Christian, Antoine Leon AKA Christian, Reginald Jerome ( 2024 )

IN THE COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS
OF TEXAS
NO. WR-39,987-04
EX PARTE REGINALD JEROME CHRISTIAN
AKA ANTOINE LEON CHRISTIAN, Applicant
ON APPLICATION FOR A WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS
CAUSE NO. 1093011-A IN THE 184TH DISTRICT COURT
FROM HARRIS COUNTY
KEEL, J., filed a concurring opinion.
CONCURRING OPINION
The majority opinion confuses “same type of misconduct” with circumstances
surrounding it. Surrounding circumstances like other witnesses or corroboration might
rebut an inference of falsity or undermine materiality, but it would not inform an
assessment of sameness. Indeed, the parties agree that Goines’s alleged misconduct in
this case was the same type of misconduct that he committed before, and that is
consistent with our caselaw.
Newly alleged misconduct is of the same type as earlier misconduct if it “would
Christian Concurring 2
have affected the evidence in the applicant’s case[.]” Ex parte Coty, 418 S.W.3d 597,
605 (Tex. Crim. App. 2014). For example, Mathews held that Goines’s two earlier
instances of proven or alleged misconduct “would each at least broadly be of the kind
that, if repeated in Applicant’s case, would have affected the evidence against him:
manufacturing false evidence to obtain a drug arrest or conviction.” Ex parte Mathews,
638 S.W.3d 685, 691 (Tex. Crim. App. 2022) (per curiam). In contrast, a lab tech’s
prior instances of intentional “dry-labbing” cocaine and alprazolam were not the same
type of misconduct as his “carelessness or general incompetence” in testing for
marijuana. Ex parte Owens, 515 S.W.3d 891, 897 (Tex. Crim. App. 2017).
Sameness depends on the misconduct, not the circumstances surrounding it. Such
circumstances as we have here—like other eyewitnesses and Applicant’s
inconsistencies—may rebut the inference of falsity and undermine the materiality of the
alleged misconduct, but they would not change the type of misconduct Goines has
repeated—falsifying offense reports to support drug charges. So I concur in the
majority’s result without joining its opinion.
Filed: September 25, 2024
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