James Willard Ransdell v. The State of Texas--Appeal from 336th District Court of Fannin County

In The
Court of Appeals
Sixth Appellate District of Texas at Texarkana
______________________________
No. 06-06-00166-CR
______________________________
JAMES WILLARD RANSDELL, Appellant
V.
THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee
On Appeal from the 336th Judicial District Court
Fannin County, Texas
Trial Court No. 21661
Before Morriss, C.J., Carter and Moseley, JJ.
Memorandum Opinion by Justice Moseley
MEMORANDUM OPINION

James Willard Ransdell, charged with unlawful restraint of Sierra Rose Ransdell (a child less than seventeen years of age) and placing her in substantial risk of serious bodily injury, was found guilty by a Fannin County jury. (1) This conviction being enhanced by a prior felony conviction to a second-degree felony, Ransdell was sentenced to twenty years' imprisonment. He appeals from that conviction.

FACTS OF THE CASE

Ransdell suffers from bi-polar disorder and is schizophrenic, maladies from which he has suffered for a number of years. He had previously been married to Bonnie Ransdell, who divorced him in May 2005. The couple had three children, Sierra, Jayden, and Zach. During their marriage, Ransdell had intermittently exhibited bizarre behavior, occasionally having paranoid delusions and having attempted suicide at least once.

After their divorce, Ransdell and Bonnie maintained an amicable relationship. Ransdell (although maintaining a dwelling elsewhere) apparently had the run of Bonnie's house--both day and night--and he and Bonnie still sometimes engaged in sex together.

 

Ransdell had, a few days before, driven off with Bonnie's car, which contained her purse, cellular telephone, house keys, and other items. Then, in the early morning hours of November 4, 2005, Ransdell appeared at the house, telling Bonnie that he wanted to take a shower there. Bonnie consented and was pleased to have her car and other items returned to her.

After he had showered, Ransdell became convinced that "people" who had malicious intentions toward Bonnie and the couple's children were both inside and outside of the house. Ransdell maintained that he could see the nonexistent "people" and insisted that all of the lights be turned off so these "people" could not see any of the Ransdell family. Ransdell used a light on Bonnie's cellular telephone to negotiate around through the house; he even peered through the hatch going into the attic of the house and announced that some of the "people" were in the attic as well. During this episode, he became extremely agitated; he shoved the entertainment center against the front door to block its entrance to the "people" (though it is unclear whether he was attempting to keep the "people" inside the house or outside of it), began carrying around a child's aluminum baseball bat, and yelling enough to be foaming about the mouth.

The Bonham Police Department received two 9-1-1 emergency calls. One of these was from Bonnie's next-door neighbor, who complained of having been awakened by the screaming of Ransdell, Bonnie, and the children. The other emergency call was from Ransdell, who called to seek police assistance in protecting against the unnamed "people" he was seeing as being a threat to his family.

When the first officer arrived, Sierra spotted his police flashlight and pounded on a picture window in the front of the house, crying and screaming, "help me." The officer observed Bonnie, with Zach in her arms, both mother and child weeping; Ransdell was in the same room, shouting, screaming, and "wild-eyed." Another officer arrived and the officers were told by Bonnie through the window that the front door was barricaded, the officers proceeded to the rear door of the house. Sierra came running from the house with her arms extended toward one of the officers, crying and saying, "Help me, my dad's crazy." Sierra was followed by Jayden, Bonnie, and Zach. Ransdell then exited the rear door of the house; after he first paced back and forth, shouting that there were people in the house. On the demands of the officers, he laid on the ground and allowed himself to be handcuffed and escorted to jail.

Initially, Bonnie wrote a statement for the police which said that Ransdell had blocked the front door of the house with the entertainment center and that, when they had attempted to exit through the rear door of the house, Ransdell had blocked them. Thereafter, Bonnie signed more than one document requesting that no prosecution of the claim proceed, maintaining that all that she wanted concerning Ransdell was aid in getting him treatment, not in criminal prosecution of him. At trial, Bonnie recanted the portion of her statement that he had barred their exit, maintaining that Ransdell had been blocking the use of the exits to protect his family from "the people" and did not attempt to bar any members of the family from leaving the house except in his attempt to protect them.

