Garay v. State

• Decision Date: 22 June 2022
• Docket Number: S22A0073
• Citation: 314 Ga. 16,875 S.E.2d 631
• Parties: GARAY v. The STATE.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

314 Ga. 16

875 S.E.2d 631

GARAY

v.The STATE.

S22A0073

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Decided: June 22, 2022

Juwayn Haddad, Haddad Law Group, LLC, 4426 Hugh Howell Road, Suite B504, Tucker, Georgia 30084, for Appellant.

Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Deputy Attorney General, Paula Khristian Smith, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Christopher M. Carr, Attorney General, Department of Law, 40 Capitol Square, S.W., Atlanta, Georgia 30334, Patsy A. Austin-Gatson, District Attorney, Tristan Wade Gillespie, A.D.A., Gwinnett County District Attorney's Office, 75 Langley Drive, Lawrenceville, Georgia 30046, Leslie Anna Coots, A.D.A., Cobb County District Attorney's Office, 70 Haynes Street, Marietta, Georgia 30090, for Appellee.

Bethel, Justice.

After a jury trial in December 2019, Hector Garay was convicted of malice murder and other crimes in connection with the January 1996 shooting death of Adalberto Salinas. In his only enumeration of error on appeal, he contends that there was insufficient evidence to prove him guilty of the crimes charged beyond a reasonable doubt.¹ We disagree and affirm.

1. Viewed in the light most favorable to the verdicts, the evidence presented at trial showed the following. At around 9:30 or 10:00 p.m. on Sunday, January 21, 1996, Mr. Salinas, who owned a store called El Norteño, returned home from dinner with his wife, Francisca. After walking in the front door of their home, Mr. Salinas secured the chain lock on the door while Mrs. Salinas began taking off her gloves and scarf. They then heard the door handle shake as though someone was trying to enter the front door. Mr. Salinas opened the door with the chain still latched, and gunshots were immediately fired through the front door into the home, striking Mr. Salinas in the head and neck and killing him. Mrs. Salinas saw a man, who was not very tall and who was wearing a ski mask, on the other side of the door.

A neighbor heard the shots, looked outside, and saw a two-door car drive by at a rapid speed. At the scene, the police recovered three 9 mm Luger shell casings that were all fired from the same firearm, as well as a black knit hat that was found on a neighbor's driveway. A little over $17,000 in cash was located in the Salinases’ home.

On January 25, investigators learned that Edgar Quintanilla had information about the shooting. Quintanilla was interviewed by the police, and an audio and video recording of the interview was played for the jury. In the interview, Quintanilla told investigators the following. On January 19, the Friday before the shooting, he saw Garay's wife hand Garay a 9 mm firearm. When Quintanilla asked to whom the gun belonged, Garay said it was his. Garay then told Quintanilla that he needed it to do some "business" the following night, which he explained meant that he intended to rob someone who had a lot of money. Garay said he had some people ready to assist in the robbery and that he needed one more, and asked Quintanilla to help.

Quintanilla declined. The next day, Garay asked Quintanilla to look at a car, and Quintanilla agreed. Garay came to pick Quintanilla up in his Toyota Celica and asked Quintanilla to drive. Garay gave him directions to a gas station where they stopped, and Garay handed him a pistol, telling him that they were going to go do the "business right now." Quintanilla again declined. Garay agreed to drive Quintanilla home but drove him past the Salinases’ house, where Garay again asked him to "go do the business." Quintanilla once again declined, and Garay drove him home, saying that he would do the "business" the next day instead.

Quintanilla spoke with Garay on the Monday following the shooting, and Garay told Quintanilla that he went to rob the man who owns El Norteño but that it "went wrong" and he ended up shooting the man "many times" with his 9 mm firearm, causing the others who were with him to run away. Garay told Quintanilla that he was going to leave the country because he was worried his Toyota Celica may have been identified at the scene. Based on the information Quintanilla provided, investigators identified Garay as a suspect. By that time, however, Garay had fled to El Salvador, where he was apprehended by the FBI in 2018.

