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  • Hampton v. The State

    Publication Date: 2017-10-25
    Practice Area: Criminal Law
    Industry:
    Court: Court of Appeals
    Judge: Chief Justice Hines
    Attorneys: For plaintiff: Raina Jeager Nadler, Atlanta, for appellant.
    for defendant: Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Paula Khristian Smith, Christopher M. Carr, S. Taylor Johnston (Department of Law), Atlanta; D. Victor Reynolds, Michael Scott Carlson (Cobb County District Attorney's Office), Marietta, for appellee.
    Case Number: S17A0984

    The evidence supported defendant's convictions for malice murder and related crimes after he fatally shot a man at a bar where defendant sometimes worked as a security guard.

  • Moran v. The State

    Publication Date: 2017-10-25
    Practice Area: Criminal Law | Evidence
    Industry:
    Court: Court of Appeals
    Judge: Justice Benham
    Attorneys: For plaintiff: Debra Kay Jefferson, Lawrenceville, for appellant.
    for defendant: Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Paula Khristian Smith, Christopher M. Carr, Matthew Blackwell Crowder (Department of Law), Atlanta; Lee Darragh, Shiv Sachdeva (Northeastern Circuit District Attorney's Office), Gainesville, for appellee.
    Case Number: S17A0967

    The evidence supported defendant's convictions for malice murder and related crimes and the trial court did not err in admitting photographs of text messages on defendant's cell phone, as defendant had executed a Fourth Amendment waiver as a condition of her probation for other crimes and there was reasonable suspicion that defendant was involved in a murder.

  • Blackmon v. The State

    Publication Date: 2017-10-25
    Practice Area: Criminal Law
    Industry:
    Court: Court of Appeals
    Judge: Justice Nahmias
    Attorneys: For plaintiff: Genevieve Holmes (Georgia Public Defender Council), Atlanta, for appellant.
    for defendant: Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Paula Khristian Smith, Christopher M. Carr, Ashleigh Dene Headrick (Department of Law), Atlanta; Lenny I. Krick, Sherry Boston (DeKalb County District Attorneys Office), Decatur, for appellee.
    Case Number: S17A0993

    Defendant failed to prove his several ineffective assistance of counsel claims following his convictions for felony murder and other crimes arising out of a drug deal gone wrong.

  • Williams v. The State

    Publication Date: 2017-10-24
    Practice Area: Criminal Law | Evidence
    Industry:
    Court: Court of Appeals
    Judge: Justice Peterson
    Attorneys: For plaintiff: Wallace Carter Clayton II (Jones, Morrison & Womack, PC.), Atlanta, for appellant.
    for defendant: Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Paula Khristian Smith, Michael Alexander Oldham, Christopher M. Carr (Department of Law), Atlanta; Michael Scott Carlson, D. Victor Reynolds (Cobb County District Attorney's Office), Marietta; Gregg M. Jacobson (Chamberlain, Hrdlicka, White, Williams and Aughtry), Atlanta, for appellee.
    Case Number: S17A0764

    The evidence supported defendant's conviction for the malice murder of his wife and any error in the trial court's decisions to admit evidence of defendant's prior bad acts and allow State to perform a demonstration was harmless in light of the overwhelming evidence of guilt.

  • The State v. Wilkins

    Publication Date: 2017-10-24
    Practice Area: Criminal Law | Evidence
    Industry:
    Court: Court of Appeals
    Judge: Justice Boggs
    Attorneys: For plaintiff: Jerome M. Rothschild Jr., Lyndsey Hurst Rudder (Fulton County District Attorney's Office), Atlanta; Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Paula Khristian Smith, Christopher M. Carr (Department of Law), Atlanta, for appellant.
    for defendant: Robert Warren Attridge Jr. (Law Offices of Robert W. Attridge Jr. PA), Tybee Island; Robert Lawrence Persse (Office of the Public Defender, Eastern Judicial Circuit), Savannah, for appellee.
    Case Number: S17A0873

    The trial court did not abuse its discretion in granting defendant's pretrial motion in limine to exclude incriminating statements his co-defendant made with regard to a double murder, as the evidence supported the trial court's conclusion that the co-defendant did not make the challenged statements "in furtherance of the conspiracy" and the statements, therefore, did not fall within the exception to the hearsay rule provided by O.C.G.A. 24-8-801 subsection (d) (2) (E).

