Deadly Weapon Sufficiency in Family-Violence Assaults | Davis v. State (2025)

Davis v. State, 02-25-00209-CR, June 18, 2026.

On appeal from Criminal District Court No. 3, Tarrant County, Texas

Synopsis

The Fort Worth Court of Appeals affirmed deadly-weapon findings tied to family-violence assault counts involving hands and a knife. The court held the evidence was legally sufficient where repeated strangulation, the complainant’s visible distress, near-loss of consciousness, and threats made while wielding a knife allowed a rational jury to find that the hands and knife were used in a manner capable of causing death or serious bodily injury.

Relevance to Family Law

Although this is a criminal appeal, its practical significance for Texas family lawyers is immediate. In divorce, SAPCR, protective-order, and modification litigation, the same kinds of facts that supported deadly-weapon findings here—manual strangulation, threats preventing escape, forced movement, visible injury, and post-assault control—can materially affect conservatorship, possession, supervised access, injunction strategy, and the framing of family-violence allegations. For family-law litigators, the case reinforces that the manner of use and surrounding circumstances matter at least as much as the object itself; hands, when used to occlude breathing, can carry the same evidentiary weight as a traditional weapon.

Case Summary

Fact Summary

The respondent and the complainant had dated for several months in 2023. The evidence described multiple assaults during the relationship, including an incident in which the respondent repeatedly hit the complainant and strangled her after becoming angry over a text message involving the father of her child.

The charged events escalated in November 2023. After the complainant sent a message stating that she did not want to continue the relationship, the respondent arrived at her apartment complex within about fifteen minutes, approached her outside, put his arm around her, and tried to strangle her to the ground while telling her she was never going to leave him. He then forced her upstairs into her apartment.

Inside the apartment, he hit her in the face, knocked her to the kitchen floor, and repeatedly strangled her. The complainant testified that he stopped when she started turning blue and began to pass out, then resumed once she started breathing again. He later took her phone and tablet, gathered clothing, told her she would not be returning to the apartment for a while, made her shower and change clothes, pushed her to the ground, and attempted to hit her with a chair.

The respondent then grabbed a knife from the kitchen, said, “We got to go,” and told the complainant that he would hurt her if she ran. She believed he would stab her if she did not comply. He forced her to leave with him, drove her to pick up her daughter from daycare, and then took both of them to his house. After she used her daughter’s tablet to message someone for help, he again yelled at her, strangled her, kicked her, and hit her in the head. By then, she had two black eyes and could barely see.

The jury convicted the respondent of aggravated assault against a family member causing serious bodily injury with a deadly weapon, namely his hands; aggravated assault of a family member with a deadly weapon, namely a knife; assault of a family member by occlusion while using or exhibiting a deadly weapon, namely his hands, with a prior family-violence conviction; and assault against a family member with a previous conviction.

Issues Decided

• Whether the evidence was legally sufficient to support deadly-weapon findings for Count One, involving hands.
• Whether the evidence was legally sufficient to support a deadly-weapon finding for Count Three, involving a knife.
• Whether the evidence was legally sufficient to support a deadly-weapon finding for Count Four, involving hands during assault by occlusion.
• Whether the evidence was legally sufficient to support the serious-bodily-injury element alleged in Count One.
• Whether the trial court violated the respondent’s confrontation rights by overruling hearsay objections to a police officer’s punishment-phase testimony.

Rules Applied

The court applied the Penal Code provisions governing aggravated assault, assault by occlusion, and deadly weapons, including Tex. Penal Code Sections 22.01(b)(2)(A), 22.01(b-3), 22.02(a)(2), 22.02(b)(1)(A), and 1.07(a)(17).

For deadly-weapon sufficiency, the governing question was whether the evidence permitted a rational jury to find that, in the manner of its use or intended use, the object was capable of causing death or serious bodily injury. That standard applied both to a knife and to hands. The court’s framing recognized that ordinary body parts may qualify as deadly weapons when used in a way capable of producing death or serious bodily injury, and that capability may be shown through the manner of use, the surrounding circumstances, threats, and the injuries inflicted.

Application

The court treated the deadly-weapon question as one driven by manner of use, not labels. For Count One and Count Four, the evidence showed repeated strangulation, not a brief or ambiguous physical encounter. The respondent tried to strangle the complainant outside the apartment, then repeatedly strangled her again inside after knocking her to the kitchen floor. The complainant described turning blue, beginning to pass out, and then being strangled again once she resumed breathing. That testimony gave the jury a concrete basis to find that the respondent’s hands were used in a manner capable of causing death or serious bodily injury.

The same was true for the later assault at the house, where the respondent again strangled, kicked, and hit the complainant after discovering her message for help. The court’s reasoning, as framed by the issues on appeal and the affirmance, accepted that the surrounding circumstances and the resulting injuries were part of the capability analysis. The complainant’s black eyes, impaired vision, and near-loss of consciousness were not incidental details; they helped demonstrate the dangerous manner in which the hands were used.