Under Section 20.02 of the Texas Penal Code, the base offense of unlawful restraint (2) is to intentionally or knowingly restrain another person. Without additional circumstances, this is a class A misdemeanor. Tex. Penal Code Ann. 20.02 (Vernon 2003). However, if the restrained person is younger than seventeen years of age, the crime escalates to a state-jail felony and it becomes a felony of the third degree if the "actor recklessly exposes the victim to a substantial risk of serious bodily injury." Id.

FACTUAL/LEGAL INSUFFICIENCY CLAIMS

Ransdell raises three points of error, all relating to the legal and/or factual sufficiency of the evidence to support the finding of guilt. (3)

In a factual sufficiency review, the evidence is reviewed in a neutral light rather than (as in a legal sufficiency review) in the light most favorable to the verdict. Roberts v. State, No. AP-75,051, 2007 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 429 (Tex. Crim. App. Apr. 18, 2007). Evidence can be factually insufficient in one of two ways: (1) when the evidence supporting the verdict is so weak that the verdict seems clearly wrong and manifestly unjust, and (2) when the supporting evidence is outweighed by the great weight and preponderance of the contrary evidence so as to render the verdict clearly wrong and manifestly unjust. Watson v. State, 204 S.W.3d 404, 414-15 (Tex. Crim. App. 2006). A reversal for factual insufficiency cannot occur when "the greater weight and preponderance of the evidence actually favors conviction!" Id. at 417. Although an appellate court reviewing factual sufficiency has the ability to second-guess the jury to a limited degree, the review should still be deferential, with a high level of skepticism about the jury's verdict required before a reversal can occur. Cain v. State, 958 S.W.2d 404, 407 & 410 (Tex. Crim. App. 1997).

We apply well-known standards when reviewing challenges to the legal sufficiency of the evidence. See Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979). Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the verdict, we determine whether any rational trier of fact could have found the elements of the offense beyond a reasonable doubt. Vodochodsky v. State, 158 S.W.3d 502, 509 (Tex. Crim. App. 2005); Escamilla v. State, 143 S.W.3d 814, 817 (Tex. Crim. App. 2004), cert. denied, 544 U.S. 950 (2005); Simmons v. State, 109 S.W.3d 469, 472 (Tex. Crim. App. 2003).

Under either a review of the factual or legal sufficiency of the evidence, the jury is the exclusive judge of the witnesses' credibility and the weight to be given to their testimony and is free to accept or reject any or all of the evidence presented and to make reasonable inferences and deductions from the evidence. See Swearingen v. State, 101 S.W.3d 89, 97 (Tex. Crim. App. 2003); Jones v. State, 944 S.W.2d 642, 647-48 (Tex. Crim. App. 1996); Smith v. State, 895 S.W.2d 449, 452 (Tex. App.--Dallas 1995, pet. ref'd).

EVIDENCE OF ILLEGAL RESTRAINT

Looking at the evidence, a good portion of the facts have already been set out above and there is no need to restate them. However, as to the critical issue of the restraint of Sierra, we find some contradictions from the primary witness to the incident, Bonnie. On direct examination at trial, some of the testimony from Bonnie went as follows:

Q. Did Sierra ever try to leave?

A. I don't think she ever tried to leave. None of the kids were trying -- I mean, it was early in the morning. It wasn't like it was daylight and they wanted to go outside and play. You know, they didn't try to get out the doors. The baby wouldn't have tried to get out the door, that sort of thing.

