## Facts

- Amanda Sylvia Thompson worked as an “entertainer” at an adult cabaret in Houston, Texas.
- A City of Houston ordinance required entertainers at sexually oriented enterprises to conspicuously display a personal permit card on their person while acting as entertainers.
- Thompson was charged by information with failing to conspicuously display the required card while performing at the Trophy Club.
- The information referenced “Section 28-25(a),” although the duty described corresponded to Houston Code § 28-256(a).
- Thompson moved to quash the information, arguing (among other grounds) that the county criminal court at law lacked jurisdiction and that the information was defective for omitting a culpable mental state and other necessary allegations.
- The trial court denied the motion to quash; Thompson pleaded guilty; the court assessed two days’ confinement and a $100 fine.
- Thompson appealed, challenging jurisdiction and the sufficiency of the charging instrument.

## Issues

1. Whether the county criminal court at law had jurisdiction to hear a prosecution for violating a municipal ordinance.
2. Whether the information was fundamentally defective for failing to allege a culpable mental state for the ordinance-based offense.
3. Whether the ordinance’s silence on mens rea made the offense strict liability, eliminating the need to plead and prove a culpable mental state.

## Decision

- The court of appeals held the county criminal court at law had jurisdiction over the ordinance-violation prosecution.
- The court of appeals reversed the conviction because the information failed to allege a culpable mental state required for the offense.
- The court ordered the information dismissed.

## Legal Principles

- When an offense definition does not plainly dispense with a mental element, a culpable mental state is generally required.
- Strict-liability offenses are disfavored and are not inferred from silence unless the law’s text and context clearly show an intent to dispense with mens rea.
- A charging instrument that omits an essential element (including a required culpable mental state) fails to allege an offense and is fundamentally defective.
- A fundamentally defective information cannot support a conviction, including one based on a guilty plea; the proper remedy is reversal and dismissal of the defective information.

## Conclusion

The court affirmed the trial court’s subject-matter jurisdiction but reversed Thompson’s conviction and dismissed the information because the ordinance did not clearly create a strict-liability offense and the information omitted a required culpable mental state.


Thompson v. State, 44 S.W.3d 171 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 2001)