Opinion
NO. 01-18-00624-CR
01-16-2020
GERMAN GUTIERREZ, Appellant v. THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee
On Appeal from the 184th District Court Harris County, Texas
Trial Court Case No. 1557751
MEMORANDUM OPINION
German Gutierrez pleaded guilty to aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon, and the court assessed punishment at 25 years' imprisonment. See TEX. PENAL CODE § 29.03(a)(2). On appeal, he contends that the trial court lacked jurisdiction over his case and the judgment of conviction is void. We affirm.
Background
Gutierrez and an accomplice stole a man's car at gunpoint from a car wash. A Harris County grand jury indicted Gutierrez for aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon. He pleaded guilty without an agreed sentencing recommendation. After a hearing on the presentence investigation, the court sentenced him to 25 years' imprisonment. He appealed.
Jurisdiction
In his sole issue, Gutierrez contends that his judgment of conviction is void. He argues that the trial court, the 184th District Court of Harris County, Texas, lacked jurisdiction over his case because the underlying indictment was presented to the district clerk by the grand jury empaneled by the 178th District Court of Harris County, Texas.
The 178th and 184th District Courts are both criminal district courts in Harris County, Texas. They share the same clerk, i.e. the Harris County District Clerk, and both have original jurisdiction in felony criminal cases. The grand jury for the 178th District Court returned a true bill of indictment for the charged offense, which was then presented to the Harris County District Clerk, as demonstrated by the clerk's original file stamp, and filed in the 184th District Court.
The Texas Constitution provides that "District Judges may exchange districts, or hold courts for each other when they may deem it expedient, and shall do so when required by law." See TEX. CONST. art. V, § 11. All state district courts within the same county have jurisdiction over cases in that county, and criminal district courts have original jurisdiction over felony criminal cases in that county. TEX. CODE CRIM. PROC. art. 4.05; TEX. GOV'T CODE § 74.094; Henderson v. State, 526 S.W.3d 818, 820 (Tex. App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 2017, pet. ref'd). In counties with two or more district courts, the judges of the courts "may adopt rules governing the filing and numbering of cases, the assignment of cases for trial, and the distribution of the work of the courts as in their discretion they consider necessary or desirable for the orderly dispatch of the business of the courts." TEX. GOV'T CODE § 24.024; see also TEX. GOV'T CODE § 74.093 (addressing adoption of local rules of administration to provide, in part, for assignment, docketing transfer, and hearing of all cases). The district clerk for each county "is the clerk of the court for all districts in that county." Henderson, 526 S.W.3d at 820 (quoting Ex parte Alexander, 861 S.W.2d 921, 922 (Tex. Crim. App. 1993), superseded by statute on other grounds as stated in Ex parte Burgess, 152 S.W.3d 123, 124 (Tex. Crim. App. 2004)).
In multi-court counties, like Harris County, a specific district court may impanel a grand jury, but not all cases considered by that court's grand jury are necessarily assigned to that court. See Henderson, 526 S.W.3d at 820; Davis v. State, 519 S.W.3d 251, 255 (Tex. App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 2017, pet. ref'd). ("If a grand jury in one district court returns an indictment in a case, the case nevertheless may be then assigned to any district court within the same county."); Hernandez v. State, 327 S.W.3d 200, 204 (Tex. App.—San Antonio 2010, pet. ref'd); Bourque v. State, 156 S.W.3d 675, 678 (Tex. App.—Dallas 2005, pet. ref'd); Tamez v. State, 27 S.W.3d 668, 670 n.1 (Tex. App.—Waco 2000, pet. ref'd) (noting that "the judges of the Harris County district courts exercising criminal jurisdiction have adopted a procedure by which indictments are filed in each court on a rotating basis without reference to the court which empaneled the grand jury presenting the indictments"). In other words, one court may impanel a grand jury, and if the grand jury returns an indictment, the case may be filed in another court of competent jurisdiction within the same county.
