Brinson v. State

The defendant confessed to officers that he shot and killed his girlfriend after she berated him for his sexual inadequacies.

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Appellant Christopher Darrell Brinson appeals his conviction for murder,1 alleging that numerous errors were committed by the trial court and that his trial counsel was ineffective. Having reviewed the record, we conclude that appellant’s claims of error are meritless. Therefore, we affirm. The evidence of record shows that in July 2000, using his own gun, appellant shot and killed his girlfriend. The murder occurred in appellant’s Cobb County apartment. After the shooting, appellant drove to his mother’s home in Dublin, Georgia, leaving the murder weapon behind in the apartment. Shortly thereafter, appellant voluntarily surrendered to the Laurens County Sheriff and confessed to the killing. Appellant claimed he shot the victim after she berated him for his sexual inadequacies, informed him she was seeing another man and said she was ending their relationship.

1. Contrary to appellant’s claim, the evidence did not mandate a finding that the killing was committed in the heat of passion so that appellant could only be guilty of voluntary manslaughter. Evidence showed that at different times before the killing, appellant had threatened the victim with a gun and told her that he would kill her if she ever attempted to leave him, attacked her physically by shoving her into a wall hard enough to leave a hole in the sheet rock, and had become upset when the victim purchased her own car which appellant apparently construed to mean the victim was leaving him. While appellant claimed he shot the victim because he “lost control of his senses” due to her taunting, “it is generally a question for the jury to determine whether . . . the slayer acted from passion,”2 rather than with malice. Regardless of whether the evidence might have authorized a finding of voluntary manslaughter, the evidence by no means demanded such a finding. Based upon all of the evidence, the jury was authorized to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that appellant is guilty of malice murder.3

Brinson v. State

The defendant confessed to officers that he shot and killed his girlfriend after she berated him for his sexual inadequacies.

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