Jeffrey Dean Gerron v. State, 10-14-00121-CR

Appellant Jeffrey Dean Gerron was convicted on multiple counts involving child pornography; this is a dissent addressing admission of foreign witness testimony.
The State introduced testimony from Bjorn Ludvigsen, a Norwegian National Criminal Police officer, who testified about identities and ages of girls in certain photos though he lacked personal knowledge of those facts.
The majority found Ludvigsen’s testimony violated hearsay and the Confrontation Clause but deemed the error harmless as to most counts; this dissent agrees error occurred but contests harmlessness for counts 5, 8, and 10.
The State’s expert, Dr. Jayme Coffman, testified she could definitively say the girl in count 9 was under 18 but could not determine age for counts 5, 8, and 10 for medical reasons (breast tissue, closed labia majora, or inability to determine).
Ludvigsen’s testimony provided unique, uncorroborated assertions of the girls’ identities and ages that the dissent says the jury relied on, and the State highlighted his testimony in closing arguments alongside Dr. Coffman’s testimony.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Admissibility under Confrontation Clause	Ludvigsen’s out-of-court identifications were testimonial and inadmissible without confrontation	State relied on Ludvigsen as investigative witness to identify victims and ages	Majority and dissent agree admission violated Confrontation Clause
Harmlessness of constitutional error	The admission was harmless because other evidence supported convictions	Ludvigsen’s unique testimony likely affected jury on counts where medical expert could not determine age	Dissent: error not harmless for counts 5, 8, 10; would reverse those counts
Sufficiency of remaining evidence	State argues overall evidence supports convictions independent of Ludvigsen	Gerron argues some counts lack medical/expert corroboration, so Ludvigsen was crucial	Majority found evidence sufficient; dissent acknowledges sufficiency but focuses on harm analysis
Impact on sentencing/cumulative counts	State maintains convictions and cumulative sentence stand	Gerron contends reversal of counts 5, 8, 10 requires modifying cumulative sentence	Dissent would delete those counts and modify cumulative sentence accordingly

Langham v. State, 305 S.W.3d 568 (Tex. Crim. App. 2010) (harmless-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard for Confrontation Clause error)
Scott v. State, 227 S.W.3d 670 (Tex. Crim. App. 2007) (focus on whether constitutional error affected integrity of conviction process)
Wall v. State, 184 S.W.3d 730 (Tex. Crim. App. 2006) (analysis of whether constitutional error could have contributed to conviction)
Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18 (U.S. 1967) (constitutional-error-harmless-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard)
Snowden v. State, 353 S.W.3d 815 (Tex. Crim. App. 2011) (consideration of all circumstances in harmless-error analysis)