Page 145 - Texas police Association Peace Officer Guide 2017

Additionally, as the court of appeals properly noted, intermediate courts have upheld convictions
for tampering with evidence without requiring the State to definitively prove exactly what
evidence was altered, concealed, or destroyed.
The only “element” the State must allege in the indictment is whether the evidence at issue was
“a record, a document, or a thing.” By alleging that Zuniga tampered with “an unknown
substance,” the State seeks to prosecute Zuniga for tampering with a “thing,” rather than a
“record” or a “document.” Thus, we agree with the State and the court of appeals that 1) the State
alleged every element of the offense of tampering with evidence when it amended its indictment
and 2) the specific identity of the tampered-with evidence was not an element of the offense.
The specific identity of the tampered-with evidence is not an element of the offense. However,
the court of appeals did not address whether the trial court could have properly determined that
more specificity was required in the indictment in order to provide the defendant with adequate
notice of the charged conduct. We remand this case for the court of appeals to fully address that
issue.

State v. Zuniga, No. PD-1317-15, Court of Criminal Appeals, Mar. 08, 2017.
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7. Civil cases:

CIVIL CLAIMS
QUALIFIED IMMUNITY
USE OF FORCE
REASONABLE SUSPICION TO DETAIN
BYSTANDER OFFICER LIABILITY

Herman Barnes was a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic. He died in 2006 after a confrontation in
his home with Harris County sheriff’s deputies. His surviving family members (the Carrolls)
sued the deputies involved in the confrontation, asserting that the deputies’ seizure of Barnes was
unlawful, that the deputies’ warrantless entry into his home was unreasonable, and that the
deputies’ use of force was excessive and deprived Barnes of his civil rights under the Fourth and
Fourteenth Amendments in violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The deputies seek interlocutory
appeal from the district court’s denial of their motion for a directed verdict. The deputies argue
they are entitled to qualified immunity from § 1983 liability because their actions did not violate
clearly established law.

To evaluate whether a government official is entitled to qualified immunity, we conduct a two-
prong inquiry: we ask (1) whether the undisputed facts and the disputed facts, accepting the
plaintiffs’ version of the disputed facts as true, constitute a violation of a constitutional right, and
(2) whether the defendant’s conduct was “objectively reasonable in light of clearly established
law.” A government official’s acts are not objectively unreasonable unless all reasonable
officials in the defendant’s circumstances would have then known that the defendant’s conduct
violated the plaintiff’s rights.

Herman Rochan Barnes (also known as Herman Rochan Carroll) suffered from paranoid
schizophrenia. On the afternoon of October 6, 2006, Barnes stood outside of his home beside
the subdivision’s community mailboxes smoking a cigarette. Barnes’s neighbor testified that

A Peace Officer’s Guide to Texas Law 140 2017 Edition