How ‘affluenza teen’ Ethan Couch got almost two years of jail time

After a judge in Tarrant County ordered Ethan Couch to almost two years in jail Wednesday, social media users reacted the way they often have about the “affluenza” teen.

“Still just a slap on the wrist smh,” one Twitter user wrote. Another chimed in about Couch “enjoying the breaks of an America I’ll never know.”

In fact, state District Judge Wayne Salvant’s decision to add four 180-day jail terms to Couch’s list of probation conditions was the strongest punishment allowed by Texas law.

“The judge hit him as hard as he could,” said Clay Abbott, a staff attorney with the Texas District and County Attorneys Association.

“The court didn’t have the ability to revoke his probation, but they could modify it. Because of the strange intersection of juvenile and adult courts, the court was limited to that remedy. But [Salvant] seemed to do that with a vengeance.”

Salvant made the ruling during Couch’s first appearance in adult court.

Couch, whose case was transferred to the adult system when he turned 19 on Monday, is still under the 10-year probation sentence he got in 2013 in juvenile court for killing four people in a drunken driving crash.

He violated that probation when he fled to Mexico in December. But that happened when Couch was under the juvenile system.

Salvant, in adult court, could only make the overall terms of Couch’s probation stiffer.

“He can’t change the underlying sentence,” Abbott said.

The Texas Code of Criminal Procedure gives judges authority to confine felons on probation for up to 180 days for each charge they’re convicted on, four in Couch’s case.

Judges may “stack” — that is, order the 180-day terms served one after another, or consecutively — as long as they don’t exceed two years.

When Dallas attorney Pete Schulte first heard about Salvant’s decision Wednesday, he was surprised, tweeting that probation sentences should run concurrently, or at the same time.

“What doesn’t ever happen is when they stack them,” Schulte said Thursday.

But when Schulte searched Google, he said, he found an explanation.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals ruled on a similar probation issue in 2006.

Asad Wali Kesaria, a Houston-area man convicted in two burglary cases stemming from one incident, had received 10 years of probation as his sentence. The trial judge then included consecutive 180-day jail stints for each case.

When Kesaria appealed — arguing that the jail stints should run concurrently — the appeals court upheld the trial judge’s decision.

The court cited Article 42 of the Code of Criminal Procedure:

“When the judge also requires a defendant to serve a term in a community corrections facility, the total time served in such a facility and in a jail may not exceed 24 months. Nothing else in the article limits the judge’s authority to require confinement in jail for each offense of which a defendant is convicted.”

Judge could change mind

Salvant, a Republican appointed to the bench of Criminal District Court No. 2 in 1995, is up for re-election in November and has no opponent.

He has presided over numerous high-profile cases, including inheriting the case of mentally ill Death Row inmate Steven Staley, who killed a Steak & Ale manager in 1989 during a botched robbery. In 2006, Salvant ordered prison officials to forcibly medicate Staley so he would be competent for execution.

The Court of Criminal Appeals ruled that Salvant didn’t have the authority to order Staley’s medication, according to The Texas Tribune.

Last week, the Court of Criminal Appeals upheld a recommendation by Salvant that a former Fort Worth police officer sentenced to life in prison for sexually assaulting a 13-year-old girl in 1994 get a new trial.

Brian Edward Franklin, 56, has spent more than 21 years in prison. Salvant held that Franklin did not get a fair trial because of the accuser’s perjury. Franklin has been returned from prison to the Tarrant County Jail to await the new trial.

Salvant is also presiding over the felony case against Couch’s mother, Tonya Couch, who is accused of hindering her son’s apprehension.

In Ethan Couch’s case, Salvant issued a gag order this week, preventing defense attorneys and prosecutors from speaking to the media.

He told both sides Wednesday that he will reconvene with them in two weeks to possibly reconsider Couch’s jail time. Couch will remain in a maximum security unit of the downtown Tarrant County Jail, where he’s been since Feb. 5.

Nicole Knox, a Dallas attorney, said she expects Couch’s attorneys to argue that Couch’s charges should be considered one case, not four, which would limit his jail time to 180 days.

Schulte doesn’t see Salvant budging.

“Judge Salvant wouldn’t have done that unless he made that decision and was comfortable,” Schulte said. “I don’t think Judge Salvant is going to change anything. When you get to conditions of a probation, it’s a lost cause” for the defense.

This story was originally published April 14, 2016 at 6:58 PM with the headline "How ‘affluenza teen’ Ethan Couch got almost two years of jail time."