THIRD DIVISION BARNES, P. J., BOGGS and BRANCH, JJ.
NOTICE: Motions for reconsideration must be physically received in our clerk’s office within ten days of the date of decision to be deemed timely filed. http://www.gaappeals.us/rules/
June 17, 2014
In the Court of Appeals of Georgia A14A0420. SLAUGHTER v. THE STATE.
B RANCH, Judge.
On appeal from his conviction for aggravated stalking, burglary, and criminal
damage to property, Kenneth Slaughter argues that the evidence was insufficient and
that the trial court erred when it refused to charge the jury on violation of a family
violence order as a lesser included offense of aggravated stalking. We find no error
and affirm.
“On appeal from a criminal conviction, we view the evidence in the light most
favorable to the verdict, with the defendant no longer enjoying a presumption of
innocence.” Reese v. State, 270 Ga. App. 522, 523 (607 SE2d 165) (2004) (citation
omitted). We neither weigh the evidence nor judge the credibility of witnesses, but
determine only whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, a “rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the
crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U. S. 307, 319 (III) (B)
(99 SCt 2781, 61 LE2d 560) (1979) (citation omitted).
So viewed, the record shows that after Slaughter and the victim began a
romantic relationship online, Slaughter moved into the victim’s home in February
2010. After a few months, however, Slaughter stopped taking his prescription
medication and began behaving erratically, blaming the victim for his problems and
starting numerous arguments with her. In early July 2010, the victim ended the
relationship but told Slaughter that he could stay in the home until his next hospital
appointment in August “if he was civil.”
On July 12, 2010, the victim lent Slaughter her car while she remained at work.
Driving the victim’s car, Slaughter appeared in the parking lot of the victim’s
employer and drove in circles around other cars in the lot. When the victim went
outside to give Slaughter money to take the bus home, he threw the money on the
ground and “stormed off,” but remained in the area so that the victim was able to drive
him back to her house at the end of her workday. That evening, after an altercation
with Slaughter, the victim called police, who in turn obtained an ambulance that
transported Slaughter to the hospital, from which he was ejected later that night. On
2 the drive home with the victim, Slaughter began kicking the car’s dashboard and
trying to grab the steering wheel, so the victim returned Slaughter to the hospital
parking lot, left him there, retrieved some belongings from her house, and went to her
sister’s house.
On July 14, 2010, the victim drove to her house and encountered Slaughter. She
found damage on the ground floor including flooding, pulled-up carpet, dirt scattered
on the underlying concrete floor, holes in the walls, and mirrors and a television
smashed. One bathroom vanity had been destroyed, and a hole was knocked through
an exterior wall. Although Slaughter told police that his laptop computer had been
taken, none of Slaughter’s property had been damaged. While Slaughter remained in
the house, the victim took photographs of the damage. She then left the house and
called her mother, who advised her to obtain a protective order. On July 16, 2010, the
victim obtained a temporary protective order under which Slaughter was “to stay
away” from the victim’s residence and workplace, was “restrained and enjoined from
approaching within 100 yards” of the victim herself, and was ordered “not to have any
contact, direct, indirect, or through another person,” with the victim. The last page of
the order specified that a violation of its terms “may be punished by arrest.” On the
3 same afternoon, Slaughter was personally served with the order and escorted off the
victim’s property.
When the victim and her mother returned to the victim’s home from work on
the evening of July 16, they did so in the company of police because the victim “didn’t
feel safe” around Slaughter without police protection. As the victim and her mother
were outside in the company of a police officer, Slaughter opened the front door and
came out of the house. After confirming that Slaughter had been served with the
protective order, the officer arrested him for violating the terms of that order.
Although Slaughter told the officer that he did not know how the house had been
damaged, he showed the officer around the first floor, which now had holes punched
in every wall, a space where the clothes dryer had been, water throughout, bathroom
pipes broken, a gas can on the dining room table, and broken glass in the kitchen
sink’s garbage disposal. Damage had also been done on the second floor of the house,
and the exterior air-conditioning unit had been overturned, pulling wiring out of the
exterior wall. Repair costs exceeded $15,000.
Slaughter was charged with aggravated stalking, burglary, and criminal damage
to property in the second degree. A jury found him guilty of all three charges, and he
4 was sentenced to 20 years with 10 to serve. Slaughter’s motion for new trial was
denied.
