GEORGIA SUPREME COURT

CLICK TO READ Cortney Bell v. State of Georgia, Docket # S22G0747

The Supreme Court of Georgia has reversed an intermediate appellate court’s decision which held that the evidence against Cortney Bell, related to the killing of her infant daughter, Caliyah, in 2017, was legally sufficient to support her conviction for contributing to the dependency of a minor.  “Because we conclude based on the facts of this case that the evidence was insufficient to authorize a jury to conclude that Caliyah’s death was proximately caused by Bell’s conduct as alleged in the indictment, we reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals,” Justice John J. Ellington writes in today’s unanimous opinion.  Court records state that Bell lived with her boyfriend and her children’s father, Christopher McNabb. The two smoked methamphetamine together the night before their two week-old daughter, Caliyah, was killed. On the morning of Oct. 7, 2017, the couple woke up at 5 a.m. to feed and dress Caliyah. Bell then fell back asleep and woke up twice—once at the sound of McNabb’s phone and later when the couple’s two-year-old child woke Bell to tell her that Caliyah was missing. Bell called 911 after she could not find Caliyah but found the baby’s pajamas on the bathroom floor. Caliyah’s body was discovered the next day in a wooded area close to the home.

A Newton County jury initially found Bell guilty of murder in the second degree, cruelty to children in the second degree, and felony contributing to the dependency of a minor as a result of Caliyah’s death. (McNabb also was charged with murder and other crimes, and a jury found him guilty of all charges. His convictions were affirmed by the Supreme Court in May 2022.) The Georgia Court of Appeals, the state’s intermediate appellate court, reversed Bell’s convictions for second-degree murder and cruelty to children, concluding the evidence was insufficient to support those charges. However, the Court of Appeals confirmed her conviction for contributing to the dependency of a minor, concluding that although Bell’s “acts of neglect were not the sole proximate cause of the victim’s death, the evidence played a substantial part in [the victim’s] death and that death was a reasonably probable consequence of that neglect.” In support of its conclusion, the Court of Appeals relied on evidence showing that Bell used methamphetamine and marijuana on a regular basis and allowed McNabb and others to do the same in her house, and that McNabb had hit Bell both before and after Caliyah was born. The Supreme Court granted certiorari review and heard oral arguments in the case on April 20, 2023.  The Supreme Court has concluded that the evidence in this case was insufficient to authorize the jury to conclude that Bell’s failure to provide proper parental care, as alleged by the State, was the proximate cause of Caliyah’s death. (The State in this case is represented by the Alcovy Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office.) The Supreme Court also has rejected the State’s second theory of Bell’s guilt—that Caliyah’s death, even though directly caused by McNabb, was foreseeable because Bell failed “to provide proper parental care” by choosing to live with McNabb, who had been violent towards Bell. “In summary, the evidence here showed that Bell went to sleep one night, checked on Caliyah early the next morning, and went back to sleep for four and one-half hours. The evidence further showed that while Bell slept, McNabb committed a violent crime that the State conceded was the direct and immediate cause of Caliyah’s death,” Justice Ellington writes. “There was no evidence that Caliyah’s death was a reasonably foreseeable consequence of Bell’s drug use or drug use in the home by McNabb or others or that it was reasonably foreseeable that McNabb would commit the horrific crimes that resulted in Caliyah’s death. And there was no evidence presented that showed Bell was a party to McNabb’s crimes, that she heard McNabb striking Caliyah and did nothing to stop him, or that she refused to provide Caliyah with potentially lifesaving medical treatment.”

CLICK TO READ State of Georgia v. Aaron Cooke, Jason Roache, Guito Dela Cruz, Omar Jackson, Kenesia Strowder, and William Whitaker, Docket # S23A0702, S23A0703, S23A0704, S23A0705, S23A0706, S23A0707

The Supreme Court of Georgia has reversed a Fulton County trial court ruling that threw out indictments charging six former county jailers—Aaron Cook, Jason Roache, Guito Dela Cruz, Omar Jackson, Kenesia Strowder, and William Whitaker—with crimes connected to the death of detainee Antonio May. The six, named as appellees in the related cases, were all on duty at the Fulton County Jail at the time of May’s death. The State, represented in this case by the Atlanta Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office, alleges they caused May’s death by beating him, pepper-spraying him, and repeatedly shocking him with a Taser-like device. Each of the six was indicted for felony murder and other crimes.

