IN THE COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS
OF TEXAS
NO. AP-75,634
ADRIAN ESTRADA, Appellant
v.
THE STATE OF TEXAS
ON DIRECT APPEAL
FROM CAUSE NO. 2006-CR-2079 IN THE 226
JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT
TH
BEXAR COUNTY
HERVEY, J., delivered the opinion of the Court in which KELLER, P.J., MEYERS,
JOHNSON, KEASLER, HOLCOMB and COCHRAN, JJ., joined. PRICE and WOMACK, JJ., concurred.
O P I N I O N
Appellant was convicted of capital murder for murdering Stephanie Sanchez (“Sanchez”) and
their thirteen-week-old unborn child on December 12, 2005. See §§ 19.03(a)(7)(A), TEX. PEN. CODE
(making it a capital offense to intentionally or knowingly murder more than one person during the
same criminal transaction); 1.07(26), TEX. PEN. CODE (defining an individual to include an unborn
child). Pursuant to the jury’s answers to the special issues, the trial court sentenced appellant to
death. Appellant raises forty-four points of error on direct appeal. We will sustain point of error two
Estrada--2
and reverse and remand this case for a new punishment hearing. We overrule all guilt-phase points
of error and all other punishment-phase points of error that we find necessary to address.
Appellant claims in point of error one that the evidence is legally insufficient to support the
jury’s affirmative answer to the future-dangerousness special issue. Viewed in the light most
favorable to the jury’s finding on this issue, the evidence shows that appellant was a youth pastor at
a church in San Antonio. Sanchez was in appellant’s youth group, and she lived with her mother and
father and her three younger siblings. Appellant and Sanchez began having sex when Sanchez was
sixteen years old and appellant was twenty years old. Appellant impregnated Sanchez three times.
The first time, Sanchez got an abortion. The second time, she miscarried. The third time, Sanchez
decided to have the baby. Appellant told Sanchez that he wanted to share his life with her and their
baby. Appellant did not tell Sanchez that he was having