1. Slaughter first argues that the evidence was insufficient to sustain his
convictions for (a) aggravated stalking, (b) burglary, and (c) criminal damage to
property in the second degree. W e disagree.
(a) OCGA § 16-5-91 (a) provides that a person commits the offense of
aggravated stalking when that person, in violation of a court order including a
“temporary protective order,” “follows, places under surveillance, or contacts another
person at or about a place or places without the consent of the other person for the
purpose of harassing and intimidating the other person.” OCGA § 16-5-90 (a) (1)
defines “contact” as “any communication including[,] without being limited to[,]
communication in person,” and “harassing and intimidating” as
a knowing and willful course of conduct directed at a specific person which causes emotional distress by placing such person in reasonable fear for such person’s safety or the safety of a member of his or her immediate family, by establishing a pattern of harassing and intimidating behavior, and which serves no legitimate purpose.
A defendant “need not engage in unequivocally hostile conduct or make explicit
threats in order to be convicted of stalking” or aggravated stalking. Placanica v. State,
5 303 Ga. App. 302, 304 (693 SE2d 571) (2010). Further, “[e]ven a single violation of
a protective order may violate OCGA § 16-5-91 (a) if that violation is part of a pattern
of harassing and intimidating behavior.” Brooks v. State, 313 Ga. App. 789, 792 (1)
(723 SE2d 29) (2012), citing Louisyr v. State, 307 Ga. App. 724, 729 (1) (706 SE2d
114) (2011). In considering whether evidence shows such a pattern, “the jury can
Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI
THIRD DIVISION BARNES, P. J., BOGGS and BRANCH, JJ.
NOTICE: Motions for reconsideration must be physically received in our clerk’s office within ten days of the date of decision to be deemed timely filed. http://www.gaappeals.us/rules/
June 17, 2014
In the Court of Appeals of Georgia A14A0420. SLAUGHTER v. THE STATE.
B RANCH, Judge.
On appeal from his conviction for aggravated stalking, burglary, and criminal
damage to property, Kenneth Slaughter argues that the evidence was insufficient and
that the trial court erred when it refused to charge the jury on violation of a family
violence order as a lesser included offense of aggravated stalking. We find no error
and affirm.
“On appeal from a criminal conviction, we view the evidence in the light most
favorable to the verdict, with the defendant no longer enjoying a presumption of
innocence.” Reese v. State, 270 Ga. App. 522, 523 (607 SE2d 165) (2004) (citation
omitted). We neither weigh the evidence nor judge the credibility of witnesses, but
determine only whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, a “rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the
crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U. S. 307, 319 (III) (B)
(99 SCt 2781, 61 LE2d 560) (1979) (citation omitted).
So viewed, the record shows that after Slaughter and the victim began a
romantic relationship online, Slaughter moved into the victim’s home in February
2010. After a few months, however, Slaughter stopped taking his prescription
medication and began behaving erratically, blaming the victim for his problems and
starting numerous arguments with her. In early July 2010, the victim ended the
relationship but told Slaughter that he could stay in the home until his next hospital
appointment in August “if he was civil.”
On July 12, 2010, the victim lent Slaughter her car while she remained at work.
Driving the victim’s car, Slaughter appeared in the parking lot of the victim’s
employer and drove in circles around other cars in the lot. When the victim went
outside to give Slaughter money to take the bus home, he threw the money on the
ground and “stormed off,” but remained in the area so that the victim was able to drive
him back to her house at the end of her workday. That evening, after an altercation
with Slaughter, the victim called police, who in turn obtained an ambulance that
transported Slaughter to the hospital, from which he was ejected later that night. On
2 the drive home with the victim, Slaughter began kicking the car’s dashboard and
trying to grab the steering wheel, so the victim returned Slaughter to the hospital
parking lot, left him there, retrieved some belongings from her house, and went to her
sister’s house.
On July 14, 2010, the victim drove to her house and encountered Slaughter. She
found damage on the ground floor including flooding, pulled-up carpet, dirt scattered
on the underlying concrete floor, holes in the walls, and mirrors and a television
smashed. One bathroom vanity had been destroyed, and a hole was knocked through
an exterior wall. Although Slaughter told police that his laptop computer had been
taken, none of Slaughter’s property had been damaged. While Slaughter remained in
the house, the victim took photographs of the damage. She then left the house and
called her mother, who advised her to obtain a protective order. On July 16, 2010, the
victim obtained a temporary protective order under which Slaughter was “to stay
away” from the victim’s residence and workplace, was “restrained and enjoined from
approaching within 100 yards” of the victim herself, and was ordered “not to have any
contact, direct, indirect, or through another person,” with the victim. The last page of
the order specified that a violation of its terms “may be punished by arrest.” On the
3 same afternoon, Slaughter was personally served with the order and escorted off the
victim’s property.
