Opinion issued August 25, 2026
In The
Court of Appeals
For The
First District of Texas
NO. 01-24-00109-CR
REGDRION JARRE WALKER, Appellant
V.
THE STATE OF TEXAS, Appellee
On Appeal from the 208th District Court
Harris County, Texas
Trial Court Case No. 1487014
MEMORANDUM OPINION
Regdrion Jarre Walker pleaded guilty to the felony offense of aggravated
assault. The trial court deferred adjudication of guilt and placed him on community
supervision for eight years. Several years later, the State moved to adjudicate guilt, alleging that Walker had violated multiple community supervision conditions.
Following an evidentiary hearing, the court found that Walker violated the
conditions. The court adjudicated Walker’s guilt, revoked his community
supervision, and assessed his punishment at twelve years’ confinement.
In his sole appellate issue, Walker argues that he was denied counsel during
the thirty-day period in between his sentencing and filing his notice of appeal. He
requests that we abate this proceeding so he can file an out-of-time motion for new
trial in the trial court. We affirm.
Background
A grand jury indicted Walker for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. In
2017, Walker pleaded guilty to this offense without an agreed recommendation on
punishment. The trial court deferred adjudication of guilt and placed Walker on
community supervision for eight years.
The State moved to adjudicate Walker’s guilt in 2020, and it filed two
amended supplemental motions to adjudicate in 2023. The State alleged various
violations of Walker’s community supervision conditions in each motion, including
allegations that Walker committed several new criminal offenses.
The trial court held a two-day evidentiary hearing on the motion to adjudicate
on January 3 and 4, 2024. Walker was represented by two attorneys, including Guy
Williams. At the close of the hearing, the trial court found several of the State’s
2
allegations true and adjudicated Walker guilty of the charged offense. The court then
assessed Walker’s punishment at twelve years’ confinement.
Walker did not file a motion for new trial. Williams timely filed a notice of
appeal on Walker’s behalf.1
Right to Counsel at Motion for New Trial Stage
In his sole issue on appeal, Walker argues that he did not have counsel during
the motion for new trial stage of the trial proceeding: the thirty days in between his
sentencing and the filing of his notice of appeal. He asks that we abate this appeal to
allow him to file and prosecute a motion for new trial raising a “facially plausible”
claim of ineffective assistance of counsel for failing to investigate and present
mitigating evidence at the adjudication hearing.
A. Governing Law
A criminal defendant has thirty days following the imposition of his sentence
to file a motion for new trial. TEX. R. APP. P. 21.4(a); State v. Zalman, 400 S.W.3d
590, 593 (Tex. Crim. App. 2013). A motion for new trial is generally not a
1
Williams did not timely file an appellate brief, and this Court abated the appeal to
determine whether Williams had abandoned the appeal and whether Walker wished
to pursue the appeal. In his motion to withdraw filed with the trial court, Williams
asserted that he “was employed to represent Defendant on an Appeal matter
stemming from a decision out of this Court,” but “[a]fter reviewing the transcripts
and discussing the same with Defendant, Movant does not believe that he can
satisfactorily advocate on Defendant’s appeal requests.” He requested that the trial
court appoint new appellate counsel for Walker. The trial court found that Williams
had abandoned the appeal but that Walker wished to pursue the appeal. The court
appointed new appellate counsel for Walker.
3
prerequisite to preserving a point of error on appeal, but it is “when necessary to
adduce facts not in the record.” TEX. R. APP. P. 21.2; Cooks v. State, 240 S.W.3d
906, 910 (Tex. Crim. App. 2007) (“Sometimes a motion for new trial is a necessary
step to adduce facts not otherwise in the record, in order to be able to present these
points of error based on those facts in the appeal.”).
Because a defendant’s substantial right “to preserve some issues for appeal
can be at stake” during the motion for new trial stage, the time period for filing a
motion for new trial is a “critical stage” of the proceeding, and the defendant has a
constitutional right to counsel during that period. Cooks, 240 S.W.3d at 910–11; see
Montejo v. Louisiana, 556 U.S. 778, 786 (2009) (“[O]nce the adversary judicial
process has been initiated, the Sixth Amendment guarantees a defendant the right to
have counsel present at all ‘critical’ stages of the criminal proceedings.”). If a
defendant is deprived of counsel during this stage of the prosecution, his
constitutional rights are violated. Carnell v. State, 535 S.W.3d 569, 572 (Tex.
App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 2017, order).
However, if a defendant is represented by counsel during trial, a rebuttable
presumption exists that his counsel continued to adequately represent him during the
critical motion for new trial stage. Cooks, 240 S.W.3d at 911; Carnell, 535 S.W.3d
at 572. “In order to rebut the presumption, the record must compel the conclusion
that appellant was abandoned by trial counsel.” Monakino v. State, 535 S.W.3d 559,
4
565 (Tex. App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 2016, order) (quotation omitted). Further, a
rebuttable presumption exists that when the defendant does not file a motion for new
trial, it is because the defendant considered and rejected that option “with the benefit
of counsel’s representation.” Cooks, 240 S.W.3d at 911 n.6 (quotation and emphasis
omitted).