  • Davis v. The State

    Publication Date: 2017-10-24
    Practice Area: Criminal Law | Evidence
    Industry:
    Court: Court of Appeals
    Judge: Chief Justice Hines
    Attorneys: For plaintiff: Leigh Ann Webster (Strickland Webster, LLC), Atlanta, for appellant.
    for defendant: Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Paula Khristian Smith, Elizabeth Michelle Haase, Christopher M. Carr (Department of Law), Atlanta; Paul L. Howard Jr., Kevin Christopher Armstrong, Lyndsey Hurst Rudder (Fulton County District Attorney's Office), Atlanta, for appellee.
    Case Number: S17A0949

    The evidence supported defendant's convictions for malice murder, criminal attempt to commit armed robbery, aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony and defendant failed to prove his several ineffective assistance of counsel claims.

  • Spencer v. The State

    Publication Date: 2017-10-23
    Practice Area: Criminal Law | Evidence
    Industry:
    Court: Court of Appeals
    Judge: Justice Boggs
    Attorneys: For plaintiff: Thomas James Thomas, Thomas Webb & Willis, Atlanta, for appellant.
    for defendant: John Andrew Pipkin III, William Barney Kennedy III, Meredith Chafin Florio (Henry County Solicitor General's Office), McDonough for appellee.
    Case Number: S16G1751

    The Court of Appeals erred in holding that the trial court properly admitted a police officer's testimony correlating the results of a Horizontal Gaze Nystagmus test with a numeric blood alcohol content; accordingly, the Supreme Court reversed the Court of Appeals' decision affirming defendant's DUI-less safe conviction.

  • Deloney v. The State

    Publication Date: 2017-10-23
    Practice Area: Civil Appeals | Criminal Law
    Industry:
    Court: Court of Appeals
    Judge: Justice Nahmias
    Attorneys: For plaintiff: Danny E. Deloney, Valdosta, for appellant.
    for defendant: Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Paula Khristian Smith, Christopher M. Carr, Vanessa Therese Meyerhoefer (Department of Law), Atlanta; Anna Green Cross, Sherry Boston (DeKalb County District Attorney's Office), Atlanta, for appellee.
    Case Number: S17A0700

    Defendant was not entitled to an out-of-time appeal following his guilty plea to the felony murder of his 6-year-old daughter and numerous other crimes and the trial court was thus not required to hold an evidentiary hearing on his motion.

  • Thompson v. The State

    Publication Date: 2017-10-20
    Practice Area: Criminal Law
    Industry:
    Court: Court of Appeals
    Judge: Judge Rickman
    Attorneys: For plaintiff: Kevin Anderson (Georgia Public Defender Council), Atlanta, for appellant.
    for defendant: Robert James (District Attorney), Decatur; Sherry Boston (DeKalb County District Attorney), Decatur; Deborah Wellborn (Assistant District Attorney), Decatur, for appellee.
    Case Number: A17A0676

    The trial court did not abuse its discretion in overruling defendant's objection to a statement the prosecutor made in her closing argument or in failing to rebuke the prosecutor because the prosecutor's comment was a reasonable inference raised by the evidence.

  • Suggs v. The State

    Publication Date: 2017-10-19
    Practice Area: Criminal Law
    Industry:
    Court: Court of Appeals
    Judge: Judge Rickman
    Attorneys: For plaintiff: Justin Williams (Williams & Williams Law Firm, LLC), Alpharetta, for appellant.
    for defendant: Stephanie Woodard (Solicitor General), Gainesville; Daniel Sanmiguel (Hall County Solicitor's Office), Gainesville, for appellee.
    Case Number: A17A0841

    The trial court properly denied defendant's motion to suppress all evidence surrounding and including his arrest for DUI-less safe after a sheriff deputy conducted a traffic stop in his appointed territory but performed a DUI investigation and arrested defendant outside of the territorial boundary of his law enforcement agency.