Joe Montoya v. The State of Texas--Appeal from 167th District Court of Travis County

montoya IN THE COURT OF APPEALS, THIRD DISTRICT OF TEXAS,
AT AUSTIN
NO. 3-90-322-CR
JOE MONTOYA,

APPELLANT

 
vs.
THE STATE OF TEXAS,

APPELLEE

 
FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF TRAVIS COUNTY, 167TH JUDICIAL DISTRICT
NO. 102,831, HONORABLE BOB JONES, JUDGE PRESIDING

Over a plea of not guilty, the jury found Joe Montoya guilty of murder. See Tex. Penal Code Ann. 19.02 (1989). The jury also found favorably to the State on the allegations contained in two enhancement paragraphs of the indictment. They assessed punishment at life imprisonment. The trial court adjudged Montoya guilty and sentenced him accordingly. He appeals. We will affirm the judgment.

 
THE CONTROVERSY

Austin police officer David Lugo received a report that a man was throwing rocks at a house occupied by Deborah Trujillo, Adolph Barron, and Johnny Barron. When Lugo arrived at the house, Trujillo and Adolph Barron emerged from the front door of the house and ran down the side of the dwelling toward the back yard. Lugo followed the pair to the back yard. There he saw Johnny Barron leaning over the body of Jesse Guerra, who was still alive but in serious condition because of stab wounds in his chest. Other officers arrived within minutes and began an investigation.

In the back yard, the officers found several items that were later introduced in evidence. One of the items was a butcher knife lying several feet from where Lugo first saw Johnny leaning over Guerra's body. The evidence adduced at trial showed that the butcher knife belonged to Johnny, who used it in cooking outside in the back yard. The knife had no blood on it and was of a size different from that which inflicted the stab wounds.

Montoya was later arrested and indicted for the murder of Guerra. A jury found Montoya guilty. He appeals.

 
DISCUSSION AND HOLDINGS

Montoya brings two points of error under one heading. He contends the trial court erred in admitting the butcher knife in evidence because: (1) the butcher knife was not relevant to any material issue in the case, the State having conceded the butcher knife was not the murder weapon; and (2) even if the butcher knife was relevant to a material issue, its probative value was substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice. See Tex. R. Crim. Evid. Ann. 403 (Pamph. 1992). (1)

We hold there was no error in either respect.

 
Relevance

To carry its burden in a murder prosecution, the State must prove the defendant intentionally or knowingly caused the death of a person. See Tex. Penal Code Ann. 19.02(a)(1) (1989). By his plea of not guilty, Montoya required the State to adduce evidence proving each element of the crime. Therefore, the State was entitled to introduce any evidence which tended to make Montoya's guilt more probable than it would be absent the evidence. See Tex. R. Crim. Evid. Ann. 401 (Pamph. 1992) ("Relevant evidence" means evidence having a tendency to make the existence of any fact that is of consequence to the determination of the action more probable or less probable than it would be without the evidence.).

The State conceded the butcher knife was not the murder weapon. (2) Before the jury, however, it justified its offer of the knife as evidence on two grounds: (1) Introduction of the knife in evidence forestalled any defense argument that the State had failed to conduct a thorough investigation; and (2) introduction of the knife in evidence refuted possible defense arguments that it was the murder weapon and had been wielded by someone other than Montoya.

We agree with the State that the butcher knife was admissible to refute any possible defense contentions that it was the murder weapon. The evidence showed without dispute that the butcher knife lay within a few feet of Guerra's body and belonged to the blood-splattered Johnny, who was leaning over Guerra's body when the first officer arrived. The investigating officers observed, however, that the butcher knife had no blood on it. Moreover, the evidence showed that the deadly wounds were caused by a knife blade three-quarters of an inch wide, and the butcher knife was wider than that.

