Pineda v. State

A jury found Antonio Pineda guilty of the offenses of armed robbery, aggravated assault and making harassing phone calls. The trial judge merged the aggravated assault conviction with the armed robbery conviction and sentenced Pineda to serve 20 years in prison for armed robbery and a concurrent 12 months in prison for making harassing phone calls. Pineda appeals. Viewed in the light most favorable to the verdict,1 the evidence presented at trial shows that on September 1, 2002, Nora Angle was driving with her nine-year-old niece to Lake Lanier when Pineda, whom she had been dating for several months, began following them in his car. Pineda forced Angle to pull into a gas station. Pineda then approached Angle’s stopped car and pulled the driver’s door open. He had a knife in his hand, asked Angle where she thought she was going, said that she had better come back to his apartment and tried to take her car keys. When she would not let him get the keys, he grabbed her neck, brandished the knife and took her purse. Pineda fled, and Angle called the police to report the incident. The police met Angle at the gas station and then went to Pineda’s apartment, where they found the knife and Angle’s purse, but not Pineda.

That night, Pineda called Angle on the telephone and told her that she was in trouble. He threatened to send someone to kill her and her brother, saying he knows where her brother works. The police were immediately notified of the call, and they subsequently found Pineda at his sister’s apartment, hiding in a closet with a loaded gun. They also found Angle’s wallet, from which $300 was missing, in Pineda’s car.