Alton Randall Hooker v. The State of Texas--Appeal from 174th District Court of Harris County

Affirmed and Memorandum Opinion filed June 28, 2005.

In The

Fourteenth Court of Appeals

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NO. 14-04-00141-CR

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ALTON RANDALL HOOKER, Appellant

V.

THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee

On Appeal from the 174th District Court

Harris County, Texas

Trial Court Cause No. 961,448

M E M O R A N D U M O P I N I O N

Appellant, Alton Randall Hooker, was convicted of murder. In one issue, he challenges the factual sufficiency of the evidence to support his conviction. We affirm.

I. Factual and Procedural Background

In the early morning hours of July 18, 2002, Luis Carcamo heard a man yelling for help outside of his apartment. When he went outside to investigate, he saw appellant and Matthew Testa running after a third man, later identified as Jose Cruz. The men stopped under a tree, at which point appellant and Testa began hitting, kicking, and beating Cruz with closet rods. After scaring appellant and Testa away, Carcamo called the police for help. An ambulance took Cruz to the hospital.

Upon his arrival at the hospital, Cruz was diagnosed with having broken ribs, a dislocated jaw, and a splenic laceration caused by blunt trauma. After an initial surgery failed to stop the internal bleeding, Cruz underwent a series of five additional surgeries to remove his spleen and to treat his other wounds from the assault. During the second surgery, the attending physician noted Cruz had a pre-existing medical condition, advanced cirrhosis of the liver. Cruz contracted a number of infections during his three-month stay in the hospital, for which he also received medical attention. The treatment was unsuccessful, however, and on October 6, 2002, Cruz died in the hospital.

Cruz=s attending physician, Dr. Thomas Granchi, testified that the cause of death was hepatorenal syndrome (AHRS@), which he described as kidney failure related to liver failure. In Dr. Granchi=s opinion, Cruz=s injuries from the assault initiated a chain reaction, resulting in significant blood loss, infection, organ failure, and the development of HRS. The medical examiner listed Cruz=s cause of death as complications from blunt force injuries to the head and abdomen and concluded in the autopsy report that the manner of death was homicide.

Appellant was charged by indictment with murder. See Tex. Pen. Code Ann. ' 19.01(a) (Vernon 2004). Appellant pleaded not guilty. The jury found appellant guilty, and the trial court assessed punishment at 45 years= confinement in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Institutional Division.

II. Issue and Analysis

In his only appellate issue, appellant contends the evidence is factually insufficient to prove his conduct caused Cruz=s death. A person is criminally responsible for a result if it would not have occurred but for his conduct. Tex. Penal Code Ann. ' 6.04(a) (Vernon 2003). Even if another potential cause exists, a person is still criminally responsible if his conduct was sufficient by itself to produce the result. Robbins v. State, 717 S.W.2d 348, 351 (Tex. Crim. App. 1986). A person is not criminally responsible, however, if (1) his conduct is clearly insufficient to produce the result, and (2) the concurrent cause is clearly sufficient to produce the result. Id.

When evaluating a challenge to the factual sufficiency of the evidence, we view all the evidence in a neutral light and inquire whether the jury was rationally justified in finding guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Zuniga v. State, 144 S.W.3d 477, 484 (Tex. Crim. App. 2004). A reviewing court may find the evidence factually insufficient in two ways. Id. First, when considered by itself, the evidence supporting the verdict may be too weak to support the finding of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Id. Second, after weighing the evidence supporting the verdict and the evidence contrary to the verdict, the contrary evidence may be strong enough that the beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard could not have been met. Id. at 484B85. In conducting the factual-sufficiency review, we must employ appropriate deference so that we do not substitute our judgment for that of the fact finder. Id. at 481B82. Our evaluation should not intrude upon the fact finder=s role as the sole judge of the weight and credibility given to any witness=s testimony. Cain v. State, 958 S.W.2d 404, 407 (Tex. Crim. App. 1997). In conducting a factual-sufficiency review, we must discuss the evidence appellant claims is most important in allegedly undermining the jury=s verdict. Sims v. State, 99 S.W.3d 600, 603 (Tex. Crim. App. 2003).

In this case, appellant contends Cruz=s pre-existing health condition, not the injuries he received from the assault, caused his death.[1] Specifically, appellant claims Cruz=s cirrhosis caused the HRS and led to his death. In making this argument, appellant relies on an excerpt from a medical textbook that his counsel asked Dr. Granchi to read at trial. Following a description of HRS, the textbook states, APatients with cirrhosis often develop HRS following admission to the hospital, raising the question as to whether events in the hospital might precipitate HRS.@ However, Cruz would not have been admitted to the hospital on July 18 if he had not been beaten by appellant. Even under appellant=s theory, had Cruz not been admitted to the hospital, he would not have developed the fatal HRS.

Dr. Granchi opined Cruz could have lived for at least another ten years, even with his cirrhosis. He testified the injuries from the assault alone were sufficient to cause Cruz=s death and Cruz=s cirrhosis was insufficient to cause his death at the time of the assault. After taking the textbook sentence into consideration, Dr. Granchi explicitly concluded Cruz would not have died but for the assault. At trial, the medical examiner who performed the autopsy on Cruz=s body agreed that Cruz would not have died if Cruz had not suffered organ failure, which resulted from the assault. Appellant offered no medical testimony at trial to contradict these expert conclusions.

Thus, the record does not support appellant=s argument that Cruz=s pre-existing health condition was sufficient by itself to cause his death at that time or that appellant=s conduct was insufficient to cause Cruz=s death. There is evidence, however, to support a determination by a rational jury that appellant=s assault of Cruz was sufficient by itself to cause Cruz=s death. Under the applicable standard of review, we conclude the evidence is factually sufficient to support appellant=s conviction. Accordingly, we overrule appellant=s only issue on appeal.

We affirm the trial court=s judgment.

/s/ Kem Thompson Frost

Justice

Judgment rendered and Memorandum Opinion filed June 28, 2005.

Panel consists of Justices Frost, Seymore, and Guzman.

Do Not Publish C Tex. R. App. P. 47.2(b).

[1] Appellant also claims physician error contributed to Cruz=s death, although he never develops this argument in his appellate brief. The record fails to show how any alleged physician error could have caused Cruz=s death.