kill us? What do you mean
killed us," I submit to the Court that the meaning behind that has
to do with the relationship and the marriage. It has nothing to do
with bodily harm or a threat to commit bodily harm. But taken out
of context on this tape or whatever, whatever, without anybody to
explain it, the jury is free to presume that has to do with a
physical threat to commit harm, and I do not believe that's what
the meaning of this conversation is at that point. And there's no
way for that to be explained. The State's free to argue its
interpretation without us knowing the true meaning behind that
portion of the tape or the words.
We don't
believe the predicate has been laid for the admission of the tape.
It is rank hearsay. We are aware of the fact that the Court of
Criminal Appeals in [citation omitted] has basically stated that
the previous requirements that were mentioned in [citation omitted]
were not necessarily valid or to be followed now. Their
interpretation was that those predicates have been subsumed in
Rule 901 of the Texas Rules of Evidence and it doesn't mean
they've been taken away. It just means the rule is going to
control rather than the plain language of case law in [citation
omitted] which established the predicate for recording; that is,
the device is capable of taking the testimony, the operator of the
device was competent, the authenticity of the correctness of the
recording, no changes, additions, or deletions have been made. The
manner and preservation of the recording and of speakers and the
testimony elicited was voluntarily made without any kind of
inducement. We will submit to the Court that even that has not
been satisfied.
For all
these reasons we object to the admission of this rank hearsay that
has no way of being verified.
Appellant's
trial objection, specifically mentioning only the wife's out-of-court
statements, "Why do you want to kill us? What do you mean killed
us," raised no claim that the admission into evidence of these
out-of-court statements violated his federal constitutional right
to confront the witnesses against him. Appellant's trial objection,
thus, does not comport with that raised on appeal, and appellant,
therefore, failed to preserve for review the federal
constitutional confrontation claim that he makes on appeal.
See Tex. R. App. Proc., 33.1(a).
In addition,
appellant's statement on the tape, "You want me to go shoot you
right now," was not hearsay and was properly admitted since it was
offered to prove an assertion and not to prove the truthfulness of
an asserted fact. See Teague v. State, 864 S.W.2d 505,
519 (Tex.Cr.App. 1993), overruled in part on other grounds,
Robertson v. State, 871 S.W.2d 701, 712-13 n.13 (Tex.Cr.App.
1993), cert. denied, 513 U.S. 853 (1994). Under these
circumstances, any error in admitting the wife's out-of-court
statements on the August 1997 tape was harmless. Cf. Leday v.
State, 983 S.W.2d 713, 717-18 (Tex.Cr.App. 1998) (ruling
admitting evidence usually will not be reversible error when same
evidence is admitted without objection). Point of error one is
overruled.
In point of
error four, appellant also claims that the trial court erroneously
admitted the August 1997 tape "because appellant could not present
the remainder of the tape in violation of Tex. R. Evid. 106."
Appellant also made the following objection to the admission of
the August 1997 tape.
[APPELLANT]:
Judge, we would also object under Rule 106 that this is an
incomplete recording because a portion of it is inaudible and not-we
have no way of knowing what was said on the other end of the line,
and we're entitled to have the whole thing introduced if a portion
is going to be introduced. And I'll submit that can't happen
because you can't hear what's said.
Appellant
argues on appeal that the inaudible portions of the tape made it
incomplete for purposes of Rule 106 which states:
When a
writing or recorded statement or part thereof is introduced by a
party, an adverse party may at that time introduce any other part
or any other writing or recorded statement which ought in fairness
to be considered contemporaneously with it. "Writing or recorded
statement" includes depositions.
We disagree.
The inaudible portions of the tape did not make the tape
incomplete. Introduction of the tape (including the inaudible
portions) did not violate the "plain" language of Rule 106. We
also cannot conclude that the inaudible portions of the August
1997 tape are so substantial as to render the tape as a whole
untrustworthy. See United States v. Mickens, 837 F.Supp.
