Shealey v. State

• Decision Date: 01 June 2020
• Docket Number: S20A0185
• Citation: 308 Ga. 847,843 S.E.2d 864
• Parties: SHEALEY v. The STATE.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

308 Ga. 847

843 S.E.2d 864

SHEALEY

v.The STATE.

S20A0185

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Decided: June 1, 2020

Jackie Glenn Patterson, Patterson Firm, LLC, 2964 Peachtree Road, Suite 260, Atlanta, Georgia 30305, Attorneys for the Appellant.

Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Deputy Attorney General, Paula Khristian Smith, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Christopher M. Carr, Attorney General, Ashleigh Dene Headrick, Department of Law, 40 Capitol Square, S.W., Atlanta, Georgia 30334, John H. Cranford, Jr., District Attorney, Coweta Judicial Circuit District Attorney's Office, 323 Newnan Street, Rm 105, Carrollton, Georgia 30117, John Clinton Winne, A.D.A., Coweta Judicial Circuit District Attorney's Office, 100 Ridley Ave, Suite 3500, LaGrange, Georgia 30240, Attorneys for the Appellee.

Nahmias, Presiding Justice.

Appellant Dextreion Shealey and his co-defendant Kelvin Hurston were found guilty of felony murder and other crimes in connection with the gang-related shooting death of Daven Tucker. Appellant's only contention in this appeal is that the trial court abused its discretion by excluding from evidence statements that his co-indictee Charles Lovelace made during Lovelace's guilty plea hearing. Seeing no error, we affirm.¹

1. Viewed in the light most favorable to the verdicts, the evidence presented at Appellant's trial showed the following. On the evening of December 17, 2016, Appellant, Hurston, Lovelace, Shawndarious Sands, Coty Green, Natori Lee, Lee's brother Kouri, Dantavious Rutledge, Zachary Holloway, Andre Gilliam, and Essence Todd – all of whom were connected to a criminal street gang from West Point called "4way" – attended a memorial celebration for a friend who had died.² After the memorial, the group and a few other people decided to go to LaGrange. They drove there in a caravan of cars that included among others Appellant's Ford Mustang, Green's Honda Accord, and Todd's Hyundai Sonata.

Appellant and a few others in the caravan stopped at a jail in LaGrange to put money in an inmate's account and then at a gas station before proceeding to a nearby public housing complex. A surveillance video recording of the complex's parking lot showed that Appellant's Mustang and the other cars in the caravan were at the complex from 9:53 to 9:59 p.m.

According to Green, there was an ongoing "beef" between 4way and a LaGrange group called "Mob," and the people in the caravan decided to drive to Granger Park to see if any Mob associates were hanging out there. Surveillance video recordings from the park showed that at 10:03 p.m., Appellant's Mustang and the rest of the caravan of cars entered a parking lot where dozens of people had gathered. According to several witnesses who were in the park, gunshots rang out from some of the cars in the caravan. One of those witnesses heard return fire from some of the people in the parking lot; several people in the caravan, however, testified that the people in the parking lot began shooting first. The park surveillance video showed that the caravan left as people in the parking lot ran away. Investigators later found 39 shell casings in the parking lot. Remarkably, no one was injured during the shooting.

The surveillance video from the housing complex showed that at 10:07 p.m., Appellant's Mustang and the rest of the caravan returned to the parking lot there. Appellant's Mustang had a bullet hole in the passenger door, and according to several members of the caravan, Appellant was angry because his car had been hit.

According to Kouri, he received information that Mob members had shot at the caravan; he relayed that information to the group at the housing complex, and Green said that he knew the location of a house where some Mob members lived. According to Lee, Appellant suggested that they go to the house, which was on Newnan Street, saying that he "wanted some get back." Green testified that Appellant said, "Somebody's got to pay. My car just got shot," and "What y'all want to do? Somebody's got to get it." Green explained that he, Appellant, Hurston, Lovelace, Sands, Lee, and Kouri planned to shoot up Daven Tucker's house – the house on Newnan Street – because Tucker was a member of Mob.³ Appellant told another caravan member to drive Appellant's Mustang back to West Point, and Gilliam, Todd, and other people in the caravan then drove back there. Appellant got in the Accord with Green, Lovelace, Lee, and Kouri, while Hurston, Sands, Rutledge, and Holloway got in the Sonata. Kouri testified that everyone who got in the Accord and the Sonata knew about the plan to shoot up Tucker's house; Lee also testified that he, Appellant, Green, and Lovelace knew about the plan.

