Peter James Martin v. State ( 2014 )

In The
Court of Appeals
Ninth District of Texas at Beaumont
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NO. 09-13-00180-CR
NO. 09-13-00181-CR
NO. 09-13-00182-CR
NO. 09-13-00183-CR
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PETER JAMES MARTIN, Appellant
V.
THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee
__________________________________________________________________
On Appeal from the 221st District Court
Montgomery County, Texas
Trial Cause No. 12-03-02604-CR (Counts 1, 2, 3, 4)
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MEMORANDUM OPINION
Arguing that the prosecutor elicited prejudicial testimony about his criminal
history from a witness during the guilt-innocence phase of his trial, Peter James
Martin contends he is entitled to receive a new trial. With respect to Martin’s
complaint, the record shows the trial court instructed the jury to disregard Martin’s
sister’s testimony that Martin had been in and out of prison. Because the
instruction sufficiently cured any harm that resulted from the jury hearing the
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question and testimony at issue, the trial court’s decision to deny Martin’s motion
for mistrial was not an abuse of discretion.
Background
In a four-count indictment, the State charged Martin with aggravated assault
against a public servant (Count One), evading arrest/detention with a vehicle
(Count Two), tampering with physical evidence (Count Three), and possession of a
controlled substance (Count Four). See Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 22.02(b)(2) (West
2011), § 38.04(b)(2)(A) 1 (West Supp. 2013), § 37.09(d) (West Supp. 2013); Tex.
Health & Safety Code Ann. § 481.115 (West 2010). Seeking to enhance Martin’s
punishment, the State also alleged that Martin had previously been convicted of
several prior felonies.
Martin pled not guilty to each of the four counts of the indictment; the jury
found him guilty on all four counts following the guilt/innocence phase of his trial.
Additionally, the jury found that Martin used a deadly weapon while evading
arrest.
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The judgment of conviction related to Martin’s conviction cites section
38.04(b)(1), making evading arrest or detention with a vehicle a state jail felony if
the defendant is shown to have a prior conviction for evading arrest or detention
under section 38 of the Penal Code. However, the factual allegations in Martin’s
indictment and the evidence introduced during the trial show that he evaded arrest
or detention by using a vehicle, a third-degree felony under 38.04(b)(2)(A) of the
Penal Code. In the opinion, we cite to the correct statute.
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During the punishment phase of the trial, Martin pled “not true” regarding
all the enhancement allegations in the indictment. At the conclusion of the
punishment phase of Martin’s case, the jury returned “true” verdicts regarding
three of Martin’s prior felonies. Given its enhancement findings, the jury
considered an enhanced range of punishment regarding three of the four crimes on
which it convicted Martin of committing. On each of the felonies that were the
subjects of the jury’s enhancement findings (aggravated assault against a public
servant, evading arrest, and tampering with physical evidence), the jury assessed
separate life sentences. For possessing a controlled substance, the felony not
subject to any of the jury’s enhancement findings, the jury assessed a sentence of
twenty years.
Analysis
The record shows that during the prosecutor’s cross-examination of Martin’s
sister, the prosecutor asked her if she knew that Martin had “been in and out of
prison[.]” After Martin’s sister answered, Martin objected to the question and
asked that the trial court instruct the jury to disregard it. The trial court sustained
Martin’s objection, and then instructed the jury “to disregard the testimony about
being in and out of prison.” Martin then moved for a mistrial; however, the trial
court denied Martin’s request.
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In a single issue, Martin contends the prosecutor purposely elicited
inadmissible testimony showing that he had been in and out of prison. According
to Martin, given the nature of the charges against him, the evidence about having
been in prison was extremely prejudicial.
We review Martin’s issue complaining of the trial court’s decision to deny
his request for a mistrial under an abuse of discretion standard. See Hawkins v.
State, 135 S.W.3d 72, 76-77 (Tex. Crim. App. 2004). Asking an “improper
question will seldom call for a mistrial, because, in most cases, any harm can be
cured by an instruction to disregard.” Ladd v. State, 3 S.W.3d 547, 567 (Tex. Crim.
App. 1999). “A mistrial is required only when the improper question is clearly
prejudicial to the defendant and is of such character as to suggest the impossibility
of withdrawing the impression produced on the minds of the jurors.” Id. In
considering whether an abuse of discretion occurred, we consider the severity of
the alleged misconduct, the curative effect of the trial court’s instruction to
disregard, and the certainty of the punishment assessed assuming the misconduct
had not occurred. See Hawkins, 135 S.W.3d at 77.
Martin argues that his sister’s testimony concerning his prior incarceration
was so prejudicial that it was impossible for the jury to disregard it. On the record
before us, we disagree that the evidence was very prejudicial. Before Martin’s
sister testified, a statement that Martin gave to the police was admitted into
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evidence without objection: in that statement, Martin said that he did not pull over
because he was on drugs and on parole. Because the jury could infer directly from
Martin’s statement to the police that he had been in prison, and because the
statement was admitted without objection, the additional testimony of Martin’s
sister about Martin having been in prison was cumulative of other evidence that
was properly before the jury. See Austin v. State, 222 S.W.3d 801, 816 (Tex.
App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 2007, pet. ref’d) (determining the prejudicial impact
by considering the evidence in the context of the entire trial).
