Ruben Trevino v. the State of Texas

Summary

The Texas Thirteenth Court of Appeals affirmed Ruben Trevino’s conviction for murder and fifty-year sentence. The court held that Trevino failed to preserve his complaint concerning a limiting instruction for extraneous-offense evidence, and it rejected his challenges to the denial of mistrials and his claimed deprivation of a fair trial.

Holdings

1. The trial court did not err by failing to include a limiting instruction in the jury charge because Trevino did not request a limiting instruction when the evidence was first admitted and did not object to the testimony.
2. The trial court did not abuse its discretion by denying a mistrial based on the prosecutor's references to Trevino's criminal history.
3. The trial court did not abuse its discretion by denying a mistrial based on jurors' complaints about trial delays because the remarks reflected frustration with the pace and length of trial, not bias or partiality against Trevino.
4. Trevino's fair-trial claim failed because he did not object that the juror was disabled or disqualified, and the record did not show a condition preventing the juror from fully and fairly performing juror functions.
5. Trevino failed to establish reversible error or a constitutional fair-trial violation arising from the ten-day recess because he did not object and did not show harm.

Questions Presented

1. Whether the trial court erred by failing to give a limiting instruction concerning extraneous-offense evidence in the jury charge or contemporaneously when the evidence was admitted.
2. Whether the trial court erred by denying Trevino's motions for mistrial based on references to extraneous offenses and juror complaints about trial delays.
3. Whether Trevino was deprived of a fair trial because a complaining juror remained on the jury and because the trial included a ten-day recess.

Disposition

affirmed