713 S.W.3d 913

Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas. Filed: 6/4/2025

In Ex parte Estevez, our client had been arrested for a misdemeanor, and released on conditions of bond including that she not get arrested for anything else. She was arrested for DWI, and the judge (now-former judge Darryl Jordan of County Criminal Court at Law 16) held her in contempt for violating her bond conditions, and sent her to an inpatient drug-treatment facility.

Then the State wanted to prosecute our client for the new DWI. We filed an application for writ of habeas corpus in the trial court (Court 16) and then-judge Jordan denied relief, which would have allowed the State to go forward with the DWI prosecution.

We appealed to the First Court of Appeals, which upheld the trial court’s decision. We filed a petition for discretionary review with the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, arguing that our client’s right not to face multiple prosecutions for the same offense would be violated by a DWI prosecution after she had been held in contempt for the DWI.

The Court of Criminal Appeals granted our petition, and after briefing (briefs are at https://search.txcourts.gov/Case.aspx?cn=PD-0581-24&coa=coscca) and oral argument (oral argument is at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrOJyPiFEP8) agreed with us that Ms. Estevez’s prosecution for DWI would violate her right to be free from double jeopardy.

Ex parte Estevez is an important case because it keeps the State from punishing someone for contempt for conduct that is contempt only because it is criminal, and then punishing her again with a criminal sentence for the same conduct.

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