## Facts

- Kelvin Kianta Brooks was tried for possessing more than four but less than 200 grams of crack cocaine with intent to deliver.
- A jury convicted Brooks and assessed punishment at 25 years’ imprisonment.
- On appeal, Brooks challenged the evidence supporting the “intent to deliver” element.
- The court of appeals held the evidence legally sufficient but factually insufficient on intent to deliver, and it ordered a new trial.
- Both Brooks and the State sought discretionary review, placing at issue (1) the proper sufficiency standard and (2) whether the evidence supported the jury’s intent-to-deliver finding.

## Issues

1. Whether Texas appellate courts should continue to apply a separate “factual sufficiency” review of the elements of a criminal offense in addition to Jackson v. Virginia legal-sufficiency review.
2. Whether, under the proper sufficiency standard, the evidence permitted a rational jury to find beyond a reasonable doubt that Brooks possessed the cocaine with intent to deliver.

## Decision

- The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals overruled Clewis v. State and eliminated separate factual-sufficiency review of criminal offense elements.
- The court held that Jackson v. Virginia legal sufficiency is the sole standard for reviewing evidentiary sufficiency in criminal cases.
- Applying Jackson, the court concluded the evidence was sufficient to support the jury’s finding of intent to deliver.
- The court reversed the court of appeals’ judgment to the extent it granted relief based on factual insufficiency and affirmed Brooks’s conviction and 25-year sentence.

## Legal Principles

- Evidence supporting each element of a criminal offense is reviewed under a single standard: Jackson v. Virginia legal sufficiency.
- Under Jackson, reviewing courts consider all the evidence in the light most favorable to the verdict and ask whether any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements beyond a reasonable doubt.
- Sufficiency review requires deference to the jury’s role in weighing evidence, resolving conflicts, and making credibility determinations; appellate courts may not substitute their judgment for the jury’s on these matters.
- A separate factual-sufficiency review that purportedly reweighs evidence is not meaningfully distinct from Jackson when deference is properly applied and is therefore not retained.

## Conclusion

The court unified Texas criminal sufficiency review under Jackson v. Virginia, rejected a separate factual-sufficiency analysis, and affirmed Brooks’s conviction after determining that a rational jury could find intent to deliver beyond a reasonable doubt when the evidence was viewed in the light most favorable to the verdict.


Brooks v. State, 323 S.W.3d 893 (Tex. Crim. App. 2010)