For Count Three, the knife did not need to be used to cut or stab in order to support the deadly-weapon element. The respondent grabbed a kitchen knife, told the complainant “We got to go,” and threatened to hurt her if she ran. She testified that she believed he would stab her if she did not comply. In that setting—after repeated assaults, strangulation, isolation, and removal of her phone—the jury could rationally conclude that the knife was used or exhibited in a manner capable of causing death or serious bodily injury.

For family-law practitioners, the evidentiary lesson is plain: capability can be proven through the full sequence of conduct. Repeated occlusion, inability to escape, threats during forced movement, visible injuries, and the complainant’s physical reaction all matter in showing the dangerous manner of use.

Holding

The court held that the evidence was legally sufficient to support the deadly-weapon finding in Count One. Repeated strangulation with hands, combined with the complainant’s turning blue, beginning to pass out, and the severity of the assault, allowed a rational jury to find that the hands were used in a manner capable of causing death or serious bodily injury.

The court also held that the evidence was legally sufficient to support the deadly-weapon finding in Count Three. The respondent’s use of a knife while forcing the complainant to leave, together with his threat that he would hurt her if she ran and her belief that he would stab her, supported the finding that the knife was used or exhibited as a deadly weapon.

The court further held that the evidence was legally sufficient to support the deadly-weapon finding in Count Four. The repeated strangulation evidence, viewed in context, supported the jury’s determination that the respondent used his hands as deadly weapons during the occlusion assault.

Finally, the court affirmed the convictions.

Practical Application

For Texas family-law litigators, this case is useful well beyond the criminal docket. In protective-order hearings, temporary-orders practice, and final trials involving conservatorship or possession, do not under-develop strangulation evidence on the assumption that “no weapon” means a weaker record. A detailed account of how the hands were used, whether breathing was impeded, whether the victim lost consciousness or nearly did, whether there was color change, whether the assailant resumed pressure after pauses, and whether threats accompanied the assault can substantially sharpen the family-violence presentation.

The case also underscores the importance of building narrative continuity. Here, the dangerousness showing was strengthened by the sequence: assault, strangulation, confiscation of communication devices, forced movement, weapon display, threats, continued control, and renewed assault. In family litigation, that same sequence may support requests for exclusive use of the residence, temporary injunctions, supervised possession, exchange restrictions, non-removal provisions, and targeted findings affecting best-interest analysis.

Practitioners representing an accused parent or spouse should focus on precision rather than general denial. If the record contains allegations of occlusion or weapon exhibition, counsel should be prepared to address the manner-of-use evidence directly, the extent of injury, the temporal sequence, and any corroborating photographs, statements, or third-party observations. Broad arguments that hands are not weapons, or that a knife was never actually used to cut, are unlikely to carry much weight where the surrounding circumstances show capability.

Checklists

Building a Strangulation Record in Family Court

• Obtain detailed testimony about how the pressure was applied to the neck or throat.
• Pin down whether breathing was impeded or circulation was affected.
• Ask about color change, dizziness, ringing in the ears, blurred vision, passing out, or near-loss of consciousness.
• Develop whether the assailant paused and resumed the strangulation.
• Tie the assault to visible injuries, photographs, and medical or first-aid evidence.
• Establish threats made during or immediately after the occlusion.
• Show whether the victim was isolated, restrained, or prevented from leaving or calling for help.

Proving Dangerousness Without a Conventional Weapon

• Do not assume the absence of a firearm or stabbing defeats a dangerousness theory.
• Emphasize the manner of use of hands during occlusion assaults.
• Connect the assault to resulting physical distress and functional impairment.
• Use the full surrounding circumstances, including repeated attacks and control over movement.
• Present evidence of threats that made noncompliance dangerous.

Using Knife Evidence Effectively

• Establish where the knife came from and when it was introduced into the encounter.
• Develop the words spoken while the knife was being wielded.
• Show whether the knife was used to force movement or compliance.
• Tie the knife display to earlier violence in the same incident.
• Elicit testimony about why the victim believed the threat would be carried out.

Temporary Orders and Protective Orders Strategy

• Frame strangulation evidence as central to immediate safety risk.
• Request tailored no-contact or limited-contact relief when there is evidence of forced movement or continued control.
• Seek provisions restricting exchanges, pickups, and unannounced appearances.
• Consider supervised possession or neutral exchange locations where the facts show threats and coercion.
• Use photographs and contemporaneous messages to corroborate the timeline.

Defense-Side Risk Management

• Address the capability element head-on rather than arguing only that no traditional weapon was used.
• Test the specificity of testimony regarding breathing impairment, unconsciousness, and physical symptoms.
• Scrutinize chronology and whether multiple incidents are being conflated.
• Evaluate whether alleged threats were contemporaneous with weapon display.
• Be prepared for the other side to rely heavily on surrounding circumstances, not just injury labels.

Citation

Davis v. State, No. 02-25-00209-CR (Tex. App.—Fort Worth June 18, 2026, mem. op.).

Full Opinion

Read the full opinion here

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