Manning v. State

814 S.E.2d 730
Supreme Court of Georgia·Decided May 21, 2018·No. S18A0369·Published·Cited by 21 cases

Opinion

Benham, Justice.

*732Appellant Marvin Charlton Manning was charged with malice murder, two counts of felony murder, and other offenses arising out of the shooting death of Jimmy Sims. The jury found Manning not guilty of malice murder but found him guilty of the remaining charges.1 At trial, the victim's friend Demont Shorter testified that the victim accompanied him when he drove his grandmother's car to a gas station. After parking the car near the gas station store, the two went into the store together. Shorter testified he heard the victim speaking on his cell phone inside in a normal voice and the victim did not appear to be angry or upset. Shorter saw the victim exit the store, return to the car, and sit in the front passenger seat with the door open. Shorter then observed a person he identified at trial as Manning standing next to the car and pointing a gun at the victim through the open car door. Another person standing near Manning was pointing a gun at the victim as well, as if he were covering for Manning. Shorter commenced exiting the store and heard the victim yell, "Damn, brother, you going to do me like that?"

Another witness who was at the gas station at the time of these events testified he saw a man standing next to the car in which the victim was sitting and heard that man say something to the effect of, "You think I'm mother f- - - - - - playing around about my money!" This witness also observed another person standing behind the man who made that statement. According to this witness, the man who made the statement pulled out a gun and immediately started firing it at the victim. He was standing up while shooting into the car, and the witness believed that this man fired the first shot. The victim shot back at the man and wounded him.

When Shorter exited the store he found Manning lying on the ground near the car. The victim was slumped out of the car, and Shorter pulled the victim out onto the ground. A police officer who happened to be in the neighborhood in his patrol car heard gunshots and drove immediately to the scene. He testified that a revolver containing five spent rounds was found on the ground next *733to Manning and $424 in cash was found on the ground near the vehicle. The interior panel from the front passenger side door apparently had been pulled away and was also laying on the ground. The other man who had been standing near Manning fled the scene. The victim died from multiple gunshot wounds after being transported to the hospital. A crime scene analyst testified for the defense that the shots fired from the victim's gun were fired in a downward angle, and that four of the five shots fired from Manning's gun were fired upward. He therefore concluded Manning was on the ground shooting up.

1. Appellant raised justification as a defense, and he argues that based upon the testimony of the witnesses and other evidence, it cannot be determined who fired the first shot. Accordingly, appellant challenges the sufficiency of the evidence to support the convictions. On appeal, however, the evidence must be viewed in the light most favorable to supporting the verdict, and this Court "defers to the jury's assessment of the weight and credibility of the evidence." Mosby v. State , 300 Ga. 450, 452 (1), 796 S.E.2d 277 (2017). The trial court instructed the jury on self-defense and justification. The jury was not required, however, to conclude appellant acted in self-defense where, as here, the State presented evidence to refute that defense. See Blackmon v. State , 302 Ga. 173, 174-175 (1) (b), 805 S.E.2d 899 (2017) ; Pridgett v. State , 290 Ga. 365, 366, 720 S.E.2d 639 (2012).

In this case, one witness heard appellant make threatening remarks to the victim just prior to seeing appellant pull a gun and commence shooting. Another witness heard the victim exclaim, before the shooting started, "[Y]ou going to do me like that?" From the testimony of both witnesses, a reasonable trier of fact could conclude another man appeared to be acting in concert with appellant to threaten the victim at gunpoint. Such evidence was sufficient to permit the jury to reject appellant's claim that he was acting in self-defense when he shot the victim, and thus was sufficient to enable a rational trier of fact to find appellant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of the crimes of which he was convicted. See Batten v. State , 295 Ga. 442, 444 (1), 761 S.E.2d 70 (2014) (where two witnesses heard appellant's threats and eyewitnesses saw appellant shoot the victim). Accordingly, applying the standard set forth in Jackson v. Virginia ,2 we reject appellant's challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence.

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Manning v. State, 814 S.E.2d 730 (Ga. 2018).

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