19 results for 'judge:"Colvin"'.
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of murder and aggravated assault. Defendant failed to show that the trial outcome was probably impacted by the inclusion of an option on the verdict form for voluntary manslaughter only after the felony murder count instead of after both murder counts. The trial court correctly instructed the jury with respect to the verdict form after the jury sent a note during deliberations. Although the trial court violated defendant's right to be present and right to counsel during the proceedings by responding to the jury note outside the presence of the parties, the error was harmless. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: May 9, 2024, Case #: S24A0094, Categories: Murder, Jury Instructions
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of murder, aggravated battery, violating the Street Gang Terrorism and Prevention Act and other offenses. Any error the trial court committed in barring defendant from making a closing argument about the sentences his co-defendants avoided by pleading guilty was harmless in light of the overwhelming evidence of defendant's guilt. Defendant admitted to stabbing the victim and another witness testified that defendant told her he shot the victim. The trial court correctly overruled defendant's objection that the prosecutor personally attacked his counsel during closing arguments in saying that the defense's theory of the case insulted the victim's memory. However, the trial court incorrectly failed to merge some of the counts against defendant for sentencing. Affirmed in part.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: April 16, 2024, Case #: S24A0125, Categories: Murder, Sentencing, Gangs
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of murder and correctly denied defendant's motion for a new trial. Sufficient evidence was presented to support defendant's convictions, including evidence that three eyewitnesses identified defendant as one of the inmates who stabbed the victim. Defendant's counsel failed to object to statements made by the prosecutor in closing arguments telling the jury that it needed to assess the guilt of defendant's co-indictees and saying there is no evidence exonerating defendant. Defendant's claims based on the alleged error are therefore not preserved for appellate review. Defendant failed to show that he was prejudiced by his trial counsel's allegedly deficient performance. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: April 16, 2024, Case #: S24A0117, Categories: Ineffective Assistance, Murder
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly denied a mother's motions for attorney fees and a contempt citation against the grandparents. The trial court granted the mother's petition to set aside and revoke a final consent order granting grandparent visitation rights. There was no evidence presented to support a contempt finding. The mother's challenge to the constitutionality of the grandparent visitation statute is moot. Affirmed in part.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: March 5, 2024, Case #: S24A0004, Categories: Contempt, Family Law, Attorney Fees
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly sentenced defendant to serve 15 years following his guilty plea to vehicular homicide, DUI and other offenses. The trial court did not commit any error in considering defendant's status as an undocumented immigrant during sentencing. The trial court did not violate the due process and equal protection clauses when it refused to probate any portion of defendant's sentence and applied a statute allowing trial courts to refuse to probate a sentence if a defendant would be subject to deportation while serving a probated sentence. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: February 20, 2024, Case #: S23A1135, Categories: Sentencing, Dui, Vehicular Homicide
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[Consolidated.] J. Colvin finds that the trial court improperly ruled in favor of the teacher in an action against the education officials challenging a provision of the 2007 Charter Systems Act waiving public charter schools' compliance with the Fair Dismissal Act, a law that gave public school teachers some protections against demotion and nonrenewal of their contracts after their fourth consecutive school year. The teacher alleged that the provision violated the impairments clause of the Georgia Constitution by impairing teachers' vested property rights and contract rights under the Fair Dismissal Act. A grant of the waiver to the school system did not impair any rights belonging to teachers who had earned Fair Dismissal Act rights prior to the school system's conversion into a charter school system. The passage of the Charter Schools Act of 1993 had already waived any obligation that charter schools would have had to comply with the Fair Dismissal Act. Reversed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: February 20, 2024, Case #: S23A0821, Categories: Education, Contract
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of murder, cruelty to children and other offenses. Defendant was found guilty but mentally ill. The trial court correctly admitted an audio recording of defendant's interview with the state's psychiatrist. The trial court did not commit any error by failing to instruct the jury on a possible verdict of guilty but with intellectual disability. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: February 6, 2024, Case #: S23A0936, Categories: Murder, Child Victims
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of murder, cruelty to children and battery. The trial court correctly denied defendant's motion for a directed verdict and did not commit any error by excluding evidence of the co-defendant's drug use. Sufficient evidence was presented to support defendant's convictions, including evidence that defendant and his co-defendant were the one-year-old victim's only caretakers at the time she suffered fatal, non-accidental injuries. The trial court also correctly refused to give defendant's requested jury charge on grave suspicion because the charge was already covered by other instructions. Defendant failed to show that his trial counsel performed deficiently. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: February 6, 2024, Case #: S23A1205, Categories: Murder, Child Victims
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly sentenced defendant for his murder convictions. The trial court correctly sentenced defendant for two counts of felony murder predicated on felony fleeing a police officer instead of for two counts of vehicular homicide predicated on misdemeanor fleeing a police officer. The rule of lenity does not apply in this case. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: November 7, 2023, Case #: S23A1137, Categories: Murder, Sentencing
