Full Opinion

In the Court of Appeals Second Appellate District of Texas at Fort Worth ___________________________ No. 02-26-00191-CR ___________________________ Ex parte Gary Dion Daniels On Appeal from County Criminal Court No. 5 Tarrant County, Texas Trial Court No. HBB0027 Before Sudderth, C.J.; Kerr and Walker, JJ. Memorandum Opinion by Justice Walker MEMORANDUM OPINION I. INTRODUCTION Appellant Gary Dion Daniels, proceeding pro se, appeals the trial court’s order denying his Article 11.072 application for a writ of habeas corpus. See Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 11.072. Because Daniels was sentenced to a term of confinement, he is not eligible for relief under Article 11.072. See id. We will affirm. II. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND In 2008, Daniels pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor offense of assault–family violence. See Tex. Penal Code § 22.01; Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 42.013. Pursuant to a plea agreement, the trial court adjudicated Daniels guilty and sentenced him to thirty days’ confinement in the Tarrant County Jail. The trial court permitted Daniels to serve his sentence on “labor detail” as an alternative to confinement but did not probate the sentence. See Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 42.034 (authorizing county jail work release programs as an alternative term of service for misdemeanor defendants). Daniels failed to appear for labor detail, and the trial court ordered his arrest and remanded him to the sheriff’s custody to serve his sentence in the Tarrant County Jail. In 2021, Daniels was indicted for the felony offense of assault–family violence enhanced by the 2008 assault–family violence conviction.1 See Tex. Penal Code § 22.01(a), (b)(2)(A); Daniels v. State, No. 02-23-00205-CR, 2024 WL 3977219, at *4 The indictment included a habitual-offender notice. See Tex. Penal Code 1 § 12.42(d). 2 (Tex. App.—Fort Worth Aug. 29, 2024, pet. ref’d) (mem. op., not designated for publication). A jury found him guilty and assessed his punishment at forty years’ confinement, and the trial court sentenced him accordingly.2 Id. at *5. In 2026, Daniels filed an “application for writ of habeas corpus seeking relief from final misdemeanor conviction under Code of Criminal Procedure Article 11.072.” Contending that Article 11.072 was applicable because he had been—in his words—sentenced to “30 days of Community Service (Labor Detail),” Daniels sought to challenge his 2008 assault–family violence misdemeanor conviction.3 The State filed an answer, claiming that Daniels’s application should be denied as frivolous because Texas Code of Criminal Procedure “Article 11.072 is not proper; [Daniels] was not placed on any form of community supervision.” The trial court referred the matter to a criminal law magistrate to prepare and to enter findings of fact and conclusions of law. The magistrate found that Daniels “was ordered to 30 days’ confinement in the Tarrant County Jail to be served on labor detail, not community supervision,” that the 2 Daniels appealed his 2021 felony conviction, and we affirmed the trial court’s judgment. Daniels, 2024 WL 3977219, at *8. He also filed an application for a writ of habeas corpus under Article 11.07 with the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. The Court of Criminal Appeals denied his application without a written order. In re Daniels, WR-86,938-14 (Tex. Crim. App. Nov. 20, 2025). 3 Daniels claimed that (1) he was actually innocent, (2) his sentence of “community service” was not a conviction, (3) there was no evidence to support a finding of family violence, (4) there was not a hearing to adjudicate his guilt or to revoke his supervision, and (5) the State’s use of his 2008 conviction in a future prosecution violated double jeopardy. 3 labor-detail program is “operated by the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office in which persons convicted of a misdemeanor offense perform physical labor to fulfill a sentence of confinement,” and that the “labor-detail program is not community supervision.” Because Daniels was not ordered to community supervision, the magistrate concluded that Daniels was “manifestly entitled to no relief under Article 11.072.” The magistrate denied the application as frivolous, and the trial court signed an order adopting and ratifying the actions taken by the magistrate. Daniels filed this appeal. III. DISCUSSION A. APPLICABLE LAW AND STANDARD OF REVIEW Texas Code of Criminal Procedure Article 11.072 “establishes the procedures for an application for a writ of habeas corpus in a felony or misdemeanor case in which the applicant seeks relief from an order or a judgment of conviction ordering community supervision.”4 Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 11.072, § 1; see Ex parte Nugent, 593 S.W.3d 416, 423 (Tex. App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 2019, no pet.). Article 11.072 Texas Code of Criminal Procedure Article 42A.001(1) defines “community 4 supervision” as the placement of a defendant by a court under a continuum of programs and sanctions, with conditions imposed by the court for a specified period during which: (A) criminal proceedings are deferred without an adjudication of guilt; or (B) a sentence of imprisonment or confinement, imprisonment and fine, or confinement and fine, is probated and the imposition of sentence is suspended in whole or in part. Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 42A.001(1). 4 provides that at the time the application is filed, “the applicant must be, or have been, on community supervision,” and the application must challenge either the legal validity of the conviction or the conditions of community supervision. Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 11.072, § 2; see State v. Guerrero, 400 S.W.3d 576, 582 (Tex. Crim. App. 2013) (explaining that Article 11.072 is the exclusive means by which trial courts exercise constitutional habeas jurisdiction “in cases involving an individual who is either serving a term of community supervision or who has completed a term of community supervision”). Article 11.072 further provides that if, as here, the trial court “determines from the face of an application or documents attached to the application that the applicant is manifestly entitled to no relief, the [trial] court shall enter a written order denying the application as frivolous.” Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 11.072, § 7(a). When reviewing a trial court’s ruling on a habeas corpus application, we view the facts in the light most favorable to the trial court’s ruling and will uphold it absent an abuse of discretion. Kniatt v. State, 206 S.W. 3d 657, 664 (Tex. Crim. App. 2006). We will uphold the trial court’s decision on any theory of law applicable to the case. Ex parte Evans, 410 S.W.3d 481, 484 (Tex. App.—Fort Worth 2013, pet. ref’d). B. ANALYSIS The 2008 misdemeanor judgment reflects that Daniels’s punishment was assessed at “30 days confinement in the Tarrant County Jail” and that he was “remanded to the custody of the Sheriff of Tarrant County, Texas to serve said 5 sentence.” The judgment makes no mention whatsoever of community supervision, and Daniels’s sentence of confinement was not suspended in whole or in part. See Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 42A.001(1). As noted, Daniels filed an “application for writ of habeas corpus seeking relief from final misdemeanor conviction under Code of Criminal Procedure Article 11.072.” But Daniels was not ordered to community supervision—he was sentenced to a term of confinement in the Tarrant County Jail. Despite this fact, Daniels maintains that because the trial court permitted him to participate in Tarrant County’s labor-detail program, he was placed on “30 days of community service.” He conflates community service—i.e., labor detail—with community supervision. When a trial court sentences a defendant to a term of confinement in the county jail and then permits the defendant to serve that sentence on labor detail or through a work- release program, the sentence is being executed—not suspended. See Guzman v. State, 841 S.W.2d 61, 64 (Tex. App.—El Paso 1992, pet. ref’d) (“[W]e find that the intent of the legislature in enacting the work release provisions of [Texas Code of Criminal Procedure Articles] 42.033 and 42.034 was to increase the sentencing options available to the trial judge when the punishment imposed included confinement in the county jail.”); see also Ex parte Hale, 117 S.W.3d 866, 870 n.12 (Tex. Crim. App. 2003). We conclude that Daniels’s sentence of confinement—that permitted him to serve on labor detail—was not an order of community supervision. See Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 42A.001(1). 6 Because Daniels was not, nor had been, on community supervision for the 2008 misdemeanor offense of assault–family violence, we conclude that Article 11.072 is inapplicable. See Ex Parte Zambrana, No. 07-19-00171-CR, 2019 WL 4582769, at *1 (Tex. App.—Amarillo Sept. 20, 2019, no pet.) (mem. op., not designated for publication) (concluding that Article 11.072 was inapplicable to appellant because he “was sentenced to serve forty-five days in the Potter County Jail”); see also Ex Parte Prayor, No. 02-16-00297-CR, 2016 WL 4538605, at *1 (Tex. App.—Fort Worth Aug. 31, 2016, no pet.) (mem. op., not designated for publication) (holding that appellant was not entitled to relief under Article 11.072 because he filed his habeas application after his community supervision had been revoked). Accordingly, because Article 11.072 is inapplicable, we hold that the trial court did not err by denying Daniels’s application for a writ of habeas corpus under Article 11.072.5 See Ex parte Williams, No. 05-19-00666-CR, 2021 WL 1015863, at *2 (Tex. App.—Dallas Mar. 17, 2021, no pet.) (mem. op., not designated for publication); Martinez v. State, No. 04-14-00555-CR, 2015 WL 8391329, at *1 (Tex. 5 Daniels does not argue that his application should be construed as an application filed under Article 11.09. See Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 11.09 (establishing the procedure for seeking a writ of habeas corpus in misdemeanor cases not involving community supervision). Nor does the substance of his application indicate that he was seeking relief under Article 11.09. On the contrary, Daniels has made his intent of pursuing habeas relief under Article 11.072 unmistakably clear. First, he wrote in his habeas application that an application under Article “11.09 was the wrong application.” Second, he objected to the application “being referred to Magistrate Jacob Mitchell as an Art. 11.09 due to it clearly being an Art. 11.072.” [emphasis added] We therefore do not consider the merits of Daniels’s application with respect to Article 11.09. See Williams, 2021 WL 1015863, at *1 n.2. 7 App.—San Antonio Dec. 9, 2015, pet. ref’d) (mem. op., not designated for publication) (affirming trial court’s order denying appellant’s Article 11.072 application for a writ of habeas corpus when appellant “was given jail time without probation”); Ex parte Paselk, No. 06-14-00099-CR, 2014 WL 4922981, at *3 (Tex. App.—Texarkana Oct. 1, 2014, pet. ref’d) (mem. op., not designated for publication) (affirming trial court’s order denying appellant’s Article 11.072 application for a writ of habeas corpus when appellant “was sentenced to 275 days’ confinement in the Hopkins County Jail”). IV. CONCLUSION We affirm the trial court’s order denying Daniels’s Article 11.072 application for a writ of habeas corpus.6 See Tex. R. App. P. 43.2(a). /s/ Brian Walker Brian Walker Justice Do Not Publish Tex. R. App. P. 47.2(b) Delivered: September 17, 2026 6 We deny all pending motions in this appeal. 8