State v. Gibbs

• Decision Date: 19 August 2020
• Docket Number: Opinion No. 5760,Appellate Case No. 2017-002042
• Citation: State v. Gibbs, 431 S.C. 313, 847 S.E.2d 495 (S.C. App. 2020)
• Court: South Carolina Court of Appeals
• Parties: The STATE, Respondent, v. Jaron Lamont GIBBS, Appellant.

431 S.C. 313

847 S.E.2d 495

The STATE, Respondent,

v.Jaron Lamont GIBBS, Appellant.

Appellate Case No. 2017-002042

Opinion No. 5760

Court of Appeals of South Carolina.

Submitted May 8, 2020

Filed August 19, 2020

Rehearing Denied September 21, 2020

Katherine Carruth Goode, of Winnsboro, and Jack B. Swerling, of Columbia, both for Appellant.

Attorney General Alan McCrory Wilson, Deputy Attorney General Donald J. Zelenka, Senior Assistant Deputy Attorney General Melody Jane Brown, and Assistant Attorney General Caroline M. Scrantom, all of Columbia, for Respondent.

HEWITT, J.:

Jaron Lamont Gibbs appeals his convictions for murder and possessing a weapon while committing a violent crime. He claims the trial court erred in allowing a police officer to testify about single and double action revolvers when the officer was not qualified as an expert witness. Gibbs also claims the trial court erred in allowing the State to reference the officer's testimony in the State's closing argument and if these alleged errors do not independently justify reversal, reversal is warranted by their cumulative effect.

We respectfully disagree with both arguments. First, we find no abuse of discretion in allowing the officer to testify based on his experience with revolvers. Second, the State's closing argument was permissible advocacy based on its view of the evidence.

FACTS

Events Giving Rise to Charges

The circumstances of this mid-day shooting were disputed, but multiple witnesses testified the case arose out of a drug transaction. On a Saturday in August 2017, Hunter Raby, Robby Porter, and Kalyn Meadors were going to the lake near Clemson when they contacted Gibbs—the defendant—to buy drugs. Raby drove his white Ford Explorer with Porter in the front passenger seat. Meadors rode in the rear passenger seat. They met Gibbs near Clemson.

Gibbs gave them marijuana and pills in exchange for money. After the transaction, the occupants of Raby's Explorer weighed the marijuana they purchased. Believing they had been shorted, they drove Raby's Explorer back to the purchase location to look for Gibbs and saw him in a Chrysler. They contacted Gibbs by phone and began following the Chrysler.

According to Raby, the phone calls with Gibbs became heated. Shortly thereafter, the two cars arrived and stopped at a four-way intersection. At that point, Gibbs exited the Chrysler's front passenger seat, walked behind the Chrysler, and walked up to the Explorer's driver's side window where Raby was seated. Witness accounts differ as to what happened next.

Raby said Gibbs pulled out a gun, put the gun inside the Explorer's driver's side window, and yelled that Raby had messed up and "was really close to losing [his] life over it." Raby said that the gun was a silver revolver, Gibbs held the gun in his right hand, and Gibbs held the gun along the left side of Raby's face. Raby said he used both of his hands to push the gun away as Gibbs was threatening him. At that point, Raby said the gun fired. Raby denied touching the gun's trigger.

Meadors—the Explorer's backseat passenger—could not see the gun from her seat and only realized what it was after it fired. She assumed Raby had taken the gun away from Gibbs.

Gibbs's story was significantly different. He said Raby and Porter called him and demanded he settle up for an unpaid bet made at a social event a few weeks earlier. Gibbs said he told them he was on his way to Atlanta and would pay the bet later, but he claimed Porter would not take "no" for an answer. He said Raby and Porter got increasingly upset as their phone calls went on and they began following closely behind Gibbs and driving aggressively.

Gibbs said the reason he got out of the Chrysler was to offer the gun as payment for the alleged bet. Gibbs purportedly thought the gun was unloaded. He agreed that he held the gun in his right hand but explained he was left-handed, he held the pistol by the grip, and his finger was never on the trigger. Gibbs said he pushed the gun inside the car in front of Raby's face and that Raby pushed the gun back out. Gibbs said the gun fired when this occurred a second time. Gibbs claimed he had no idea anyone had been shot after the gun fired.

Three other cars were stopped at the intersection when the shooting happened. The occupants of those cars all recalled waiting on a silver sedan—the Chrysler—to proceed through the intersection. All saw Gibbs exit the Chrysler from the passenger side, walk up to the driver's side of the Explorer, and address the driver.