Q. Well, did James ever grab her, hold her, or put her in her room or --

A. Huh-uh.

Q. -- or use a verbal command to restrain her from going outside or leaving the house?

A. No.

 

Bonnie also testified that Ransdell had used the entertainment center to barricade the front door. She related that Ransdell's ranting about the "people" frightened the children, who began to cry. From the rendition which was given by her at trial, the fears of the children--when coupled with the irrational thought patterns of Ransdell--made the entire episode spiral upward into a truly out-of-control situation.

This was the general tenor of the testimony from Bonnie regarding Ransdell's conduct regarding the restraint of Sierra during the incident.

However, this testimony contrasted with the written statement given by Bonnie on the morning of November 4, 2005. In it, she related that:

I felt that Jay was not letting us leave the house. He was saying that he was keeping "people in." If we went to the Back door he would go & jump on the Bar Preventing us from going out the Rear door. He moved the entertainment center in front of the Front door. We had no way out.

 

While these two statements are not entirely inconsistent, (4) the statement given by Bonnie to the police in the early morning after the incident does not attribute the benignity to Ransdell's conduct which her testimony gives at trial. The general tenor which the jury could glean from the two was that Sierra (and the others in Ransdell's family) were being restrained by Ransdell in the house against their will. The fact that Sierra, a ten-year-old at the time, made no actual attempt to power past her raving father in an attempt to leave the house did not diminish the fact that he was preventing her from leaving. Section 20.01 of the Texas Penal Code provides that:

"Restrain" means to restrict a person's movements without consent, so as to interfere substantially with the person's liberty, by moving the person from one place to another or by confining the person. Restraint is "without consent" if it is accomplished by:

 

(A) force, intimidation, or deception; or

(B) any means, including acquiescence of the victim, if:

 

(i) the victim is a child who is less than 14 years of age or an incompetent person and the parent, guardian, or person or institution acting in loco parentis has not acquiesced in the movement or confinement.

 

Tex. Penal Code Ann. 20.01.

 

There is nothing which would require the victim of an illegal restraint to attempt to escape; the threat of force (whether real or reasonably perceived) would be sufficient to restrain her. There was sufficient evidence, both legally and factually, for the jury to have found that Ransdell unlawfully restrained Sierra, a child younger than fourteen years of age.

EXHIBITION OF DEADLY WEAPON IN THE COMMISSION OF AN OFFENSE

The State concentrated a great deal on the fact that Ransdell was, at one time during the episode, carrying around an aluminum baseball bat which his elder son (then age six) used when playing T-ball. They elicited testimony that the boy had gotten in trouble because he had put a dent in the family's lawnmower by hitting it with the bat; accordingly, it was substantial enough that it could have been used as a deadly weapon.

As mentioned before, whether or not the T-ball bat carried by Ransdell during the incident constituted the use of a deadly weapon becomes important because Section 12.35 of the Texas Penal Code provides that an individual adjudged guilty of a state-jail felony shall be punished for a third-degree felony if it is shown on the trial of the offense that a deadly weapon was used or exhibited during the commission of the offense. Tex. Penal Code Ann. 12.35 (Vernon 2003). Section 1.07(17) of the Texas Penal Code defines a "deadly weapon" as being "(A) a firearm or anything manifestly designed, made, or adapted for the purpose of inflicting death or serious bodily injury; or (B) anything that in the manner of its use or intended use is capable of causing death or serious bodily injury." Tex. Penal Code Ann. 1.07(17) (Vernon Supp. 2006). Certainly, a child's T-ball baseball bat does not fit within the category (A) above because it was not designed, made, or adapted as set out in the statute. However, it is possible that it "in the manner of its use or intended use" would be capable of inflicting death or serious bodily injury. Not even a knife is necessarily a deadly weapon per se. Brown v. State, 716 S.W.2d 939, 946 (Tex. Crim. App. 1986). There are certain factors which a jury may consider when analyzing whether an object is a deadly weapon: (1) the physical proximity between the alleged victim and the object; (2) any threats or words used by the accused; (3) the size and shape of the object; (4) the potential of the object to inflict death or serious injury; and (5) the manner in which the accused allegedly used the object. Id. at 946-47; Williams v. State, 575 S.W.2d 30, 32-33 (Tex. Crim. App. [Panel Op.] 1979); see also Adame v. State, 69 S.W.3d 581, 584 (Tex. Crim. App. 2002) (Meyers, J., concurring); Nunez v. State, 117 S.W.3d 309, 323 (Tex. App.--Corpus Christi 2003, no pet.); In re S.B., 117 S.W.3d 443, 446-47 (Tex. App.--Fort Worth 2003, no pet.). No one factor is determinative, and each case must be examined on its own facts. Adame, 69 S.W.3d at 584; Brown, 716 S.W.2d at 946-47; Nunez, 117 S.W.3d at 323.

