Gadson v. State
| Citation | 477 S.E.2d 598,223 Ga.App. 342 |
| Decision Date | 08 October 1996 |
| Docket Number | No. A96A2120,A96A2120 |
| Parties | GADSON v. The STATE. |
| Court | United States Court of Appeals (Georgia) |
C. Jackson Burch, Savannah, for appellant.
Spencer Lawton, Jr., District Attorney, Lori E. Loncon, Assistant District Attorney, for appellee.
Henry Gadson appeals his conviction, asserting the evidence was insufficient and complaining of the trial court's admission of certain evidence and its denial of his motion to sever. Gadson went to trial on an indictment that charged him with attacking four Savannah women between December 6, 1994, and January 11, 1995. For his December 6 attack on the first victim, he was convicted of rape and kidnapping with bodily injury. With regard to the December 10 attack on the second victim, he was convicted of aggravated assault with intent to rape and robbery by intimidation. His December 30 attack on the third victim resulted in convictions for rape, aggravated assault, kidnapping with bodily injury, and robbery by intimidation. Although the jury convicted him of armed robbery for his January 11 attack on the fourth victim, it acquitted him of rape, kidnapping with bodily injury, and aggravated assault charges related to that incident. He received consecutive life sentences. We find no reversible error.
1. Because Gadson challenges the sufficiency of the evidence, we apply the standard set forth in Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 2789, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979) and review that evidence with all reasonable inferences made, and all issues of weight and credibility resolved, in favor of the verdict. Patterson v. State, 181 Ga.App. 68, 69, 351 S.E.2d 503 (1986). We find the evidence supports each conviction.
The victim of the December 6 attack, a high school student, was walking toward the bus stop early in the morning when Gadson approached her and asked if she wanted to buy some clothes. When she ignored his solicitations, he grabbed her around the neck, told her he had a pistol, and forced her to walk with him to an abandoned garage, where he raped her and took money from her book bag. DNA samples taken from seminal fluid found in the victim's groin matched Gadson's blood. The victim identified Gadson in court. This evidence supports the convictions for rape and kidnapping with bodily injury related to this attack. See Gido v. State, 216 Ga.App. 330, 331-332(1), (2), 454 S.E.2d 201 (1995).
The second victim testified that on the afternoon of December 10, she was walking through her neighborhood when Gadson approached her and said "he had just got out of jail" and was "looking for him a nice woman." When she tried to ignore him, Gadson told her he had a gun and, using abusive language, said that if she did not come with him to have sex, he would shoot her. He demanded the victim's money, but, as she thrust it at him, she ran away. She identified Gadson in court as her attacker. This evidence supports the corresponding convictions for aggravated assault with intent to rape and robbery by intimidation. See Smith v. State, 215 Ga.App. 673, 675(2), 452 S.E.2d 526 (1994) (); Henderson v. State, 204 Ga.App. 884(1), 420 S.E.2d 813 (1992) ().
The third victim testified that she awoke on the night of December 30 to a knock on her door. When she opened it, a man grabbed her, hit her in the head, and dragged her to her backyard, where he forced intercourse on her. He threatened to kill her and took some of the jewelry she was wearing. In court, she identified Gadson as the attacker. This evidence is sufficient to sustain the resulting convictions for kidnapping, rape, and robbery by intimidation. See Gido, supra; Smith, supra.
In the final attack on January 11, 1995, the victim stated she was walking to a friend's house early in the morning when Gadson offered to sell her a ring. He followed her, telling her he wanted to "spend time with her," then put a gun to her face. "He didn't care about shooting me because he just had recently gotten out of jail," the victim testified Gadson told her. He then took her to an abandoned house, where he raped her and stole her necklace and a bracelet. She identified Gadson in court. This evidence supports the jury's verdict finding Gadson guilty of armed robbery. See id.
2. Gadson claims the trial court should not have let a police officer testify that, when he interviewed Gadson, the defendant told him he had just gotten out of jail and had been in jail for theft by taking. Under the circumstances of this case, we need not decide whether Gadson properly preserved his objection or whether the trial court erred in allowing the testimony.
Before the police officer testified, two of the victims testified that Gadson told them he had just been released from jail. Gadson made no objection to this testimony the first time the jury heard it. When another victim repeated the statement as she explained how Gadson verbally threatened her, the trial court correctly found it to be part of the res gestae. See Johnson v. State, 264 Ga. 456, 458(3), 448 S.E.2d 177 (1994). Thus, by the time the officer testified, his repetition of the same information constituted cumulative evidence, so any error in admitting the statement was harmless as a matter of law. Maher v. State, 216 Ga.App. 666(1), 455 S.E.2d 377 (1995); Kittles v. State, 168 Ga.App. 123(1), 308 S.E.2d 241 (1983). But see Felder v. State, 266 Ga. 574, 575(2), 468 S.E.2d 769 (1996) (). Furthermore, considering the overwhelming direct evidence of Gadson's guilt, it is highly probable that this testimony did not contribute to the verdict. Id.
3. The trial court did not err by refusing to sever the charges related to these several attacks. Two or more crimes may be joined in one indictment, and need not be severed, where they are based on "a series of acts connected together or constituting parts of a single scheme or plan." (Punctuation omitted.) Dingler v. State, 233 Ga. 462, 463, 211 S.E.2d 752 (1975). We review the trial court's determination for abuse of discretion. Whitfield v. State, 217 Ga.App. 402, 403(1), 457 S.E.2d 682 (1995). In this case, the court was authorized to conclude that these assaults on women, all committed in a similar way within a five-week period by a person matching Gadson's description, constituted part of a scheme or plan. See id.; Johnson v. State, 213 Ga.App. 194(1), 444 S.E.2d 334 (1994). Because the attacks bore such striking similarities, evidence of each could have been introduced at the trial of the others. Thus, the trial court's failure to sever could not have...
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