745 (S.D.W.Va. 1993), aff'd, 53 F.3d 329 (4th
Cir. 1995) and authorities cited therein (discussing general rule
that "[u]less the unintelligible portions are so substantial as to
render the recording as a whole untrustworthy the recording is
admissible, and the decision should be left to the sound
discretion of the trial judge"); see also Addison v. United
States, 317 F.2d 808, 815 (5th Cir. 1963),
cert. denied, 376 U.S. 905 (1964) (trial court did not abuse
its discretion to admit tape-recorded conversation even though one-half
of tape was inaudible); Odom v. State, 403 So.2d 936, 940
(Fla. 1981), cert. denied, 456 U.S. 925 (1982) and
authorities cited therein (partial inaudibility or
unintelligibility not grounds for excluding a recording if audible
parts are relevant, authenticated and otherwise properly
admissible). Point of error four is overruled.
In point of
error three, appellant claims that the trial court erred during
the punishment phase in overruling his hearsay objection to Alma's
redirect examination testimony. Alma related an out-of-court
statement by appellant's wife about three weeks before the offense
that appellant held a gun (the murder weapon) to his wife's head.
Q. [PROSECUTION]:
Alma, when the Defense attorney asked you about the defendant
being a violent man, you knew him to be violent towards your
sister [appellant's wife], correct?
A. [ALMA]:
Yes.
Q. And this
was based on things other than what he said on that [August 1997]
tape, is it not?
A. Yes.
Q. Did your
sister tell you about one particular incident during the summer of
2002, about what [appellant] did to her prior to this shooting?
A. Yes.
[DEFENSE
COUNSEL]: We object, Your Honor. Again, we would renew our
objection based on hearsay.
[THE COURT]:
I will overrule it. I believe the door has been opened.
Q. What did
your sister tell you that he started doing with this gun of his?
A. That he
would point it to her head.
Q. She would
tell you that [appellant] would point this gun to her head. When
did she start telling you this?
A. Like
three weeks after this happened.
Q. Three
weeks before this happened?
A. Yes.
Q. And why
would he be pointing this gun to her head?
A. She just
told me that if ever-something ever happened to her, that it was
him.
Q. Did that
upset you when you heard this?
A. Yes.
Q. And was
she upset when she would tell you about this?
A. She was
scared and upset.
The State
claims that appellant's wife's out-of-court statement to Alma was
admissible under the excited utterance exception to the hearsay
rule "because it was made while [appellant's wife] was under the
continuing stress of a death threat made by her husband." The
State also claims that, during her direct examination, Alma
expressed a non-expert witness opinion on appellant's character
for violence when she testified that appellant became mean and
aggressive toward his wife when he found out about Jonathan. The
State further argues that defense counsel's cross-examination
tested whether Alma's non-expert opinion was "rationally based on
her perceptions." The State, therefore, argues that appellant's
wife's out-of-court statement to Alma was not offered on redirect
examination to prove the truthfulness of the matter asserted in it
(i.e., that appellant held a gun to his wife's head); it was
offered for a nonhearsay purpose to show the basis of Alma's non-expert
opinion that appellant was violent. The State argues:
Alma's
direct testimony evinced her opinion of appellant as mean and
aggressive towards [his wife] after he learned that Jonathan was [his
wife's] son. Defense counsel's cross-examination tested whether
Alma's opinion was "rationally based on her perceptions."
Specifically, defense counsel discredited Alma's opinion by
leaving the impression that it was based only on the [August] 1997
tape recording. Because counsel attacked the foundation of Alma's
opinion and left a false impression, the State properly could
inquire into "the whole" of that subject. [Citation and footnote
omitted]. The prosecutor would not have had to ask for specific
evidence supporting Alma's opinion had defense counsel not
challenged the witness's testimony as he did.
We need not
address the State's theories of the admissibility of appellant's
wife's out-of-court statement to Alma that appellant held a gun to
her head. The record reflects that appellant's father provided
substantially similar evidence without objection by appellant.
Q. [PROSECUTION]:
Thirty-two years. Do you recall a time when [appellant's wife]
told you that [appellant] was pointing a gun at her?
A. [APPELLANT'S
FATHER]: No.