Luis Villalobos, who lived with Garay and Garay's family at the time of the shooting, testified that Garay told him that a man named "Lobos" had shot someone. Another person, Ernie DeLeon, testified that Garay and a man known as "Boscoe"² talked about how they were going to rob someone for $50,000. Garay and Boscoe asked DeLeon if he had a dark sweater, beanie, or skullcap, as well as handcuffs. DeLeon gave them a sweater and a beanie and told them they could buy handcuffs. DeLeon testified that they also invited him to participate in the robbery, but he declined.

An investigator testified that he interviewed a nightclub manager and a bouncer, who said that they had seen Garay and Juan Gomez, also known as "Lobo," around 3:00 a.m. on January 21. The manager and bouncer said that Garay had a handgun in his waistband and that Gomez told them that he also had a gun.

Garay testified at trial and denied being involved in the shooting. According to Garay, he was drinking at a gas station with Santos Noe Martinez, Juan Lobo, and Ernie DeLeon when Lobo and DeLeon left on foot to commit the crimes. Garay claimed that he was in the gas station and had taken a beer and was warming up a burrito.

Garay said that Martinez told him, "I heard some shots. There's been a shooting ... it's them, it's them, let's go." Garay also testified that Martinez told him DeLeon and Lobo "fired" or "shot." Garay saw DeLeon walking down Jimmy Carter Boulevard but could not tell what house he was coming from. Garay claimed that DeLeon was the one who shot Mr. Salinas and that, following the shooting, Lobo threatened him in the car that if he said anything to police, he or his children would be killed because Garay "was the only one who saw what they did."³ Garay also claimed that Quintanilla was mad at him and set him up because Quintanilla had stolen a phone "from a detective" where Garay worked cleaning offices, and Garay had told Quintanilla that he had been asked to return the phone within three days or else he would be fired.

2. Garay contends that the evidence was legally insufficient to support his convictions because he testified at trial to an alternative version of events on the evening of the murder and because there was no physical evidence connecting him to the crimes.⁴ We disagree.

When evaluating a challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence [as a matter of constitutional due process], we view all of the evidence presented at trial in the light most favorable to the verdict[s] and ask whether any rational trier of fact could have found the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of the crimes of which he was convicted.

Jones v. State , 304 Ga. 594, 598, 820 S.E.2d 696 (2018) (citing Jackson v. Virginia , 443 U. S. 307, 318-319 (III) (B), 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979) ). "We leave to the jury the resolution of conflicts or inconsistencies in the evidence, credibility of witnesses, and reasonable inferences to be derived from the facts, and we do not reweigh the evidence." (Citations and punctuation omitted.) Harris v. State , 313 Ga. 225, 229 (2), 869 S.E.2d 461 (2022).

Further, as a matter of Georgia statutory law, "[t]o warrant a conviction on circumstantial evidence, the proved facts shall not only be consistent with the hypothesis of guilt, but shall exclude every other reasonable hypothesis save that of the guilt of the accused."

OCGA § 24-14-6. "Not every hypothesis is reasonable, and the evidence does not have to exclude every conceivable inference or hypothesis; it need rule out only those that are reasonable." (Citation and punctuation omitted.) Cochran v. State , 305 Ga. 827, 829 (1), 828 S.E.2d 338 (2019). Whether alternative hypotheses are reasonable, however, is usually a question for the jury, and this Court will not disturb the jury's finding unless it is insufficient as a matter of law. See Graves v. State , 306 Ga. 485, 487 (1), 831 S.E.2d 747 (2019). Moreover, if there is any direct evidence presented by the State, the circumstantial evidence statute does not apply to a sufficiency analysis. See Jackson v. State , 310 Ga. 224, 228 (2) (b), 850 S.E.2d 131 (2020).

The State presented some circumstantial evidence. For instance, the State presented evidence that Garay was armed and planning a...