Kevion R. Wills v. the State of Texas ( 2024 )

Affirmed and Opinion Filed October 25, 2024
In The
Court of Appeals
Fifth District of Texas at Dallas
No. 05-23-00167-CR
KEVION R. WILLS, Appellant
V.
THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee
On Appeal from the Criminal District Court No. 1
Dallas County, Texas
Trial Court Cause No. F21-11831-H
MEMORANDUM OPINION
Before Justices Molberg, Breedlove, and Kennedy
Opinion by Justice Breedlove
Appellant Kevion Wills was convicted of murder after a jury trial and
sentenced by the trial court to life in prison. See TEX. PENAL CODE ANN.
§§ 19.022(b)(1)–(2), (c). In a single issue, appellant argues that the evidence is
insufficient to prove identity. We conclude that the record contains sufficient
evidence on identity to support the jury’s verdict. Accordingly, we affirm the trial
court’s judgment.
BACKGROUND
On December 18, 2020, Charonda Jones visited her friend Quashana Hobbs’s
apartment in Carrollton, Texas to check on her because Jones had not heard from
Hobbs since the day before when Hobbs texted Jones asking Jones to call her. Jones
called Hobbs at 1:44 p.m. on the 17th, but Hobbs did not answer or respond to
Jones’s later attempts to reach her. When Jones arrived at Hobbs’s apartment, she
found the door unlocked and Hobbs lying dead on the kitchen floor in a pool of
blood.
Carrollton Police Department Detective Jeremy Chevallier investigated the
crime scene and collected a 40-calliber Winchester bullet case from Hobbs’s couch.
The only DNA evidence retrieved at the scene belonged to Hobbs. The Dallas
County medical examiner who conducted Hobbs’s autopsy found that she had been
shot one time in the back of the head, and her death was ruled a homicide. Police did
not initially have a suspect in the case, but using various technology sources, they
eventually identified appellant as a suspect.
A grand jury indicted appellant for first-degree murder, and a jury trial was
held on January 26, 2023, and appellant was found guilty. After a hearing on
punishment, the trial court sentenced appellant to life in prison. This appeal
followed.
STANDARD OF REVIEW
In determining whether the evidence is sufficient to support a criminal
conviction, we apply well-established standards. See Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S.
307, 316 (1979). We view the evidence in the light most favorable to the verdict and
determine whether a rational jury could have found all the elements of the offense
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beyond a reasonable doubt. Jackson, 443 U.S. at 313; Brooks v. State, 323 S.W.3d
893, 899 (Tex. Crim. App. 2010). The jury, as the fact-finder, may make reasonable
inferences from the evidence presented at trial in determining appellant’s guilt.
Hooper v. State, 214 S.W.3d 9, 14–15 (Tex. Crim. App. 2007). When there is
conflicting evidence, we presume the fact-finder resolved those conflicts in favor of
the verdict and defer to that resolution so long as it is supported by the evidence.
Jackson, 443 U.S. at 326; Clayton v. State, 235 S.W.3d 772, 778 (Tex. Crim. App.
2007).
We also defer to the trier of fact’s determinations of witness credibility and
the weight to be given their testimony. Jackson, 443 U.S. at 319; Brooks, 323 S.W.3d
at 899. Our role as an intermediate appellate court is restricted to guarding against
the “rare occurrence when a factfinder does not act rationally.” Isassi v. State, 330
S.W.3d 633, 638 (Tex. Crim. App. 2010) (quoting Laster v. State, 275 S.W.3d 512,
518 (Tex. Crim. App. 2009)).
DISCUSSION
A person commits the offense of murder if he intentionally or knowingly
causes the death of an individual. See TEX. PENAL CODE ANN. § 19.02(b)(1).
Alternatively, he also commits the offense when he intends to cause serious bodily
injury and commits an act clearly dangerous to human life that causes the death of
an individual. Id. at § 19.02(b)(2).
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The only contested issue in this case was the element of identity. Appellant
argues that the evidence of identity is insufficient because there was no direct
evidence of identity, and of the circumstantial evidence, there were no fingerprints
or DNA evidence. Appellant also claims there was a lack of evidence on appellant’s
motive for killing Hobbs and that the evidence pointed more clearly to other
suspects, specifically Tasha Wills, appellant’s wife, and Kassandra Williams,
Tasha’s best friend and the owner of the gun that was associated with the murder.