J. Colvin finds that the trial court improperly sentenced defendant to 20 years in prison with one year to serve for his guilty plea to one count of felony child molestation. The sentencing scheme for child molestation set out in the statute violated defendant's equal protection rights. Defendant, who was 17 years old when he committed the offense against the 13-year-old victim, is similarly situated to defendants who receive a misdemeanor sentence for aggravated child molestation against a victim of the same age. Defendant received a more severe punishment than an offender who commits the aggravated version of the same offense only because defendant did not engage in sodomy, which would have made the offense aggravated. The case is remanded so defendant can be resentenced for misdemeanor child molestation. Reversed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: November 2, 2023, Case #: S23A0686, Categories: Sentencing, Sex Offender
J. Colvin finds that the trial court improperly ruled the Living Infants Fairness and Equality Act (“LIFE Act”) was unconstitutional when it was enacted based on a finding that provisions of the law regulating abortion procedures in Georgia violated the U.S. Constitution as interpreted by U.S. Supreme Court decisions which have since been overruled. The trial court incorrectly relied on U.S. Supreme Court decisions which were overruled instead of analyzing whether the law was void when enacted under the high court's now-controlling decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. The case is remanded for further proceedings. Reversed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: October 24, 2023, Case #: S23A0421, Categories: Civil Rights
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of murder predicated on aggravated assault, cruelty to children and a firearm offense. Sufficient evidence was presented to support defendant's convictions and to disprove defendant's claim of self-defense. Defendant failed to show that his trial counsel performed deficiently during cross-examination of a witness or by failing to move for a mistrial in response to a claim made by the prosecutor during the state's opening statement. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: October 11, 2023, Case #: S23A0753, Categories: Ineffective Assistance, Murder
J. Colvin answers two questions certified to the Georgia Supreme Court by the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia in a wrongful death and product liability action brought against Ford arising from the decedent's death from injuries he suffered in a car collision. Reckless conduct is a standalone exception to the ten-year statute of repose. The statute of repose therefore does not apply to a product liability claim sounding in negligence that arises from conduct which manifests reckless disregard for life or property.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: September 19, 2023, Case #: S23Q0625, Categories: Product Liability, Wrongful Death
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of murder and other offenses upon retrial. The trial court did not commit any error in admitting into evidence testimony from a witness who testified at defendant's first trial but who died and was therefore unavailable to testify at defendant's second trial. Defendant had an adequate opportunity to develop the witness's testimony at his first trial. The testimony was not inadmissible under the confrontation clause of the Sixth Amendment. The trial court also did not commit any error in admitting the victim's hearsay statements into evidence. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: September 19, 2023, Case #: S23A0530, Categories: Confrontation, Murder, Witnesses
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of murder and other related offenses. Sufficient evidence was presented to support defendant's convictions and to allow the jury to find that defendant caused the victim's death by firing the fatal bullet at a van. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: August 21, 2023, Case #: S23A0588, Categories: Murder
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of murder. The trial court correctly recharged the jury on malice murder and did not have to recharge the jury on defendant's defenses. Defendant failed to show that his trial counsel was deficient for failing to object to the state's decision to try defendant jointly with a co-defendant. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: August 21, 2023, Case #: S23A0710, Categories: Ineffective Assistance, Murder
J. Colvin finds that the Georgia Supreme Court improperly granted certiorari to determine whether the appeals court properly ruled that the state could not appeal the juvenile court's decision to seal the juvenile's record after adjudicating him delinquent but finding that he was not in need of treatment, rehabilitation or supervision. The issue has not been presented in a form that would allow the Georgia Supreme Court to clarify the law or give meaningful guidance.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: August 21, 2023, Case #: S22G1035, Categories: Civil Procedure, Juvenile Law
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of murder. Any error committed by the trial court in refusing to allow defendant to cross-examine the state's expert ballistic witness about the victim's arrest for criminal trespass the day before the shooting was harmless. The trial court's decision probably did not contribute to the verdict in light of the strong evidence against defendant's self-defense claim. Defendant failed to show that he was prejudiced by his trial counsel's allegedly deficient performance. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: July 5, 2023, Case #: S23A0637, Categories: Ineffective Assistance, Murder
J. Colvin finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of murder, participation in criminal street gang activity and other related offenses. Sufficient evidence was presented to support defendant's conviction for violating the Georgia Street Gang Terrorism and Prevention Act, including evidence that defendant was associated with the Bloods gang and that he committed the murder to further the gang's interests. The trial court did not commit any error in admitting as an excited utterance a hearsay statement that defendant had shot someone. The person who made the statement could not have said it more than 20 minutes after the shooting and behaved in a way that could show he was in a state of excitement. Defendant failed to show that his trial counsel performed deficiently. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Supreme Court, Judge: Colvin, Filed On: June 21, 2023, Case #: S23A0032, Categories: Ineffective Assistance, Murder, Gangs