All of the testimony shows that Ransdell had been carrying the bat about as a weapon--but not as a weapon to be used against Sierra or any other member of his family. Rather, all of the evidence reveals that Ransdell intended this bat to aid him in protecting them against the totally nonexistent "people" he believed posed a threat to them. He did not wave it about or thrash the air with it; he did not threaten them with it. (5) It was plainly proven that Ransdell and the bat were in close physical proximity to Sierra, that the bat was of a physical size and shape to inflict harm, and that (should he have intended its use in that fashion) there was the potential of using the T-ball bat to inflict death or serious injury. Many objects of a usually apparently-mundane character could fit those characteristics. (6) However, there is no evidence to support any claim that he threatened to use the bat on Sierra, that Sierra was afraid that he would use it on her, or that Ransdell used it in any fashion to restrain her movements from the house. The only entities upon whom Ransdell intended to use the bat, if necessary, were the "people" whom he believed were threatening his family--and the "people" did not exist. This is not to say that, considering Ransdell's apparent propensity toward wild irrationality, that the bat could hypothetically be used as a deadly weapon; for instance, in some other circumstance, he could irrationally decide that a danger arose from his family and not the chimera he perceived that night was dangerous. But the fact remains that on that night, his intended use of the bat was to protect his family and not to place them in danger. The danger or threat posed must be real and not simply hypothetical. To sustain a deadly weapon finding, there must be evidence that others were actually endangered, not merely there was a hypothetical potential for danger. Cates v. State, 102 S.W.3d 735, 738 (Tex. Crim. App. 2003). "While a deadly weapon finding does not require that the object actually cause death or serious bodily injury, it does require that the object have more than a hypothetical capability of causing death or serious bodily injury." Johnston v. State, 115 S.W.3d 761, 764 (Tex. App.--Austin 2003), aff'd, 145 S.W.3d 215 (Tex. Crim. App. 2004).

We find that the evidence is legally insufficient to support the charge that Ransdell used or exhibited a deadly weapon during the commission of the offense. This point of error is granted.

SUBSTANTIAL RISK OF SERIOUS BODILY INJURY

It is quite obvious that Ransdell suffers from extreme mental illnesses. His conduct on November 4, 2005, was clearly erratic, wild, crazy, and hellish to those who had to witness it. One can speculate upon what dire things might have occurred on that early morning if Ransdell's delusions had taken a slightly different twist than they did that night. However, it is not the province of the jury to have speculated on what might have occurred but, rather, what actually did occur.

As the testimony and evidence set out above show, during the entire episode, the source of Ransdell's anxiety was the perceived danger which the "people" posed to his family. He barricaded the door, ranted and raved, armed himself with a small bat, and finally placed a 9-1-1 emergency call himself in order to protect his family and to extricate them from what he apparently believed to be some perceived but imaginary threat to them. No doubt, his rantings about the invisible "people" and his overall conduct terrified the small children; it is impossible to gauge the adverse psychological impact which this kind of conduct has upon small children who are placed in a position of watching their father exhibiting this type of conduct. It is important to note that any damage done to the children in this incident would be to their psyches and not to their persons.