Q. Told you
and -
A. No, she
never told me that.
Q. Never
told you that?
A. Not to
me, no.
Q. Not to
you? Never to your wife?
A. Yes, she
told her.
Q. Okay. And
your wife told you about it?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Did this
upset you, Mr. Ochoa?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you
recall about when this was in relation to the shootings that your
wife told you what [appellant's wife] had told her?
A. About
three months
Appellant's
expert also testified on cross-examination by the prosecution
without objection by appellant.
Q. [PROSECUTION]:
What other alleged acts of violence [by appellant] are you aware
of?
A. [NACE]:
Well, I believe his wife had told his mother that he held a gun to
her one time around-I guess it was around '97, but the family
wasn't sure that was true or not.
This expert
also testified on re-cross examination by the prosecution without
objection by appellant.
Q. [PROSECUTION]:
Doctor, did you say that you confronted the defendant over this-over
him pointing the gun to her head three weeks before he murdered
her?
A. [NACE]:
No, I don't think I said that.
Q. You
didn't ask him about that?
A. I
remember asking him about slapping his wife.
Q. Okay. Did
you ask him to relate to you, I guess, the totality of any
violence that he might have had against anybody, including his
wife?
A. Yes.
Q. And all
he told you was hitting his wife twice?
A. That's
what I recall.
Q. He didn't
tell you about any gun pointing or ever making a threat to kill
her? He didn't mention that?
A. No. I had
read that in one of these documents, but I didn't-no, we didn't
talk about it.
Q. And you
didn't-even though you knew about it, you didn't ask him if it was
true or not?
A. I don't-I
might not have. I don't recall asking.
Q. And he
just told you he hit her twice. You don't know when or what over
or what brought that on, if it was while he was on cocaine or
before he was using cocaine, you don't know when exactly that was?
A. I think
it was before cocaine use.
Q. Before
cocaine use?
A. Yes.
Q. Okay. And
that's the extent, everything he told you that he had done, either
threatening or violently towards his wife?
A. That's my
recollection.
Under these
circumstances, the admission into evidence of appellant's wife's
out-of-court statement to Alma that appellant held a gun to his
wife's head is not reversible error. Cf. Leday, 983 S.W.2d
at 717-18. Point of error three is overruled.
In point of
error five, appellant claims that the trial court erroneously
admitted into evidence at the guilt/innocence phase a crime-scene
photograph (State's Exhibit 35) showing his murdered seven-year-old
daughter's hip and arm in a pool of blood on the kitchen floor
with a television remote control in her hand. Appellant claims on
appeal that the probative value of this photograph was
substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice under
Tex. R. Evid. 403 and that it "inflamed the jury against appellant
with regard to determining the special issues in this cause."
The record
reflects that appellant objected to the admission of State's
Exhibit 35 on Rule 403 grounds, and also because it was cumulative
of State's Exhibit 34 (to which appellant did not object), and it
was "just egregious in the amount of blood that's shown and that
it does not go to wounds and that it goes to no material contested
issue." The prosecution responded that State's Exhibit 35 was a
clearer picture of some of what State's Exhibit 34 depicted.
[THE COURT]:
I will allow 31-30, and I will overrule the Defense's objection to
30.
34 and 35?
[PROSECUTION]:
Judge, 35 is finally a clear picture. This other one [State's
Exhibit 34] is dim, and you can't actually make out what's on the
other side, the far side of her body. This is just a different
perspective to show what she is actually holding and you get a
picture from that angle. Right now you just have a-the right side
of her body. This one you see the left side and what is she
actually holding. I just say in 34 it's just hard to make that
out, the dim lighting in that picture.
[THE COURT]:
I'll overrule the Defense's objection to State's 35.
With the
admission into evidence of all of the other crime-scene and
autopsy photographs depicting the murders of five members of
appellant's family, any error in the admission into evidence of
State's Exhibit 35 did not harm appellant. Cf. Leday,
983 S.W.2d at 717-18. Point of error five is overruled.
The judgment
of the trial court is affirmed.