Justia Georgia Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

In April 2015, appellant Douglas Goodson was convicted of felony murder and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony related to the 2012 shooting death of his cousin Rodney Worley. Goodson appealed, asserting that the evidence was insufficient to convict and that he received ineffective assistance of counsel. Finding no reversible error, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed. View "Goodson v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Raemon Moore was convicted of malice murder and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony in connection with the 2012 shooting death of Asiel Parker. On appeal, he contended his convictions should be reversed because the trial court erred in admitting into evidence video recordings without proper authentication and because his trial counsel was ineffective. Finding no reversible error, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed. View "Moore v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Dameino Roberts was convicted of felony murder during the commission of an aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime in connection with the shooting death of Jhalil King. On appeal, Roberts argued the evidence was insufficient to sustain his convictions, that the trial court erred by excluding certain testimony and by expressing an opinion on certain evidence in violation of OCGA 17-8-57, and that Roberts was denied the effective assistance of counsel. Finding no reversible error, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed. View "Roberts v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Appellee John Johnson was tried by jury and found guilty for the shooting death of Brandon Scott. However, the trial court granted Johnson's motion for a new trial. At issue in this appeal is whether the trial court should have given an unrequested jury instruction on accomplice corroboration. The State argued a new trial should not have been granted because an instruction on accomplice corroboration was not clearly required where a witness other than the accomplice introduces an accomplice’s statement implicating a defendant’s guilt. In response, Johnson argued a new trial was warranted because the testimony of his alleged accomplice was the only evidence establishing Johnson’s participation in the crime, and, thus, the trial court plainly erred in failing to instruct the jury that accomplice testimony required corroboration. The Georgia Supreme Court agreed the trial court should have instructed the jury on accomplice corroboration and affirmed the grant of a new trial. View "Georgia v. Johnson" on Justia Law

Appellant Marquavis Benton was convicted of murder and related offenses arising out of the 2014 shooting death of Brian Whitfield. On appeal, Benton argued the evidence was insufficient to support his convictions for malice murder and armed robbery and that the trial court erred in failing to charge the jury on voluntary manslaughter. Finding no error, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed. View "Benton v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Jason Wyno challenged the constitutionality of former OCGA 4-8-30, a portion of the Responsible Dog Ownership Law which purported to exempt local governments and their employees from liability arising from their enforcement of, or failure to enforce, that law and local dog-control ordinances. In 2011, Misty Wyno was attacked and killed by a dog owned by one of her neighbors. In the years leading up to the attack, numerous complaints about dogs at the neighbor’s address had been filed with the Lowndes County Animal Control office. Following Misty Wyno’s death, Jason Wyno brought a wrongful death action against the dog’s owners, Lowndes County, and four individual Lowndes County Animal Control employees, alleging the County and its employees negligently failed to perform ministerial duties negligently failed to provide police protection, negligently created and failed to abate a nuisance, were negligent in their control of allegedly dangerous dogs, and were negligent per se by violating several provisions of the Lowndes County Animal Control Ordinance. The complaint also made a demand for punitive damages and alleged that Lowndes County and the County Employees “acted with actual malice and/or an intent to injure in repeatedly refusing to investigate or take any action with regards to the dangerous dogs[.]” The case was dismissed on sovereign immunity grounds. Wyno argued the statute impermissibly extended the official immunity of local government employees provided in Article I, Section II, Paragraph IX (d) of the Georgia Constitution of 1983 because former OCGA 4-8-30 was not “a State Tort Claims Act.” The Georgia Supreme Court did not reach the constitutional question in this case because the Court found the trial court erred in its preliminary determination that the relevant duties imposed by the Responsible Dog Ownership Law and the Lowndes County Animal Control Ordinance in effect at the time of the incident giving rise to this suit were ministerial in nature. Instead, the Court found the relevant acts of the County Employees were discretionary. Moreover, because the record did not contain evidence the individual defendants acted with malice or intent to injure, they were protected from Wyno’s lawsuit by the official immunity provided by Paragraph IX (d). The Court therefore affirmed the grant of summary judgment in favor of the defendants, although for reasons different than relied upon by the trial court. View "Wyno v. Lowndes County" on Justia Law

Willie Winters III appealed his conviction for felony murder in connection with the 1987 shooting death of Stephen Jones. Winters argued: (1) the evidence was insufficient to convict him of felony murder and the trial court erred by (2) admitting a witness’s post-hypnotic statement and (3) failing to admit a section of a GBI report as a public record under OCGA 24-8-803 (8) (C). Winters also argued he received constitutionally ineffective assistance by (4) relying on an alleged unwritten stipulation to admit a section of the GBI report and (5) failing to move for either a mistrial or a continuance when it became clear the report would not be admitted. Finding no reversible error, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed Winters' conviction. View "Winters v. Georgia" on Justia Law

In 2011, Terrance Beasley was found guilty of malice murder, felony murder, aggravated assault, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime in connection with the 1998 shooting death of Rodriquez Hamm. Beasley appealed the denial of his amended motion for new trial, arguing: (1) his trial counsel was ineffective for failing to object when the prosecutor allegedly violated Mallory v. State, 409 SE2d 839 (1991), by commenting on his silence; (2) the trial court erred when it instructed the jury on the defense of habitation or, alternatively, that his counsel was ineffective for failing to maintain his objection to the defense of habitation instruction after the charge was given; and (3) his counsel was ineffective for failing to object to the trial court’s alleged closure of the courtroom, thus violating his constitutional right to a public trial. Finding no reversible error, the Georgia Supreme Court affirmed Beasley's conviction. View "Beasley v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Andrea Elliott was prosecuted for DUI. When Elliott was arrested, she refused to submit to a breath test. Georgia statutes allowed the State to use her refusal against her in her criminal trial, and the State has sought to do that. The United States Supreme Court held that the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution did not bar the State from using such a refusal, in part because the Fifth Amendment gave Elliott no right to refuse to act in the first place. But the Georgia Supreme Court had held previously that the protection against compelled self-incrimination provided by Article I, Section I, Paragraph XVI of the Georgia Constitution did afford the right to refuse such a test. So Elliott argued to on appeal of her conviction that Paragraph XVI gave her the protection that the Fifth Amendment did not, and thus rendered invalid the portions of the statutes allowing her refusal to be admitted against her. The Georgia Supreme Court agreed; OCGA 40-5-67.1 (b) and 40-6-392 (d) were ruled unconstitutional to the extent that they allowed a defendant’s refusal to submit to a breath test to be admitted into evidence at a criminal trial. The Court thus reversed the trial court’s denial of Elliott’s motion to suppress. View "Elliott v. Georgia" on Justia Law

Jimmy Riley was convicted for the 1986 murder of Pauline McCoy, in addition for burglary and possession of a knife during the commission of a felony. He appealed the trial court's denial of his motion for a new trial, arguing the trial court should have allowed certain expert testimony and that the trial court erroneously found that the “person unknown” exception tolled the statute of limitation on his non-murder charges under OCGA 17-3-2 (2). Because the Georgia Supreme Court determined the trial court did not abuse its discretion in disallowing expert testimony, it affirmed Riley’s murder conviction. However, the Court vacated the trial court’s judgment with respect to Riley’s convictions for burglary and possession of a knife during the commission of a felony and remanded the case for the trial court to consider, under the facts of this case, when the State had sufficient information to establish actual knowledge of Riley as the “person committing th[ose] crime[s],” thus ending the tolling of the statute of limitation. View "Riley v. Georgia" on Justia Law