The record also shows that the trial court took prompt curative action in an
effort to prevent the jury from considering the testimony at issue. The trial court
instructed the jury to disregard the testimony just after Martin’s sister agreed that
she knew that Martin had been in and out of prison. Generally, a prompt
instruction to disregard is sufficient to cure the possible prejudice that may result
when objectionable testimony about a defendant’s prior incarceration is mentioned
by a witness. See Kemp v. State, 846 S.W.2d 289, 308 (Tex. Crim. App. 1992)
(explaining that a witness’s reference to the defendant having been in prison was
cured by an instruction to disregard); Nobles v. State, 843 S.W.2d 503, 514 (Tex.
Crim. App. 1992) (concluding a witness’s reference to the defendant having been
incarcerated was cured by an instruction to disregard). The trial court’s prompt
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instruction, in our opinion, sufficiently cured any unfair prejudice which may have
resulted from the question or the answer at issue. See Kemp, 846 S.W.2d at 308.
The evidence of Martin’s guilt leads to the conclusion that Martin’s
prospects of being acquitted on any of the charges for which he was tried were
highly unlikely. When considering the record as a whole, nothing in the record
shows that Martin might have received a different punishment. For example,
regarding Martin’s conviction for evading arrest, the entire pursuit was captured on
a video that the jury reviewed during Martin’s trial. See Tex. Penal Code Ann. §
38.04(b)(2)(A). The video shows that Deputy Chris Azwell, after observing that
Martin was not maintaining his speed and that he was operating his vehicle in an
unsafe manner, activated his overhead lights and siren in an effort to get Martin to
stop. The video further shows that Martin failed to stop, and that he committed
additional traffic violations while evading Deputy Azwell’s attempt to pull him
over. Additionally, after the State finished its closing argument and with the jury
present, Martin’s attorney requested that Martin be allowed to plead guilty to the
charge of evading arrest. In closing argument, Martin’s attorney agreed that Martin
was guilty of evading arrest.
With respect to Martin’s conviction for aggravated assault against a public
servant, Deputy Azwell testified that Martin, in attempting to evade arrest, tried to
run over him with his car. See id. § 22.02(b)(2). Martin did not testify at the trial,
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and the video admitted into evidence that captured Martin evading arrest does not
include the part where Martin used his car in an effort to run over Deputy Azwell.
Nonetheless, Deputy Azwell’s testimony about Martin’s having driven directly at
him as the chase was ending is not contradicted. According to Deputy Azwell, he
fired several shots at Martin’s car when Martin drove toward him. Based on
Deputy Azwell’s testimony, it is unlikely that the jury would have chosen to acquit
Martin on the charge that he committed an aggravated assault against a public
servant. Additionally, nothing in the record supports a conclusion that the jury
might have given Martin another punishment on the charge.
Martin’s conviction for knowingly possessing a controlled substance also
finds ample support in the evidence. See Tex. Health & Safety Code Ann. §
481.115. The testimony from the trial shows that after Martin’s arrest, a crime
scene investigator retrieved a small plastic baggy containing a white powder from
the floorboard on the driver’s side of Martin’s car. See Washington v. State, 215
S.W.3d 551, 554-57 (Tex. App.—Texarkana 2007, no pet.) (finding the evidence
sufficient to prove that the defendant knowingly possessed a controlled substance
where the facts and circumstances linked the defendant to the cocaine found in the
floorboard of his car). Additional evidence in the record shows that the substance
in the baggy was tested by a forensic scientist, who found that the powdery
substance was cocaine. Other evidence admitted during Martin’s trial shows that
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Martin was the only person in the car, that the car contained other drug
paraphernalia, and that Martin indicated he was on drugs shortly after he was
stopped. See id. at 556-57. We are not persuaded that Martin would have been
acquitted on this charge had the testimony at issue never been introduced.
The evidence further supports Martin’s conviction for tampering with
physical evidence. See Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 37.09(d)(1) (providing that a
person, who knows that an offense has been committed, commits the offense of
tampering with evidence, if the person alters, destroys, or conceals anything with
the intent to impair its availability as evidence). According to Deputy Azwell,
while pursuing Martin’s vehicle, he saw Martin throw a spoon and several syringes
out of his car’s window. Syringes that the police recovered from the area where
Deputy Azwell observed Martin throwing things from his car were admitted into
evidence during Martin’s trial. Thus, the record allowed the jury to infer that
Martin, knowing that he was in possession of a controlled substance, tampered
with evidence by attempting to dispose of evidence relevant to his guilt for
possessing a controlled substance. See Stewart v. State, 240 S.W.3d 872, 873-84
(Tex. Crim. App. 2007) (“The tampering with evidence statute requires intent as to
a particular result, namely, impairing a thing’s availability as evidence.”).
Considering the entire record, the trial court could have reasonably believed
that its instruction eliminated any prejudice from the question and answer at issue.
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Therefore, we conclude the trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying
Martin’s request for a mistrial. See Hawkins, 135 S.W.3d at 85. We overrule
Martin’s sole issue. Martin’s convictions and sentences in trial cause numbers 12-
03-02604-CR Count One, 12-03-02604-CR Count Two, 12-03-02604-CR Count
Three, and 12-03-02604-CR Count Four are affirmed.
AFFIRMED.
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HOLLIS HORTON
Justice
Submitted on April 21, 2014
Opinion Delivered May 21, 2014
Do Not Publish
Before Kreger, Horton and Johnson, JJ.
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