When the victim and her mother returned to the victim’s home from work on
the evening of July 16, they did so in the company of police because the victim “didn’t
feel safe” around Slaughter without police protection. As the victim and her mother
were outside in the company of a police officer, Slaughter opened the front door and
came out of the house. After confirming that Slaughter had been served with the
protective order, the officer arrested him for violating the terms of that order.
Although Slaughter told the officer that he did not know how the house had been
damaged, he showed the officer around the first floor, which now had holes punched
in every wall, a space where the clothes dryer had been, water throughout, bathroom
pipes broken, a gas can on the dining room table, and broken glass in the kitchen
sink’s garbage disposal. Damage had also been done on the second floor of the house,
and the exterior air-conditioning unit had been overturned, pulling wiring out of the
exterior wall. Repair costs exceeded $15,000.
Slaughter was charged with aggravated stalking, burglary, and criminal damage
to property in the second degree. A jury found him guilty of all three charges, and he
4 was sentenced to 20 years with 10 to serve. Slaughter’s motion for new trial was
denied.
1. Slaughter first argues that the evidence was insufficient to sustain his
convictions for (a) aggravated stalking, (b) burglary, and (c) criminal damage to
property in the second degree. W e disagree.
(a) OCGA § 16-5-91 (a) provides that a person commits the offense of
aggravated stalking when that person, in violation of a court order including a
“temporary protective order,” “follows, places under surveillance, or contacts another
person at or about a place or places without the consent of the other person for the
purpose of harassing and intimidating the other person.” OCGA § 16-5-90 (a) (1)
defines “contact” as “any communication including[,] without being limited to[,]
communication in person,” and “harassing and intimidating” as
a knowing and willful course of conduct directed at a specific person which causes emotional distress by placing such person in reasonable fear for such person’s safety or the safety of a member of his or her immediate family, by establishing a pattern of harassing and intimidating behavior, and which serves no legitimate purpose.
A defendant “need not engage in unequivocally hostile conduct or make explicit
threats in order to be convicted of stalking” or aggravated stalking. Placanica v. State,
5 303 Ga. App. 302, 304 (693 SE2d 571) (2010). Further, “[e]ven a single violation of
a protective order may violate OCGA § 16-5-91 (a) if that violation is part of a pattern
of harassing and intimidating behavior.” Brooks v. State, 313 Ga. App. 789, 792 (1)
(723 SE2d 29) (2012), citing Louisyr v. State, 307 Ga. App. 724, 729 (1) (706 SE2d
114) (2011). In considering whether evidence shows such a pattern, “the jury can
consider a number of factors, including the prior history between the parties, the
defendant’s surreptitious conduct, as well as his overtly confrontational acts[ ] and any
attempts by the defendant to contact, communicate with, or control the victim
indirectly.” Louisyr, 307 Ga. App. at 729 (1) (footnotes omitted).
Construed in favor of the jury’s verdict, the evidence here showed that
Slaughter had previously harassed the victim at work and in her car; that he destroyed
property at her residence; that he returned to that residence after being served with the
court order barring him from doing so; that he appeared at the door of that residence
when the victim was standing less than 100 feet outside it; and that the victim was put
in reasonable fear for her safety as a result of Slaughter’s behavior. As such, the
evidence was sufficient to sustain Slaughter’s conviction for aggravated stalking. See
Louisyr, 307 Ga. App. at 729 (1) (because OCGA § 16-5-91 does not require
“multiple violations of a protective order,” “a pattern of harassing behavior”
6 culminating in a single violation of a protective order was sufficient to sustain a
conviction for aggravated stalking); Jackson, supra.
(b) OCGA § 16-7-1 (b) defines burglary as entering or remaining “within [the]
. . . dwelling house of another” “without authority and with the intent to commit a
felony” therein. Once a victim has “withdrawn the defendant’s authority to enter [the
victim’s] house,” the fact that a defendant may have previously lived there and had
left personal property there “does not, in itself, give the defendant subsequent
authority to enter.” Pittman v. State, 230 Ga. App. 799, 802 (498 SE2d 309) (1998).
