Kelvin Duane Rivers v. State, 05-16-00847-CR

Kelvin Duane Rivers pleaded guilty to forgery (deferred adjudication) after an indictment alleging he forged a $700 check from an elderly victim; he was placed on community supervision.
While on supervision, Rivers was indicted for theft of a motor vehicle (value $2,500–$30,000) with an enhancement paragraph alleging a 1995 aggravated sexual assault felony conviction.
The State moved to adjudicate Rivers on the forgery based on commission of the theft; Rivers judicially confessed to the theft and pleaded true to the enhancement in plea paperwork and during the open plea process.
The trial court revoked supervision, found Rivers guilty of both forgery and theft, and sentenced him to ten years’ confinement on each count.
The written judgment in the theft case mistakenly marked the enhancement plea and the court’s finding as “N/A.” No timely trial-court objection was made to the forgery indictment’s level of detail identifying the check/bank account.
Rivers appealed: (1) arguing the theft sentence was illegal because the trial court did not expressly find the enhancement true; and (2) arguing the forgery indictment failed to invoke the trial court’s jurisdiction for lack of sufficient detail.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument (State)	Defendant's Argument (Rivers)	Held
Whether the trial court’s failure to expressly state the enhancement finding renders the 10‑year theft sentence illegal	The record (plea paperwork, judicial confession, sentencing within enhanced range) shows Rivers pleaded true and court implicitly found enhancement true; sentence is therefore authorized	Trial court did not orally announce or reflect in judgment a finding that the enhancement was true, so the 10‑year sentence is outside the unenhanced range and is unauthorized	Court held the enhancement was impliedly found true because Rivers pleaded true and sentence fell within enhanced range; sentence is legal; judgment modified to show "True" for plea and finding and affirmed
Whether the forgery indictment failed to invoke the trial court’s jurisdiction because it did not identify bank/account details or set out the check verbatim	The indictment, taken as a whole, sufficiently described the offense (forgery of a check against an elderly person) to identify the statute and vest jurisdiction; any form defects are forfeited if not raised before trial	Indictment failed haec verba and sufficient particularity (no bank name/full account number), so it failed to charge an offense and is jurisdictionally void	Court held indictment met constitutional charging requirements (sufficient to identify the offense and vest district court jurisdiction); Rivers waived the defect by not timely objecting; claim rejected

Meineke v. State, 171 S.W.3d 551 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 2005) (trial court not required to orally announce enhancement findings if record establishes them)
Seeker v. State, 186 S.W.3d 36 (Tex. App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 2005) (same)
Torres v. State, 391 S.W.3d 179 (Tex. App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 2012) (implied finding of enhancement where record establishes truth and enhanced sentence imposed)
Garner v. State, 858 S.W.2d 656 (Tex. App.—Fort Worth 1993) (sentence within enhanced range can show implicit finding)
Almand v. State, 536 S.W.3d 377 (Tex. Crim. App.) (court’s admonishments and sentencing can show finding of prior conviction)
Bigley v. State, 865 S.W.2d 26 (Tex. Crim. App. 1993) (appellate modification of judgments to reflect correct pleas/findings)
Teal v. State, 230 S.W.3d 172 (Tex. Crim. App. 2007) (indictment that accuses crime with sufficient clarity to identify statute vests district court jurisdiction)
Nix v. State, 65 S.W.3d 664 (Tex. Crim. App. 2001) (deferred-adjudication judgment generally not attackable on revocation appeal except to challenge void original judgment)