Okay, let me first state that this woman is the lowest scum on the face of the earth.
Having said that, in my legal opinion, this isn't going to be prosecuted as a capital murder. You can argue that the victim was being kept against his will, and that amounted to a kidnapping, in order to qualify as capital murder, but it's not going to fly.
There certainly was no intent to kidnap this person at the time of the accident, and there's little doubt that she would have left him on the road if he hadn't stuck in her windshield. After she got home, she made no effort to prevent his escape, not that he could, of course. But it's pretty evident that she didn't want to kidnap the guy. She just didn't want to deal with the situation.
She deserves the maximum punishment under the murder statute, but bumping it up to capital murder is going to be a tough sell, and I don't think it will happen.
I disagree in part. I think she clearly kidnapped the guy.
In the Texas Penal Code, a person commits kidnapping if he: "Intentionally or knowingly abducts another person."
The Penal Code defines 'abduct':
"Abduct" means to restrain a person with intent to prevent his liberation by:
(A) secreting or holding him in a place where he is not likely to be found; or
...
It defines 'restrain':
"Restrain means to restrict a person's movements without consent, so as to interfere substantially with the person's liberty, by moving the person from one place to another or by confining the person."
She restrained him to prevent his liberation - because had she not done so she would have 'gotten in trouble' for hitting him in the first place. She clearly continued on her way, deliberately, in order to avoid apprehension. Actually, that fact alone makes it aggravated kidnapping (two felony degrees higher than simple 'kidnapping'). I don't think it's fair to say that she didn't restrain him - she put him in a position where he could not free himself (by hitting him) and then refused to extricate him from that situation. That in my mind is restraining him.
The kidnapping combined with the murder makes it capital murder. I am positive you could sell a jury on capital murder, but perhaps not the death penalty. A conviction where the state doesn't seek the death penalty carries a mandatory life sentence. In contrast, first degree murder can be punished by as few as 5 years in prison.
-bc