Flowers, Vincent Henry ( 2007 )

      IN THE COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS

                                   OF TEXAS

                                                                 NO. PD-1081-06

                                        VINCENT HENRY FLOWERS, Appellant

                                                                             v.

                                                        THE STATE OF TEXAS

                   ON APPELLANT  =S PETITION FOR DISCRETIONARY REVIEW

                                     FROM THE SECOND COURT OF APPEALS

                                                            DENTON  COUNTY

Johnson, J., filed a concurring opinion in which Price, J., joined.

C O N C U R R I N G   O P I N I O N

The times, they are a changin=, and the court system must change also. But we must change with caution, lest the changes produce unfortunate, potentially unrectifiable, results.  And if the state may now use a wider assortment of sources to prove alleged prior convictions, a defendant must also be allowed to use a wider assortment of sources to disprove alleged prior convictions.

When allowing use of non-traditional resources, courts must exercise great care in assuring that the defendant is sufficiently connected to the prior conviction.^[1] Assuring that a sufficient connection exists requires at least two things: 1) enough information to establish that the conviction can be connected to its proper owner; and 2) the information is sufficiently corroborated.  More information makes the connection more reliable.  Clearly, we must not depend only on a name or even a name and a birth date.   An inexhaustive list of factors that might be considered includes: full name, date of birth, Social Security number, what the prior offense was, the place and date of the prior offense, the date of conviction, testimony about the prior conviction from a corrections, parole, or probation officer, or the prosecutor of the prior conviction.  However the information is produced, it must sufficiently connect the defendant to the prior offense.

Another crucial issue is corroboration.  Some agencies are more diligent about accuracy and completeness than others.  Variances in relevant data should not be ignored; they should be investigated. And finally, corroboration must not be a single agency speaking through two other agencies.  For example, the state produces a driving record and a criminal history printout from TCIC that was obtained from the county of conviction. The same relevant information in each is the same.  The problem is that, for both exhibits, the source is probably the same: the Department of Public Safety.  The records may be, and probably are, correct, but they should not be seen as corroborating each other; it is one agency speaking from two mouths.  

I concur in the judgment of the Court.

Filed: April 18, 2007

Publish

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^[1] Recently, in a Texas county, two young men, sharing the same full name and the same birth date and birth year, were arrested for the same charged offense on the same day. They hired different lawyers, who became confused by communications from court personnel about court dates that did not comport with their own records.  The confusion was ended when someone discovered the odd coincidences of the arrests.  Such mixups are certainly rare, but they obviously are possible.