Alexander Saidat, an off-duty EMT waiting at the intersection in his car with his wife and children, recalled seeing Gibbs exit the Chrysler's passenger side and walk to the back of the vehicle. Saidat said Gibbs had a gun in his right hand that looked like a silver revolver. Saidat testified Gibbs and the driver of the Explorer had an argument that lasted several seconds. He then witnessed Gibbs "thrust his right arm inside the vehicle with the gun" and heard the gunshot.

Although the remaining witnesses did not recall seeing a gun, they did recall hearing a gunshot. Saidat's wife said she witnessed yelling before she "saw the hand of the driver come out, and the gun went off." She also testified that "[w]hen the gun went off, the male who was in the Chrysler who had shot ran back to the Chrysler and they drove away." Another witness also recalled "seeing a hand go up and down."

The bullet grazed the top of Raby's head, leaving only a minor injury. However, the bullet struck Porter—the front seat passenger—in the left side of his temple, just above his ear. Porter died at the hospital the following day.

Autumn Gilstrap—the Chrysler's driver—testified Gibbs contacted her earlier that day requesting a ride to Atlanta. She noticed the Explorer trying to stop her from leaving the place where she picked up Gibbs. Gilstrap said that she drove around the Explorer, it kept following them, and Gibbs told her to keep driving as he answered a number of phone calls. Gilstrap said the Explorer was directly behind her when they reached the intersection where the shooting occurred.

Gilstrap saw Gibbs walk from her car to the Explorer and saw that he was armed. She said that Gibbs and the people in the Explorer were yelling at each other, and she saw Gibbs point the gun towards the Explorer's window. Gilstrap heard the gun go off and watched Gibbs walk back to her car and get in. Gilstrap said she did not see the gun when Gibbs got back in the car. Gibbs told Gilstrap to drive off and explained that the gun had gone off and hit the top of the Explorer's roof. Gilstrap testified she took Gibbs to Greenville Hospital to meet some other people and declined to drive him to Atlanta "because [she] was unsure of what really happened" at the intersection. Gilstrap said she drove directly to the Clemson Police Department and gave a statement.

Authorities recovered pills and other illegal substances from the Explorer. Raby and Meadors initially told officers that Gibbs had robbed them a few weeks earlier and owed them money. Both of them said later that their initial story was not true, and that the incident in fact stemmed from the aforementioned drug transaction. Gibbs was arrested in Atlanta two days after the shooting. No gun was recovered.

Revolver Testimony

Detective Michael Arflin testified at Gibbs's trial about his investigation of the shooting. The State asked Detective Arflin during direct examination if he was familiar with single action and double action revolvers. Gibbs objected, arguing Detective Arflin had not been qualified as an expert witness. The State responded that the detective had already testified he was "familiar with revolvers through his training and experience as an officer." Gibbs argued he was not aware of any officers that had been trained on revolvers, only semi-automatic weapons and rifles. The trial court overruled the objection and noted Gibbs's standing objection on record.

The following exchange then took place:

State: Detective Arflin, how do you fire a single action gun?

Detective Arflin: The hammer has to be cocked and then you fire – you pull the trigger and it discharges.

State: Will it fire without you cocking it?

Detective Arflin: That's kind of the rule behind single action. It has to be cocked.

State: A double action?

Detective Arflin: When you pull the trigger, the hammer both cocks and discharges.

State: Does it have a light trigger pull, [or] a heavy trigger pull?

Detective Arflin: In double action, it's going to be a long, heavy trigger pull.

Closing Argument

The solicitor made the statement during closing argument that "guns do not accidentally go off." She then demonstrated the necessary steps for single and double action revolvers to fire. She argued that if the gun was a single action, "[Gibbs] would have had to have gotten out of the car, [and] cocked it before he put it to [Raby's] head. That's intent. That is a conscious effort." She then described what was necessary for a double action revolver to discharge, arguing:

Raby testified he pushe[d] the gun up like this. He would have to push the gun up like this, wrap his fingers around where the trigger [was], pull it back and pull it up at the same time if this was a double action revolver. That simply does not make sense.

Gibbs objected to the State's argument and demonstration on the basis that there was no evidence a gun could not go off accidentally, especially an old gun that could have been traded on the street. The trial court overruled the objection.

The jury convicted Gibbs of murder and of the weapons charge.

ISSUES ON APPEAL

1. Whether the trial court erred in allowing a witness who was not qualified as an expert to testify about how single and double action revolvers fire.

2. Whether the trial court erred in allowing the State to reference the contested testimony in a demonstration during closing argument.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

The standard of review is deferential. Evidentiary rulings rest in "the ...