Montoya's own argument, that the evidence against him was "circumstantial," only highlights the relevance of the butcher knife. Trujillo testified that she saw Montoya flee after he stabbed Guerra with an instrument that looked like a knife, and that she was familiar with a knife he frequently carried. Notwithstanding this eyewitness testimony, Montoya argues that the case remains a circumstantial-evidence case because: (1) Trujillo's testimony was doubtful because she is near-sighted, she was not wearing corrective lenses at the time, and the event occurred in the hours of darkness; (2) the murder weapon was never introduced in evidence; (3) no other witness saw Montoya stab Guerra; and (4) even if the other witnesses' testimony incriminated Montoya in some respect, that evidence was doubtful for various reasons. If the case be circumstantial only, it appears to us that the butcher knife was properly admitted to discount any exculpatory theory that Johnny murdered Guerra with the butcher knife. In other words, the appearance and size of the butcher knife tended to prove that Johnny was not the perpetrator, notwithstanding the incriminating circumstances observed by the first officer to arrive on the scene: i.e., the butcher knife lay near Guerra's body and Johnny was leaning over the body with blood on his clothing. Cf. Hernandez v. State, 817 S.W.2d 744, 746-47 (Tex. App. 1991, no pet.).

In any case, we believe the knife was admissible as proof of the context of the offense. Regarding admission of evidence of an extraneous offense, the court of criminal appeals has said,

 

[E]vidence of the context of the offense is almost always admissible under the reasoning that events do not occur in a vacuum and the jury has a right to have the offense placed in its proper setting so that all evidence may be realistically evaluated. . . . [T]he unfolding of events and the progression of the crime is necessary to a full picture and understanding of what took place.

 

Mann v. State, 718 S.W.2d 741, 744 (Tex. Crim. App. 1986), cert. denied, 481 U.S. 1007 (1987). We believe that reasoning applies in the present case as well. The butcher knife was part of that context of the crime and the jury were entitled to evaluate the evidence in its true and proper setting. See Mayes v. State, 816 S.W.2d 79, 84-85 (Tex. Crim. App. 1991) ("It therefore appears that background evidence was meant to be included within the definition of relevancy, not necessarily because it influences a consequential fact, but because it illuminates a circumstance otherwise dimly perceived by the factfinder."); see also Albrecht v. State, 486 S.W.2d 97, 103 (Tex. Crim. App. 1972).

We hold the trial court did not abuse its discretion by admitting the butcher knife in evidence. See Montgomery v. State, 810 S.W.2d 372, 390-91 (Tex. Crim. App. 1990) (allowing an appellate court to overturn a trial court's decision on relevancy only when the trial court has abused its discretion).

 
Unfair Prejudice

If the relevance of the butcher knife was substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, it was not admissible even though relevant. Tex. R. Crim. Evid. Ann. 403 (Pamph. 1992). Under this rule, however, the relevance of the evidence established a presumption in favor of admitting it. See Crank v. State, 761 S.W.2d 328, 342 n.5 (Tex. Crim. App. 1988), cert. denied, 493 U.S. 874 (1989). "Unfair" prejudice does not simply mean that the evidence will injure the opponent's case; it refers to prejudice that might result in a decision on an improper basis, usually an emotional basis. See Montgomery, 810 S.W.2d at 389; Torres v. State, 794 S.W.2d 596, 600 (Tex. App. 1990, no pet.); see also Fed. R. Evid. 403 advisory committee's note.

We cannot conclude the probative value of the knife was substantially outweighed by its prejudicial effect. The State's witnesses and the prosecutor stated explicitly that the butcher knife was not the murder weapon. Given the State's clear and repeated statements before the jury that the butcher knife was not the murder weapon and its justification for introducing the knife, we hold that Montoya has not demonstrated that such prejudice was "unfair" in the sense necessary for us to hold that the trial court abused its discretion in admitting the butcher knife in evidence. See Mann, 718 S.W.2d at 744 ("Rarely will the prejudicial value render inadmissible any evidence that is context of the offense."); see also Montgomery, 810 S.W.2d at 390 (granting the trial court broad discretion in determining the admissibility of relevant evidence).

Finding no error, we affirm the trial-court judgment.

 

John Powers, Justice

[Before Justices Powers, Jones and Kidd]

Affirmed

Filed: June 3, 1992

[Do Not Publish]

1. Montoya does not contend that the butcher knife tended to show an extraneous offense committed by Montoya. Cf. Maynard v. State, 685 S.W.2d 60 (Tex. Crim. App. 1985).

2. The officer who identified the butcher knife as having been gathered at the scene stated that it was not, in his opinion, the knife used to inflict the wounds that caused Guerra's death. In argument to the jury, the prosecuting attorney stated twice that the butcher knife was not the murder weapon. The State never introduced, and apparently never found, a knife that it contended was used by Montoya to kill Guerra.