Justia Georgia Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

James McDowell was convicted by jury for the 2002 shooting death of Eric Kemp. In his sole enumeration of error, McDowell contended that, due to the destruction of the .40-caliber handgun prior to trial, the State could not prove an appropriate chain of custody for the handgun at trial, and the trial court erred by allowing the admission of evidence of that handgun. The Georgia Supreme Court found that the relevant portion of the record on appeal revealed that, when the handgun at issue was initially recovered from the car in which McDowell was a passenger, the serial number engraved on the gun was documented by police in the incident report. The gun was later transported to the GBI for ballistics testing, and, again, the serial number of the gun was recorded by the GBI. At some point towards the end of 2012, the gun was inadvertently destroyed, and, though it had been made available to the defense prior to destruction, it was not available at the time of the trial. The Court found only evidence relating to the handgun was admitted at trial, not the handgun itself. "So, McDowell’s argument, which is based on proving the chain of custody of the handgun, is generally misplaced. And, even if we assume without deciding that McDowell’s chain of custody argument could somehow apply to the evidence concerning the handgun which was admitted at trial, as opposed to the handgun itself, McDowell’s argument would still fail." Judgement was affirmed. View "McDowell v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Linda Agee was tried by jury and convicted of murder in connection with the fatal shooting of her husband, Randall Peters. Agee appealed, contending the trial court erred when it admitted certain hearsay statements of a deceased witness and determined that Agee had forfeited her constitutional right to confront that witness. After review of the trial court record, the Georgia Supreme Court reversed, finding the trial court erred in ruling the deceased-witness' statements to law enforcement were admissible. An error of “constitutional magnitude,” such as the one in this case, will not warrant a reversal “if the State can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the error did not contribute to the verdict.” The witness' statements, especially statements that he would receive life imprisonment or the death penalty if he told the truth, were highly incriminating. "They were essentially an implicit admission of guilt, providing the most direct evidence that Sargent was involved in Peters’s murder. These statements also cast a large shadow of suspicion over Agee, given her close association with Sargent at the time of the killing and their eventual marriage. Indeed, in its closing argument, the prosecution heavily emphasized Sargent’s statements about his receiving life in prison or the death penalty if he told police what he knew about the murder." At the same time, the other evidence against Agee was entirely circumstantial and not particularly strong. No evidence definitively identified Agee or anyone else as the shooter. "While a reasonable juror might conclude that certain statements and conduct of Agee suggested that she was somehow involved in Peters’s murder, the nature and extent of her involvement are far from clear. Thus, it cannot be said beyond a reasonable doubt that the admission of Sargent’s statements did not contribute to the verdict." View "Agee v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Diara Hood was convicted by jury of the felony murder of Steven Carden, the aggravated assault of Thomas Smith, and other related crimes. Following the trial court’s denial of her motion for new trial, Hood appeals, arguing that the trial court erred by admitting other-acts evidence and by charging the jury on that evidence. Although the Georgia Supreme Court concluded the trial court committed two merger errors at sentencing, it otherwise affirmed her convictions. View "Hood v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Joseph Thomas was convicted by jury of murder and other crimes in connection with the shooting death of Gregory Savelio. In his sole claim of error, Thomas contended the trial court erred in denying his Batson challenge to the State’s use of its peremptory strikes to remove African-Americans from the jury pool. Specifically, Thomas contended the trial court failed to properly scrutinize whether the prosecutor’s facially race-neutral reasons for striking Jurors 18, 31, and 42 were pretextual. He argued the trial court’s failure to apply Batson’s three-step analysis resulted in the court improperly shifting the burden to the defense to prove the prosecutor’s discriminatory intent. The Georgia Supreme Court found no merit to this claim of error; therefore, it affirmed. View "Thomas v. Georgia" on Justia Law

In 2003, appellant Brandon Cross was convicted of malice murder and other crimes in connection with the death of Debra Hymer, who was the mother of his girlfriend, Jessica Cates. On appeal, he contended the trial court erred by declining to allow him to impeach the hearsay statements of his co-conspirator Cates, by failing to charge the jury as to the burden of proof for co-conspirator statements, and by admitting three autopsy photographs and a video recording of the crime scene. He also argued that he should have been granted a new trial because the record was insufficiently complete. Finding no reversible error, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed. View "Cross v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Ulysses Blackshear, Jr. was found guilty of malice murder and other crimes in connection with the death of William Land. On appeal, Blackshear challenged the sufficiency of the evidence as to each offense of which he was found guilty and sentenced. Blackshear also argued the trial court erred by failing to apply the proper standard in considering his motion for new trial on the general grounds and that his trial counsel provided constitutionally ineffective assistance by not objecting to the admission of certain photographs from Land’s autopsy. Finding no reversible error, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed. View "Blackshear v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Rodney Carter Clark was convicted of malice murder and other crimes in connection with the shooting death of Mario Johnson. On appeal, Clark contended only that the evidence was insufficient to support his convictions. Finding that the evidence presented at Clark’s trial was legally sufficient to exclude every reasonable hypothesis other than Clark’s guilt, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed Clark's convictions. View "Clark v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Michael Styles was tried by jury and found guilty of felony murder and other crimes in connection with the shooting death of Alberto Lumens and the armed robbery of Juan Garcia. Styles contended on appeal that the evidence was insufficient to support his convictions, the trial court erred in charging the jury and in handling a communication from the jury, the prosecutor improperly expressed personal opinions during the trial, and that defense counsel rendered him ineffective assistance. Because the Georgia Supreme Court found no merit to any of these claims of error, it affirmed judgment. View "Styles v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Quantavious Grier was tried by jury in 2010, and convicted of felony murder and other crimes in connection with the robbery and fatal shooting of James Yarborough. Grier successfully moved for a new trial. The trial court found that the case against Grier was based substantially upon the testimony of Rimion Rawlings, that the greater weight of the evidence indicated that Rawlings was Grier’s accomplice, and that Rawlings’s testimony was insufficiently corroborated by independent evidence. The State appealed, contending the trial court abused its discretion when it granted the motion for new trial. Grier cross-appealed, arguing that the trial court also should have concluded that the evidence presented at trial was legally insufficient to sustain his convictions. Upon its review of the record and the briefs, the Georgia Supreme Court found no merit in either of these claims, and affirmed. View "Georgia v. Grier" on Justia Law

A trial court found that the State failed to prove that Evontae Hinton, after invoking his right to remain silent, initiated further discussions with a detective and voluntarily waived his right to remain silent; the court therefore suppressed statements Hinton then made to the detective. The State appealed the suppression, arguing the trial court misapplied the law and made erroneous factual and credibility determinations, because the detective’s testimony at the motion to suppress hearing clearly showed that Hinton waived his rights and reinitiated discussions with the detective. The Georgia Supreme Court found the trial court was not required to credit the detective’s testimony, and the State did not introduce any other evidence to meet its burden of establishing the voluntariness of Hinton’s custodial statements. Therefore, the Supreme Court affirmed the trial court. View "Georgia v. Hinton" on Justia Law