Parsons v. State

Selina Faith Parsons, Appellant v. The State of Texas, Appellee

NO. 03-19-00742-CR

TEXAS COURT OF APPEALS, THIRD DISTRICT, AT AUSTIN

August 28, 2020

FROM THE 119TH DISTRICT COURT OF TOM GREEN COUNTY

NO. B-17-0946-SB, THE HONORABLE BEN WOODWARD, JUDGE PRESIDING

MEMORANDUM OPINION

Appellant Selina Faith Parsons pleaded guilty to the offense of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. See Tex. Penal Code § 22.02(a)(2). Following the hearing on punishment, the district court sentenced Parsons to 18 years' imprisonment. In three related points of error on appeal, Parsons asserts that her trial counsel provided ineffective assistance by failing to object to the admissibility of statements that Parsons had made to the police during the investigation. We will affirm the district court's judgment of conviction.

BACKGROUND

At the punishment hearing, the district court heard evidence that in the early morning hours of July 26, 2017, Parsons's husband, Justin Miller, was sleeping in his bedroom at his home in San Angelo when he awoke to a man stabbing him with a knife. Miller attempted to defend himself and began wrestling with the assailant, who fled from the bedroom. Miller, who had been stabbed multiple times in his head, hand, and abdomen, stumbled out of the bedroom and made his way to another room in the house, where a safe contained Miller's firearms. However, when Miller opened the safe, his firearms were missing, and he passed out. When Miller regained consciousness, he went into the living room, where he found Parsons and her friend, Danielle Huckabee, on the couch. The assailant had left the house. Miller asked Parsons to call 911, but she did not. Shortly thereafter, Parsons and Huckabee drove Miller to the hospital, where he was treated for his injuries.¹ Miller recounted that in addition to the missing firearms, he noticed during the assault that his cell phone was missing from the nightstand next to his bed, where he usually kept it while he slept. Miller also testified that he had security cameras installed throughout his house, but in his review of the security-camera footage from the time of the assault, he discovered "a blank spot missing from the security system."

The assailant was later identified as Chris Lange, Parsons's ex-boyfriend² The evidence tended to show that there was a conspiracy between Parsons and Lange to kidnap Miller. Huckabee, who was a co-defendant in the case, testified that in June 2017, she overheard a conversation between Parsons and Lange in which Parsons told Lange that he, his brother, and his friend were to enter Miller's house, "get Justin, like, tie him up, put something over his head, and then they were going to take him to Dallas or Austin" and "drop him off" there.

Huckabee recounted that on the night of the assault, after Miller had gone to bed, she was on the couch in the living room when she saw Parsons go into Miller's office, where his firearms and the controls to the security cameras were located. Huckabee then saw Parsons go into Miller's bedroom to "sleep with Justin." Afterwards, Parsons returned to the living room, and Lange entered the house, holding two knives, including one that looked like a hatchet. Huckabee testified that she saw Lange and Parsons talking in the kitchen, and she heard Parsons tell Lange that Miller was asleep in the bedroom. Parsons then went to the couch with Huckabee and "held her tight," while Lange went to the bedroom.

Huckabee then "heard screams coming from Justin" and shortly thereafter saw Lange run out of the house. She also saw Miller, who was bleeding heavily, exit the bedroom, "collapse several times" on the floor, and plead with Parsons and Huckabee to call 911 because "he was dying." Huckabee was "freaking out" because she "can't handle the sight of blood," while Parsons had "grabbed the phone" but did nothing with it. Eventually, Miller was able to get out of the house, and Parsons and Huckabee followed him out, helped him into Parsons's car, and drove him to the hospital. Huckabee further testified that at the hospital, Parsons "was crying" and "kept saying, 'I'm sorry, Huck, that's not the way it was supposed to happen.'" When asked if Parsons said anything "about it being all her fault," Huckabee testified, "Yes, ma'am, she did."

Detective Matt Hawthorne of the San Angelo Police Department investigated the assault. Hawthorne testified that he interviewed both Huckabee and Parsons at Parsons's house and obtained a written statement from Parsons. The statement, which was admitted into evidence without objection from defense counsel, contained the following:

Me and my coworker (Danielle Huckabee) fell asleep on my couch at 4:15 a.m. and woken up between 5-6 a.m. to a tall male wearing a mask pointed to the couch and put a finger to his mouth. Next thing I know the male ran out and Justin [came] out telling us to call 911. I told him to get in the car and took him up to Shannon [Medical Center]. He kept saying "I'm dying." When we got to Shannon he was tooken [sic] by the ER staff. My coworker and I came back here to the house. I realized that the gun safe was empty and my cameras were off.