Green and Lee testified that on the way to Newnan Street, Green pulled the Accord over so that he could switch from the driver's seat to the passenger's seat because he "wanted to be a shooter." According to Green, Appellant also planned to shoot, but while they were in the Accord, Lovelace took a gun that Appellant was holding and said, "No, you're going to school. Let me take care of that for you."⁴

The Accord and the Sonata were parked near Newnan Street, and Hurston, Green, Lovelace, and Sands got out of the cars. Hurston had a big, black handgun; Green had a .40-caliber gun; Lovelace carried a nine-millimeter gun or a .380 pistol, and Sands carried a nine-millimeter gun. Green testified that he, Hurston, Lovelace, and Sands started shooting toward the house; Green shot once and then got back in the Accord as the three other men continued to shoot. Green and Lee heard return gunfire from the direction of the house.⁵ Lovelace then got back in the Accord; Hurston and Sands got in the Sonata; and both cars fled.

Tucker, who had been in the front yard of his house, was shot once in his chest. Emergency responders arrived minutes later, around 11:00 p.m., and took Tucker to a hospital, where he soon died from the gunshot wound

. Investigators later found 34 nine-millimeter shell casings, five .380 shell casings, and one .40-caliber shell casing at the scene.

The nine 4way members and associates in the Accord and Sonata all eventually went to a motel in Alabama.⁶ Green, Lovelace, and Kouri were arrested there the next day, December 18.⁷ In Green's Accord, investigators found Green's .40-caliber gun, an empty box for nine-millimeter bullets, a nine-millimeter bullet, and a plastic tray used to hold ammunition.

Appellant and Hurston did not testify at their trial. Appellant's theory of defense was that he was merely present in Green's Accord when other members of the group shot toward Tucker.

Appellant does not challenge the legal sufficiency of the evidence supporting his convictions. Nevertheless, in accordance with this Court's general practice in murder cases, we have reviewed the record and conclude that, when viewed in the light most favorable to the verdicts, the evidence presented at trial and summarized above was sufficient to authorize a rational jury to find Appellant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of the crimes of which he was convicted. See Jackson v. Virginia , 443 U.S. 307, 319, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979). See also Vega v. State , 285 Ga. 32, 33, 673 S.E.2d 223 (2009) (" ‘It was for the jury to determine the credibility of the witnesses and to resolve any conflicts or inconsistencies in the evidence.’ " (citation omitted)).

We note in particular that a person who does not directly commit a crime may nevertheless be convicted as a party to that crime. OCGA § 16-2-20 (a) says that anyone "concerned in the commission of a crime is a party thereto and may be charged with and convicted of commission of the crime," and OCGA § 16-2-20 (b) explains that a person is "concerned in the commission of a crime" if he, among other things, "intentionally aids or abets" the commission of the crime or "intentionally advises, encourages, hires, counsels, or procures" another person to commit the crime. And while mere presence at the crime scene is insufficient to make someone a party to the crime, " ‘a jury may infer a common criminal intent from the defendant's presence, companionship, and conduct with another perpetrator before, during, and after the crimes.’ " Carter v. State , ––– Ga. ––––, ––––, 842 S.E.2d 831, 835 (2020) (citation omitted). In this case, although the evidence indicated that Appellant did not shoot Tucker, there was ample evidence from which the jury could find that Appellant aided, abetted, and encouraged the crimes and that he shared a common criminal intent with his 4way colleagues who did shoot at and kill Tucker, making Appellant guilty rather than merely present when the crimes occurred. See, e.g., Williams v. State , 307 Ga. 689, 690-691, 838 S.E.2d 314 (2020) (explaining that the evidence presented at trial was legally sufficient to prove that the appellant, who did not shoot the victim, was guilty as a party to the murder and not merely present at the crime scene).

2. Appellant's only contention is that the trial court abused its discretion by excluding from evidence statements Lovelace made during his guilty plea hearing. We disagree.

(a) After the State rested its case-in-chief, the trial court asked Appellant's counsel outside the presence of the jury if the defense was going to put on a case. Counsel replied that it depended on whether Lovelace would testify. Lovelace, who had pled guilty but had not yet been sentenced, was then brought into the courtroom, where he told the court that he did not wish to testify and wanted to assert his privilege against self-incrimination under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The trial court ruled that Lovelace was therefore "unavailable" as a witness.

Appellant's counsel then proffered that during Lovelace's guilty plea hearing, the prosecutor asked, "Is it truthful that [Appellant] was present in the car?" and Lovelace testified, "Yes." Counsel also proffered that during the plea hearing, the prosecutor asked Lovelace, "Is...