B. Walker Has Not Rebutted the Presumption that He Had Counsel During
the Motion for New Trial Stage
This criminal proceeding has been pending since 2016, and Walker has had
multiple attorneys of record during this time. When the hearing on the State’s motion
to adjudicate occurred on January 3 and 4, 2024, two attorneys appeared on Walker’s
behalf: Je’Freshia Bell and Guy Williams.2 Williams questioned witnesses, made
objections, argued that the State did not prove the allegations in the motion to
adjudicate, and argued that if the court disagreed and found the allegations true, the
court should not impose a lengthy prison sentence.
The trial court found that the State established multiple violations of Walker’s
community supervision conditions, adjudicated him guilty of the charged offense of
aggravated assault, and imposed his punishment at twelve years’ confinement on
January 4, 2024. This started the clock on the period for Walker to file both a motion
2
It appears Bell was Walker’s attorney of record at the time of the adjudication
hearing, as her name was listed on the judgment adjudicating guilt as “Attorney for
Defendant.” The record does not contain a motion to withdraw filed by Bell and
granted by the trial court.
5
for new trial and notice of appeal. See TEX. R. APP. P. 21.4(a) (“The defendant may
file a motion for new trial before, but no later than 30 days after, the date when the
trial court imposes or suspends sentence in open court.”); TEX. R. APP. P. 26.2(a)
(providing that defendant’s notice of appeal must be filed within 30 or 90 days after
imposition of sentence in open court, depending on whether defendant timely files
motion for new trial). No motion for new trial was filed.
On February 5, 2024, Williams timely filed a notice of appeal on Walker’s
behalf.3 Williams filed a “Notice of Appearance” that same date indicating his intent
to act as Walker’s lead counsel going forward:
Notice is hereby given that the undersigned attorney, GUY G.
WILLIAMS, is making an appearance for REGDRION JARRE
WALKER. Said attorney shall also be on record for the purpose of
receiving communications from the court and prosecuting attorneys.
This notice further provides that GUY G. WILLIAMS is the designated
Attorney-in-Charge for REGDRION JARRE WALKER, in the abovestyled matter in accordance with the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure.
The notice of appearance and the notice of appeal contain Williams’s name, bar
number, address, and phone number. This information matches the information
3
30 days after January 4, 2024, was February 3, a Saturday. Williams filed the notice
of appeal on Monday, February 5, the next business day. Under Rule of Appellate
Procedure 4.1, the notice of appeal was timely. TEX. R. APP. P. 4.1(a) (“The day of
an act, event, or default after which a designated period begins to run is not included
when computing a period prescribed or allowed by these rules, by court order, or by
statute. The last day of the period is included, but if that day is a Saturday, Sunday,
or legal holiday, the period extends to the end of the next day that is not a Saturday,
Sunday, or legal holiday.”).
6
listed for Williams on the “Appearances” page of the reporter’s record from the
adjudication hearing.
On appeal, Walker argues that he has rebutted the presumption that Williams
(one of two attorneys who represented him at the adjudication hearing) represented
him during the motion for new trial stage, pointing to Williams’ notice of
appearance. He argues that if Williams “intended to continue representing Walker
past his adjudication and sentencing, Williams would not have entered an
appearance as appellate counsel.” Instead, “[t]he representation would have simply
continued from trial counsel to appellate counsel.”
We disagree that the notice of appearance rebuts the presumption that
Williams continued representing Walker from the adjudication hearing through the
motion for new trial stage. Walker questions why Williams filed a notice of
appearance if his representation of Walker continued after the adjudication hearing
and sentencing. There is a straightforward explanation for this action: Williams,
although representing Walker continuously from the adjudication hearing, was not
Walker’s attorney of record. Rather, Bell was. The notice of appearance was
therefore necessary to ensure that the lead counsel (or attorney-in-charge)
designation switched from Bell to Williams.4
4
By signing and filing the notice of appeal, Williams became Walker’s attorney of
record on appeal. See Reyes v. State, 557 S.W.3d 624, 640 (Tex. App.—El Paso
2017, pet. ref’d) (“And by having filed the notice of appeal in this case, the trial
7
We conclude that Walker has not rebutted the presumption that Williams
continued to adequately represent him during the motion for new trial stage. Further,
we conclude that Walker has not rebutted the presumption that the reason he did not
file a motion for new trial was because he considered and rejected that option with
the benefit of Williams’s representation. See Cooks, 240 S.W.3d at 911 n.6; Smith v.
State, 17 S.W.3d 660, 663 (Tex. Crim. App. 2000) (“[T]here is nothing in the record
to suggest that appellant was not counseled by his attorney regarding the merits of a
motion for new trial. We therefore assume that appellant considered this option and
rejected it.”). We hold that Walker has not established that he was deprived of
counsel during the critical motion for new trial stage.
We overrule Walker’s sole issue.
attorney was bound to represent Appellant through the appeal (unless released by
the trial court or appellate court).”); Sampson v. State, 854 S.W.2d 659, 663 (Tex.
App.—Dallas 1992, no pet.); see also TEX. R. APP. P. 6.1(a) (“Unless another
attorney is designated, lead counsel for an appellant is the attorney whose signature
first appears on the notice of appeal.”).
8
Conclusion
We affirm the trial court’s judgment adjudicating Walker’s guilt.
David Gunn
Justice
Panel consists of Justices Gunn, Caughey, and Morgan.
Do not publish. TEX. R. APP. P. 47.2(b).
9