Later that day, Hawthorne interviewed Parsons at the police station. He testified that she was not in custody but that he read Parsons her Miranda rights³ anyway "to be on the safe side" because he did not know if she would become a suspect. Hawthorne recounted that during the interview, he told Parsons that her statement was inconsistent with Huckabee's statement and asked her "if she knew who the suspect was." Parsons told Hawthorne that it was Chris Lange, and she explained that she had told Lange that Miller had abused her, which made Lange "mad and upset" and want "revenge" against Miller. Parsons further acknowledged that she had unplugged the security cameras on the night of the assault, that she had taken Miller's firearms from the safe and hidden them in Huckabee's truck, and that Lange had told her on the night of the assault "to tell the cops that it was a burglary gone bad and that the guy was wearing a ski mask," which Parsons admitted was false. Parsons further told Hawthorne that she knew Lange could be violent but that she "never thought it would go to this extreme of measures." When Hawthorne asked Parsons if she believed "Christopher Lange was ever going to try to kill" Miller, Parsons "replied that she believed so, but [Lange] never actually told her anything."

Parsons testified in her defense. When asked "what was the plan" with Lange, Parsons testified, "Mr. Lange was just supposed to go with us and talk to Mr. Miller and mayberough him up a little bit and help me get out of that house because of how I was treated." She denied telling Lange to stab Miller. Parsons denied making certain statements to the police, including the statements admitting that she had unplugged the security cameras and hidden the firearms. Parsons also claimed that she could not remember anything that she had told the police because she had "a really bad case of insomnia" at the time and had been "up for four days straight." She added, "I honestly do not remember the interview at all."

The district court found Parsons guilty of the charged offense and sentenced her to 18 years' imprisonment as noted above. This appeal followed.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

To establish ineffective assistance of counsel, an appellant must demonstrate by a preponderance of the evidence both deficient performance by counsel and prejudice suffered by the defendant. Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687 (1984); Miller v. State, 548 S.W.3d 497, 499 (Tex. Crim. App. 2018). "Failure to make the required showing of either deficient performance or sufficient prejudice defeats the ineffectiveness claim." Strickland, 466 U.S. at 700; see Perez v. State, 310 S.W.3d 890, 893 (Tex. Crim. App. 2010).

The appellant must first demonstrate that counsel's performance fell below an objective standard of reasonableness under prevailing professional norms. Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687-88; Ex parte Scott, 541 S.W.3d 104, 115 (Tex. Crim. App. 2017). To prove deficient performance, "[t]he defendant must overcome 'the strong presumption that counsel's conduct fell within the wide range of reasonable professional assistance' and that the conduct constituted sound trial strategy." Prine v. State, 537 S.W.3d 113, 117 (Tex. Crim. App. 2017) (quoting Thompson v. State, 9 S.W.3d 808, 813 (Tex. Crim. App. 1999)). "To defeat this presumption,'[a]ny allegation of ineffectiveness must be firmly founded in the record and the record must affirmatively demonstrate the alleged ineffectiveness.'" Id. (quoting McFarland v. State, 928 S.W.2d 482, 500 (Tex. Crim. App. 1996)). "Trial counsel should generally be given an opportunity to explain his actions before being found ineffective." Id. (citing Rylander v. State, 101 S.W.3d 107, 111 (Tex. Crim. App. 2003)). "In the face of an undeveloped record, counsel should be found ineffective only if his conduct was 'so outrageous that no competent attorney would have engaged in it.'" Id. (quoting Goodspeed v. State, 187 S.W.3d 390, 392 (Tex. Crim. App. 2005)). "The record on direct appeal is generally insufficient to show that counsel's performance was deficient." Id. (citing Bone v. State, 77 S.W.3d 828, 833 (Tex. Crim. App. 2002)). Thus, in most cases, "the better course is to pursue the claim in habeas proceedings." Andrews v. State, 159 S.W.3d 98, 102 (Tex. Crim. App. 2005).

To prove prejudice, the appellant must show the existence of a reasonable probability—one sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome—that the result of the proceeding would have been different absent counsel's deficient performance. Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694; Burch v. State, 541 S.W.3d 816, 820 (Tex. Crim. App. 2017). "In every case the court should be concerned with whether, despite the strong presumption of reliability, the result of the particular proceeding is unreliable because...