Steven Wayne Landrum v. the State of Texas ( 2021 )

NUMBER 13-20-00501-CR
COURT OF APPEALS
THIRTEENTH DISTRICT OF TEXAS
CORPUS CHRISTI – EDINBURG
STEVEN WAYNE LANDRUM, Appellant,
v.
THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee.
On appeal from the 36th District Court
of Aransas County, Texas.
ORDER
Before Chief Justice Contreras and Justices Longoria and Tijerina
Order Per Curiam
This cause is before the Court on appellate counsel’s Anders1 brief and motion to
withdraw as counsel. Pursuant to Kelly v. State, appellate counsel has informed the Court
that she notified appellant of her filing of the Anders brief and motion to withdraw. See
1See Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738, 744 (1967).
Kelly v. State, 436 S.W.3d 313, 319 (Tex. Crim. App. 2014). In addition, appellate counsel
stated that she sent a copy of the record directly to appellant. See id. at 320 n.22
(recognizing that appellate counsel sometimes sua sponte send the record to the
appellant). The record in this case includes two volumes of the reporter’s record, the
clerk’s record, the first supplemental clerk’s record, Exhibit V3, and State’s exhibit A,
which is a video.
In Kelly, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals held that appellate counsel must
“assist the appellant in filing a motion in the court of appeals for access to the appellate
record if that is indeed what the appellant wants,” and that “[o]nce such a motion is filed,
the court of appeals has the ultimate responsibility to make sure that, one way or
another . . . the appellant is granted access to the appellate record so that he may file his
response. . . .” Id. at 315. The Kelly court noted that sometimes however “when the
appellate record is not voluminous, appellate counsel will sua sponte send a copy of the
appellate record to the appellant along with the Anders brief and motion to withdraw.” In
that case, the Kelly court stated that “the court of appeals could then simply issue an
order requiring the appellant to file his response to the Anders brief by a date certain.” Id.at 320 n.22.
Here, appellate counsel has sua sponte provided the record to appellant along with
the Anders brief and motion to withdraw. Accordingly, it is hereby ORDERED that
appellant shall have thirty (30) days from the date of this order to file his pro se response
to the Anders brief with this Court if he so chooses. See Id. The State shall have twenty
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days thereafter to file its response, if any.
PER CURIAM
Do not publish.
TEX. R. APP. P. 47.2(b).
Delivered and filed on the
21st day of May, 2021.
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