Gutierrez argues that the text of the Texas Constitution and Texas Code of Criminal Procedure contemplate that grand juries may return indictments only to the court that impaneled them. According to the Texas Constitution, "[t]he presentment of an indictment or information to a court invests the court with jurisdiction of the cause." TEX. CONST. art. V § 12(b). (emphasis added). The Texas Code of Criminal Procedure uses the language "the court" in reference to the grand jury. See TEX. CODE CRIM. PROC. arts. 19.18-19.22; 20.08 (prohibiting a grand jury from adjourning for more than three days without "consent of the court.").
In addition to stating that jurisdiction vests with the presentment of an indictment, article V, section 12 of the Texas Constitution also states, "[t]he practice and procedures related to the use of indictments and informations . . . are provided by law." Id. This section of the constitution was amended in 1985. Before the amendment, a substantive defect in an indictment or information was a fundamental defect that deprived the court of jurisdiction, resulting in a void judgment, and the deficiency could be raised for the first time on appeal, including years after conviction. See DeDenato v. State, 819 S.W.2d 164, 168 (Tex. Crim. App. 1991) (Maloney, J., concurring) (discussing the history of the 1985 constitutional amendment). The amendment gave the legislature the authority to regulate the practices and procedures relating to indictments. See Studer v. State, 799 S.W.2d 263, 271 (Tex. Crim. App. 1990) (reviewing legislative history and materials and stating, "Clearly the perceived evil [the legislature was] correcting was the raising of indictment defects for the first time after a trial and conviction and the subsequent reversal of that conviction because of that defect."). A literal reading of article V, section 12 could lead to absurd results. DeDonato, 819 S.W.2d at 168 (Maloney, J., concurring) ("If the mere presentment of an indictment could vest jurisdiction in any court, then absent an objection from the defendant, a capital murder case could be properly tried in a county court. I cannot believe that such a result was the legislature's or the voters' intent.").
To the extent there may be friction between the use of an indefinite article in the constitution and a definite article in some statutes, the fundamental jurisdiction conferred by the constitution is not affronted by the filing procedure that occurred here. We presume that when a statute is enacted, the legislature intended compliance with the Texas Constitution. TEX. GOV'T CODE § 311.021(1). Furthermore, it is well established that reasonable construction should be given to constitutional provisions and that constitutional and statutory provisions will not be construed so as to lead to absurd conclusions, great public inconvenience, or unjust discrimination, if any other interpretation can be reasonably indulged. Cramer v. Sheppard, 167 S.W.2d 147, 155 (1942); see also Boykin v. State, 818 S.W.2d 782, 785-86 (Tex. Crim. App. 1991) (stating that when the plain language of a statute would lead to absurd consequences that the legislature could not possibly have intended, the court should not apply the language literally). We cannot say that the legislature's use of "the court" in certain criminal procedure statutes and "a court" in a constitutional provision demonstrates the intent that a grand jury in a multi- district county may only return an indictment to the specific district court that impaneled it.
Gutierrez's brief states that statutes refer to "presentment" of an indictment while the Texas Constitution uses the word "returned." Compare TEX. CODE CRIM. PROC. Arts. 20.19, 20.21, 20.22, and TEX. CONST. art. V, § 17. Gutierrez suggests that the terms are used interchangeably. Similarly, the use of the word "the court" in statutes and "a court" in the constitution is a difference without significance.
Finally, we note that any procedural challenge to the transfer of a case within a county is not a jurisdictional defect. See Davis, 519 S.W.3d at 256. Gutierrez concedes that the Harris County Direct Filing Order was appropriately applied to the docketing of his case. Gutierrez did not challenge the presentment of the indictment or the transfer between district courts in the trial court. Procedural deficiencies in an indictment may not be challenged for the first time on appeal. Henderson, 526 S.W.3d at 821.
We hold that the trial court had jurisdiction in this case and that Gutierrez waived any non-jurisdictional issue related to the indictment by failing to complain in the trial court. We overrule Gutierrez's sole issue.
Conclusion
We affirm the judgment of the trial court.
Peter Kelly
Justice Panel consists of Justices Kelly, Hightower, and Countiss. Do not publish. TEX. R. APP. P. 47.2(b).