Fluellen v. State

Joshua O’Keith Fluellen pleaded guilty, as part of a plea bargaining agreement, to aggravated robbery. The trial court deferred a finding of guilt and placed Fluellen on ten years’ community supervision. The State later filed a motion to adjudicate Fluellen’s guilt, alleging he committed eleven violations of the terms of his supervision. Fluellen pleaded not true to each of the allegations. The trial court found the allegations true, found Fluellen guilty, and sentenced him to fifty years’ imprisonment.

Except in certain narrowly defined circumstances, see Nix v. State, 65 S.W.3d 664 (Tex. Crim. App. 2001), if Fluellen wished to appeal issues arising from the original plea proceeding in an appeal taken from that proceeding, he must have done so at that time. Manuel v. State, 994 S.W.2d 658, 661-62 (Tex. Crim. App. 1999). Nix addressed the void judgment exception, which recognizes there are some rare situations in which a trial court’s judgment is accorded no respect due to a complete lack of power to render the judgment in question. Nix v. State, 65 S.W.3d 664. The judgment, being a nullity, may be attacked at any time.