Because the temporary protective order specifically deprived Slaughter of any
authority to enter the victim’s home, and because the evidence thus supported a
conclusion that Slaughter entered that home without authority and with the intent to
commit the crime of aggravated stalking, see Division 1 above, the evidence was
sufficient to sustain Slaughter’s conviction for burglary. See Bray v. State, 294 Ga.
App. 562, 562-563 (1) (669 SE2d 509) (2008) (evidence that defendant entered ex-
wife’s residence uninvited and in violation of a bond condition and threatened her and
her boyfriend was sufficient to sustain a conviction for both aggravated stalking and
burglary).
7 (c) The evidence was sufficient to sustain Slaughter’s conviction for second-
degree criminal damage to property. OCGA § 16-7-23 (a) (1) (defining second-degree
criminal damage to property as “[i]ntentionally damag[ing] any property of another
person without [her] consent” in an amount exceeding $500). Although the evidence
that Slaughter was the person that damaged the victim’s property was circumstantial,
“where the jury is authorized to find that the evidence, though circumstantial, was
sufficient to exclude every reasonable hypothesis save that of guilt, that finding will
not be disturbed unless the verdict of guilty is insupportable as a matter of law.”
Robbins v. State, 269 Ga. 500, 501(1), 499 SE2d 323 (1998) (citation omitted). Here,
evidence showed that Slaughter was inside the victim’s house on July 14, after which
the victim discovered damage done there; that after being served with a protective
order on the afternoon of July 16, Slaughter returned to the house, after which the
victim discovered additional damage thereto; and that the cost of the total damage
done by Slaughter exceeded $500. See Adams v. State, 300 Ga. App. 294, 300 (2) (b)
(684 SE2d 404) (2009) (affirming conviction for criminal damage to property where
the evidence showed that the defendant has access to the property at issue during the
time it was damaged).
8 2. Slaughter also contends that the trial court erred when it refused his request
for a charge on violation of a temporary protective order, OCGA § 16-5-95, as a lesser
included offense of aggravated stalking. Again, we disagree.
“If any portion of a requested charge is inapt, incorrect, misleading, confusing,
not adequately adjusted or tailored, or not reasonably raised by the evidence, denial
of the charge request is proper.” Revere v. State, 277 Ga. App. 393, 395 (2) (626 SE2d
585) (2006) (citation and punctuation omitted). “[W]e review a trial court’s refusal to
give a requested jury charge under an abuse-of-discretion standard.” Anderson v.
State, 319 Ga. App. 701 (738 SE2d 285) (2013) (citation and punctuation omitted).
OCGA § 16-5-95 (b) provides in relevant part that “[a] person commits the
offense of violating a civil family violence order or criminal family violence order
when such person knowingly and in a nonviolent manner violates the terms of such
order issued against that person.” (Emphasis supplied.) The record shows that
although the State’s evidence was sufficient to establish the elements of the crime of
aggravated stalking, see Division 1 (a) above, Slaughter argued at trial that he was
never served with the temporary protective order obtained by the victim and that he
did not return to the house or appear at its door with the intent of harassing or
intimidating her. By this record, then, the State was presenting evidence and argument
9 that Slaughter had violated a protective order with the intent to harass the victim,
whereas Slaughter was presenting evidence and argument that he was never served
with the protective order and did not intend to harass or intimidate the victim when
he entered the house and emerged from its front door only hours after being escorted
off the property. Accordingly, the jury could reasonably determine either that
Slaughter was served with and violated the protective order and that he possessed the
intent to harass the victim, or that he did not receive the protective order and/or did
not intend to harass the victim. However, no evidence was presented that could
reasonably be taken to show that Slaughter violated the protective order knowingly
but nonviolently. In other words, “the evidence shows either the commission of the
completed offense[ ] [of aggravated stalking] as charged, or the commission of no
offense.” Brooks, 313 Ga. App. at 794-795 (3). It follows that this trial court did not
abuse its discretion when it refused to charge this jury on violation of a temporary
protective order as a lesser included offense of aggravated stalking. Id.
Judgment affirmed. Barnes, P. J., and Boggs, J., concur.