A jury found Phillip Pearson guilty of malice murder but mentally ill, and it also returned guilty verdicts on an alternative felony murder count and on separate charges of aggravated assault and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. Concluding that the verdict on the felony murder count was vacated by operation of law and that the aggravated assault merged as a matter of fact into the malice murder, the trial court entered judgment of conviction for that offense and imposed a life sentence. As for the possession of a firearm charge, the trial court sentenced Pearson to a consecutive five-year term. After the denial of a motion for new trial, Pearson brings this appeal.1 1. There was a history of bad blood between Pearson and Rico Twine. According to Pearson, Twine stole his car and, on several occasions, assaulted him with a gun. Shortly after these alleged events, Twine was sitting in an automobile in the parking lot of Pearson’s apartment complex. He did not pose any obvious threat to Pearson, and merely was waiting while his girlfriend went into her sister’s apartment to retrieve some items. Pearson approached Twine, and shot him six times.
Pearson claimed that he acted in self defense, but, at the time of the shooting, he was not in imminent danger from Twine. ” ‘ “ The doctrine of reasonable fear does not apply to any case of homicide where the danger apprehended is not urgent and pressing, or apparently so, at the time of the killing.” ‘ Cit.” Brown v. State , 270 Ga. 601, 603 2 512 SE2d 260 1999. The battered person syndrome is not applicable here, since Twine “was not a family member with a history of abusing Pearson. . . .” Freeman v. State , 269 Ga. 337, 339 1 496 SE2d 716 1998. The jury was authorized to find that Pearson acted solely out of revenge for prior crimes and assaults allegedly committed against him by Twine. ” ‘The law will not justify a killing for deliberate revenge however grievous the past wrong may have been.’ ” Teems v. State , 256 Ga. 675, 676 4 352 SE2d 779 1987. “ The defense of justification is not so broad as to permit a private citizen to mete out judgment as he sees fit. Cit.” McPetrie v. State , 263 Ga. App. 85, 87 1 587 SE2d 233 2003. Accordingly, the evidence was sufficient to authorize a rational trier of fact to find proof beyond a reasonable doubt of Pearson’s guilt of malice murder and possession of a firearm during the commission of that offense. Jackson v. Virginia , 443 U. S. 307 99 SC 2781, 61 LE2d 560 1979; Brown v. State , supra at 604 4.