The ex-jailers sought to quash, or throw out, their indictments on the basis that they were not afforded pre-indictment notice and an opportunity to be heard before the grand jury—pre-indictment protections provided to peace officers under Georgia Code § 17-7-52. Following a hearing, the trial court quashed the indictments, determining that the six met the definition of peace officers found in other provisions of state law, specifically Georgia Code § 16-1-13(11). The Supreme Court of Georgia heard oral arguments in this case on June 20, 2023.  Today, the Court has reversed the trial court’s order, concluding that while the trial court generally defined “peace officer” correctly, it employed the wrong analysis in doing so. The Court further concludes that the six defendants do not meet the definition of a peace officer and, therefore, are not entitled to the pre-indictment protections afforded by Georgia Code § 17-7-52. Today’s unanimous opinion, authored by Justice Charlie Bethel, notes that while Georgia Code § 17-7-52 does not define the term “peace officer,” looking to other uses of the term in Georgia statutes alone is not sufficient for determining the meaning. The Court also considered the term’s “ordinary, natural, and most basic meaning,” as well as its historical usage in its past Georgia appellate decisions. “The term ‘peace officer’ has been used in Georgia statutory law since at least 1793 and has also appeared with some regularity in our decisional law, beginning with the early opinions of this Court,” Justice Bethel writes. “But the term predates even those sources and in fact derived from the common law.” Historical statutory definitions and past Supreme Court decisions recognize a peace officer’s “duty to maintain the public peace, generally by enforcing criminal laws through the power of arrest,” today’s opinion states. It also notes that the six appellees had only limited authority in their roles as jailers that did not support the trial court’s conclusion that they were peace officers. “Here, the trial court rested its conclusion that the defendants were charged with preserving the public peace on the sole fact that the defendants were responsible for maintaining order among the inmates confined to the Fulton County Jail. While it is true that the defendants’ work may have benefited the public peace, a tangential benefit to the public peace is not synonymous with a duty to maintain the peace within the community as a whole,” Justice Bethel writes. 

GEORGIA COURT OF APPEALS

CLICK TO READ State of Georgia v. Corinna Carmen Crumpton, Docket # A23A0888

Defendant moved to dismiss and filed a general demurrer to Count # 2 of the Indictment, Charging her with the offense of Improper Sexual Contact pursuant to OCGA § 16-6-5.1.  The Indictment alleged that she committed the offense while an employee of the school where the minor was enrolled as a student.  The Defendant was charged with transmitted sexually explicit photos to the minor over the internet.  The trial court ruled that the statute only criminalized in-person acts, and dismissed Count # 2 and the State appealed.

The Court of Appeals reversed and reinstated Count # 2.  The Court held that “contact” was only the name of the statute, not an element of the offense itself.  The operative statutory words were engaging in “sexually explicit conduct” which includes lewd exhibition of the genitals or pubic area.  By its plain language, OCGA § 16-12-100 (a) (4) does not define this action as requiring that the “exhibition” occur “in-person,” i. e., when two people are physically present with or proximate to one another. Nor does the plain language of OCGA § 16-6-5.1 (b) (1) limit the offense to those actions conducted when the victim and perpetrator are in one another’s physical presence.

CLICK TO READ State of Georgia v. Donnie Wayne Jackson, Docket # A23A1106

Defendant was charged with one count of Child Molestation, in which he was accused of committing the offense on an unknown date between October 1, 2019 and October 30, 2019.  He filed a special demurrer, asking the court to quash the indictment because it failed to allege a specific date or narrow the range of dates, and was therefore not perfect in form.  At a hearing, a Georgia Bureau of Investigation agent testified that she interviewed the minor victim in the case three times, and identified several potential time periods when the alleged molestation occurred.  The victim was never able to identify a specific date or day of the week that the offense took place, nor could the victim’s mother.