However, there was never any evidence presented that he threatened his family (including Sierra), physically abused them in any fashion, (7) or placed them in physical danger. "Serious bodily injury" is defined by Section 1.07(46) of the Texas Penal Code as being "bodily injury that creates a substantial risk of death or that causes death, serious permanent disfigurement, or protracted loss or impairment of the function of any bodily member or organ." Tex. Penal Code Ann. 1.07(46) (Vernon Supp. 2006). Damage to the child's mental well-being does not fall within that definition. The evidence is not legally sufficient to show that he placed Sierra at a substantial risk of serious bodily injury.

The jury charge included the lesser-included offense of the state-jail felony of the illegal restraint of a child less than seventeen years of age. We find this to have been the appropriate finding and sentence. A court of appeals may reform a judgment of conviction to reflect conviction of a lesser-included offense only if (1) the court finds that the evidence is insufficient to support conviction of the charged offense, but sufficient to support conviction of the lesser-included offense, and (2) either the jury was instructed on the lesser-included offense (at the request of a party or by the trial court sua sponte) or one of the parties asked for but was denied such an instruction. Collier v. State, 999 S.W.2d 779 (Tex. Crim App. 1999).

Because there was legally insufficient evidence to support the jury's deadly weapon finding, we sustain Ransdell's point regarding that issue. Accordingly, the trial court's judgment is modified to delete the affirmative finding that a deadly weapon was used during the commission of the offense and to delete the finding that Ransdell exposed Sierra to a substantial risk of serious bodily injury. See Williams v. State, 970 S.W.2d 566 (Tex. Crim. App. 1998) (remedy when affirmative finding erroneously made). As reformed and modified, Ransdell's conviction of the state-jail offense of unlawful detention of a child less than seventeen years of age is affirmed, the punishment is reversed, and we remand the case to the trial court for a determination of the punishment for that offense.

 

Bailey C. Moseley

Justice

 

Date Submitted: April 19, 2007

Date Decided: May 8, 2007

 

Do Not Publish

 

1. The jury also found that, in doing this act, Ransdell exhibited a deadly weapon which, pursuant to Section 12.35(c)(1) of the Texas Penal Code, converts a state-jail felony to a third-degree felony. See Tex. Penal Code Ann. 12.35(c)(1) (Vernon 2003).

2. Under Section 20.01 of the Texas Penal Code, the word "restrain" includes the restriction of a person's movements without consent. Restraint of a child less than fourteen years old can be accomplished by any means (including the acquiescence of the victim) if the parent, guardian, or person or institution acting in loco parentis has not acquiesced in the confinement. Tex. Penal Code Ann. 20.01 (Vernon Supp. 2006).

3. At trial, Ransdell's attorney had requested (but had been denied) a jury instruction that would have raised the affirmative defense set out in Section 20.02(b) of the Texas Penal Code. See Tex. Penal Code Ann. 20.02(b). However, no point of error was raised concerning the denial of this request and we do not consider it.

4. In one statement, she says that he was not allowing them to leave the house; in the other, she was saying that they nevertheless never attempted to leave.

5. The following exchange between the State and Bonnie is illustrative:

 

Q. And he was roaming through the house at 3:00 in the morning with the bat?

 

A. Well, as I stated several times before, and we went through this before about what I'm saying, when he got the bat it was all of about walking down the hall to the living room and me telling him put the bat up, and him walking back down the hallway. He was not roaming through the house. He was not screaming. He was not yelling. He was not waving the bat. He was not threatening us with the bat.

 

Q. Was he agitated when he had the bat?

 

A. Not at me. Not at the children.

6. Andrea Yates drowned her five children in a bathtub of water. See Yates v. State, 171 S.W.3d 215 (Tex. App.--Houston [1st Dist.] 2005, pet. ref'd).

7. At one point in time, Ransdell was holding Zach, the four-year-old in his arms. The child leaned over to go to the arms of his mother. Ransdell believed the child to be falling and grabbed him tightly, causing Zach to cry and complain that Ransdell had hurt his leg.