## Facts

- Juan Torres worked at a McDonald’s restaurant in Houston, Texas.
- One night, Torres, his brother, and a coworker decided to rob the restaurant.
- The group broke into the restaurant after hours and went to the office to access the safe.
- Using a blowtorch and other methods, they opened the safe but discovered it contained an inner safe.
- They could not open the inner safe and decided to leave without taking money.
- As the group left, Torres set fire to cabinets in the office area.
- Firefighters responded to the fire and searched the restaurant to confirm that no one was trapped inside.
- Two firefighters suffered asphyxia from smoke inhalation and died.
- Torres was charged with and convicted of felony murder and arson.

## Issues

1. Whether the evidence was legally sufficient to support felony murder by proving that Torres’s conduct in setting the fire during the felony was an “act clearly dangerous to human life” under the Texas felony-murder statute.

## Decision

- The court of appeals affirmed Torres’s convictions.
- The court held the evidence was sufficient for a rational jury to find that setting fire to the office cabinets inside the restaurant was an act clearly dangerous to human life.
- The court concluded the jury could find the statutory elements of felony murder satisfied based on the manner in which Torres committed the arson and the resulting deaths.

## Legal Principles

- Under Tex. Penal Code § 19.02(b)(3), felony murder is established when, in the course of committing or attempting to commit a felony (other than manslaughter) or in immediate flight from it, the defendant commits an act clearly dangerous to human life that causes death.
- The “act clearly dangerous to human life” requirement focuses on the defendant’s conduct as carried out in the case, not merely the abstract elements of the underlying felony.
- Felony murder does not require proof of an intent to kill; it requires proof of (1) a qualifying felony or attempted felony, (2) a clearly life-endangering act, and (3) a death caused by that act.
- A jury may treat setting a fire inside an enclosed structure as clearly dangerous to human life because such conduct creates a serious risk of fatal smoke exposure and related dangers to anyone who may enter the building, including emergency responders.
- On legal-sufficiency review, an appellate court views the evidence in the light most favorable to the verdict and asks whether any rational factfinder could have found the essential elements beyond a reasonable doubt.

## Conclusion

The court affirmed because the record allowed a rational jury to find that Torres, while attempting to rob the restaurant, intentionally set a fire inside the building in a manner that was clearly dangerous to human life, and that this act led to the fatal smoke inhalation deaths of two firefighters who responded to and searched the burning restaurant.


Torres v. State, 2000 WL 31838694 (2002)