Following the hearing, the trial court sustained Jackson’s special demurrer and quashed the indictment. The trial court concluded that the State could have narrowed the alleged molestation dates to a Wednesday or Thursday in October 2019.

A defendant who files a timely special demurrer prior to trial is entitled to an indictment “perfect in form and substance.”  “An indictment is ‘perfect in form and substance’ if it is stated in the terms and language of the law or so plainly that the nature of the offense charged may be easily understood by the jury and the particulars are such as to enable the defendant to prepare for trial.”  Generally, this requires that the indictment assert “a specific date on which the crime was committed.” However, where the State can show that the evidence does not permit it to allege a specific date on which the offense occurred, the State is permitted to allege that the crime occurred between two particular dates.

Here, the victim’s inability to identify the date of the touching authorized the State to allege that the offense occurred within a date range.  The Court of Appeals concluded that the State reasonably narrowed the date range alleged in the present indictment and sufficiently apprised Jackson of the offense charged so as to enable him to prepare for trial.

CLICK TO READ Jorge Houed-Cartacio v. State of Georgia, Docket # A23A1011

After Jorge Houed-Cartacio pled guilty to Aggravated Assault and False Imprisonment, the trial court sentenced him to twenty years, to serve ten. Houed-Cartacio filed a motion to withdraw his plea, arguing that he did not knowingly and intelligently enter into the plea because plea counsel had failed to disclose a conflict of interest. Specifically, Houed-Cartacio alleged that plea counsel had damaged property of the assistant district attorney (“ADA”) who was prosecuting the case and was facing restitution and that Defendant would have found other counsel to handle his case had he known that the ADA was a victim of plea counsel.  The trial court denied the motion, finding that the conflict did not affect the outcome

The Court of Appeals reversed.  It held that the trial court erred in requiring Houed-Cartacio to show that the presumed conflict of interest affected the outcome of the underlying proceedings.  Defendant was only required to show it affected the representation itself.  The case was reversed and remanded for a full determination of the motion using the correct standard.

CLICK TO READ Larry Jackson III v. State of Georgia, Docket # A23A1128

Defendant was convicted of Possession of a Firearm While a Convicted Felon after an unsuccessful motion to suppress a shotgun recovered from his home.  The evidence at the hearing established that a police officer responded to a domestic disturbance call to assist other officers.  Defendant was still inside his home after his wife and children left the house.  Defendant was going to leave the home and started gathering his things, and told the officer it would take multiple trips for him to get everything.

Jackson asked the officers to leave and told them they had no reason to be there and he refused to leave until the officers left.  The wife advised the officer that there was a firearm in the residence located inside the closet in the bedroom she shared with Jackson.  The officer entered the house to confirm the shotgun was there, and believed that there were “other items” of interest in the closet as well.  The officer recovered the shotgun and held it for “safekeeping” and when they learned Defendant had a felony conviction, they arrested him.

The Court of Appeals reversed and granted suppression.  The Court held that there were no exigent circumstances to justify the warrantless entry and search, especially where the wife and children were already outside of the house.  The conviction was reversed and suppression granted.

CLICK TO READ Marquis Dontez Jordan v. State of Georgia, Docket # A23A0772

Defendant’s sentence was originally vacated by the Court of Appeals in a prior decision after he was convicted of Aggravated Assault and related offenses.  The Court of Appeals reversed and remanded for resentencing on Counts 1 and 2 only.  At the resentencing, the trial court resentenced him on Count 3, raising the sentence from 10 years of probation to 10 years of imprisonment.  Defendant filed a motion to vacate an illegal or void sentence, which the trial court denied.  The Court of Appeals reversed, finding that the trial court lacked jurisdiction to increase his sentence at the resentencing

CLICK TO READ State of Georgia v. Kody Black, Docket # A23A0939, A23A0940

Defendant was indicted on one count of Rape.  He filed several motions to suppress evidence recovered from his cell phone pursuant to a search warrant.  The trial court granted the motion in part, finding that the warrant application failed to establish probable cause to search his phone for information outside of communications with the alleged victim.  The State appealed.

The Court of Appeals reversed, finding that the warrant application established probable cause to believe the phone contained evidence relevant to the crime charged.