1. “Does a charging instrument that does not identify the defendant by name, but which is preceded by a caption that does identity the defendant by name, meet the jurisdictional requirement that a charging instrument name a ‘person’ as required by article V, §12(b) of the Texas Constitution?” 2....
1. Whether the right to a jury trial mandated by U.S. Const. Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments, and U.S. Const. art. III § 2, and the concepts set out by this Court in Apprendi and Blakely, is violated by the procedure utilized by the Court of Appeals, that is, a judicial finding of an element not ...
1. “Is the constitutional harm standard the proper test for harm when there was a mere delay in the election versus no election at all and the jury is charged on a specific incident?” 2. “How specific must the factual rendition of a single incident in the jury charge be to serve the purposes t...
“The court of appeals’ [sic] committed a structural error by denying the appellant his right’s of due process. The second issue is whether the appellant has a right to file a pro se appeal brief after the court denies appellant his right to find new appeal counsel, and after the court has allowed...
“The Court of Appeals erred in failing to consider the conflict between the new test results and the results presented at trial, as well as the defensive evidence presented by appellant, when deciding whether the new test results cast doubt on the validity of the conviction.”
1. “The current test for determining whether an out-of-state offense is substantially similar to an enumerated Texas offense is too broad. Accordingly, this Court should disavow that test and replace it with one that only compares the elements of the respective offenses.” 2. “Even if not disavow...
1. “The court of appeals misapplies the standard of review when examining article 38.23 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure.” 2. “The court of appeals’ opinion puts it in conflict with other courts of appeals, which have applied constitutional violation analysis to private individuals under ...
“Whether the Court of Appeals erred in concluding that trial counsel’s advice was a misrepresentation of the law that rendered Briggs’s plea involuntary when the advice was based on the controlling precedent that existed at the time counsel’s advice was given?”
denotes a petition filled by SPA