The State argues that the cumulative effect of the State’s overwhelming
circumstantial evidence was sufficient to prove appellant’s identity.
Direct evidence of the elements of the offense is not required to sustain a
conviction. Hooper v. State, 214 S.W.3d 9, 14 (Tex. Crim. App. 2007).
Circumstantial evidence is as probative as direct evidence and can be sufficient alone
to establish an accused’s guilt. Id. at 15 (citing Guevara v. State, 152 S.W.3d 45, 49
(Tex. Crim. App. 2004)). Juries are permitted to make reasonable inferences from
the evidence presented at trial, including from the circumstantial evidence presented.
Id. at 14 (citing Guevara, 152 S.W.3d at 49).
Here, the evidence shows that the flock camera located at the entrance of
Hobbs’s apartment complex captured the license plate of a car associated with
appellant entering Hobbs’s complex at 1:15 p.m. on the day of the murder, ten
minutes before Hobbs’s car arrived. The Instagram video calls admitted by the State
show that Hobbs and appellant spoke in the hours leading up to the murder and
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arranging a meetup; specifically, Hobbs provided appellant with her apartment
number at 1:23 p.m., shortly before Hobbs arrived home. In addition to the flock
camera, the jury heard testimony that appellant texted his friend McCollum, who
lived in Hobbs’s apartment complex, to let him know that appellant was outside his
apartment at around 1:25 p.m., and that appellant texted McCollum the following
day to see if any police were present at the complex. These pieces of evidence, while
circumstantial, could allow a rational jury to infer that appellant was with Hobbs at
the time of her murder. See id. at 14 (citing Guevara, 152 S.W.3d at 49). This
conclusion is further bolstered by the cell phone mapping of appellant’s and Hobbs’s
cell phones, which placed them together at the time of the murder.
The jury could also infer appellant’s guilt from the ballistics evidence
presented. See id. at 14 (citing Guevara, 152 S.W.3d at 49). Multiple witnesses
testified that appellant went to his wife’s friend Kassandra Williams’s house the
afternoon of the murder and borrowed her 40-caliber Smith & Wesson handgun,
which he returned about an hour and a half after borrowing it. Cell phone mapping
showing appellant traveled from his house in Waxahachie to Williams’s house in
DeSoto, then to Hobbs’s house in Carrollton, back to DeSoto, and then finally to his
home in Waxahachie, corroborates such testimony. A forensic analyst fired a test
cartridge from Williams’s gun and determined it matched the cartridge case found
at the scene of Hobbs’s murder, indicating that Williams’s gun had fired the cartridge
at the murder scene.
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Finally, suspicious activity on appellant’s Google account in the days
following Hobbs’s murder provides evidence from which the jury could infer
appellant’s guilt. See id. at 14 (citing Guevara, 152 S.W.3d at 49). Appellant’s
Google account recorded searches for the damage a 40-caliber bullet can do to a
person, “unsolved murders” in Carrollton, and for Hobbs’s name and obituary
specifically.
The State is correct that Texas law does not require direct evidence of an
element of a crime to sustain a conviction; therefore, to the extent appellant asks us
to overturn the jury’s verdict based on a lack of direct evidence, we decline to do so.
See Hooper v. State, 214 S.W.3d at 14. With regard to the sufficiency of the
circumstantial evidence, appellant in effect asks us to disregard the evidence
discussed above because the jury heard conflicting evidence that may have
implicated other suspects; however, we must defer to the jury’s determination on
credibility in the face of conflicting evidence. See Jackson, 443 U.S. at 326; Clayton,
235 S.W.3d at 778. Because there is evidence to support the jury’s verdict, we
overrule appellant’s sole issue. See Jackson, 443 U.S. at 326; Clayton, 235 S.W.3d
at 778.
CONCLUSION
We affirm the trial court’s judgment.
230167f.u05 /Maricela Breedlove/
Do Not Publish MARICELA BREEDLOVE
TEX. R. APP. P. 47.2(b) JUSTICE
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Court of Appeals
Fifth District of Texas at Dallas
JUDGMENT
KEVION R. WILLS, Appellant On Appeal from the Criminal District
Court No. 1, Dallas County, Texas
No. 05-23-00167-CR V. Trial Court Cause No. F21-11831-H.
Opinion delivered by Justice
THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee Breedlove. Justices Molberg and
Kennedy participating.
Based on the Court’s opinion of this date, the judgment of the trial court is
AFFIRMED.
Judgment entered this 25th day of October, 2024.
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