Tew v. State

346 S.E.2d 833, 179 Ga. App. 369
CourtCourt of Appeals of Georgia
DecidedJune 17, 1986
Docket72140
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 346 S.E.2d 833 (Tew v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Georgia primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Tew v. State, 346 S.E.2d 833, 179 Ga. App. 369 (Ga. Ct. App. 1986).

Opinions

Birdsong, Presiding Judge.

The defendant, Johnnie Tew, appeals his conviction of voluntary manslaughter. Tew, was indicted for the murder of Elvin Simmons. Tew was white. Simmons, who was also known as “Smokey,” was black. Simmons was drinking beer with a friend in the Scorpio Lounge in Lumpkin Plaza just outside the entrance to Fort Benning in Muscogee County, Georgia. His girl friend, Sheila Hunter, with whom he had been living, came into the lounge with another man. Simmons and Hunter began an argument. Most witnesses agreed that there were no blows passed but the argument was just “loud.” The argument continued outside the lounge in front of Scully’s Liquor Store. Merrick Redding, Simmons’ half-brother, went to the couple and asked them to quit arguing and then turned and went back toward the lounge.

Johnnie Tew was on his way home when he stopped by Scully’s Liquor Store in Lumpkin Plaza, and bought a six-pack of beer. He placed the beer in his car and backed it away from the curb. Tew said that he saw a woman running down the street; Simmons was right behind her. Hunter put her hand on the hood of his car and he had to put on his brakes, thereby stalling the engine. Tew said he saw Simmons strike Hunter, knocking her to the ground. Tew testified that he [370]*370said “you shouldn’t be beating on that lady like that” and Simmons turned toward him and said: “I’m going to get some of your white honky a_, too. And he started to the car. And I says, Smokey, and he didn’t pay me no mind. He looked like he was wild.” Tew said he had a .22 caliber pistol with him, that he had taken as security for a loan of $20, and he placed the pistol over his left arm, pointing it at Simmons. Tew said that Simmons reached over the weapon and grabbed his wrist. He and Simmons struggled and the gun fired. Tew denied that he pulled the hammer back or pulled the trigger. Simmons was shot through the heart. The bullet entered the middle area of his chest just under the fifth rib and went on a downward path, lodging next to the spinal column, just under the tenth rib. The coroner said this was a trajectory angle of 22 degrees. The defendant’s expert testified that the trajectory angle was 45 degrees. In both cases, the deceased would have to be bending forward, either at an angle of 22 degrees, or 45 degrees. There were no powder marks on Simmons’ shirt or around the entry wound. Tests showed this particular pistol dispersed powder marks up to three feet and was “single action,” which required the hammer to be manually cocked before firing.

Merrick Redding said he saw Tew come out of the liquor store and tell his brother: “Nigger, if you don’t leave that girl alone I’ll shoot you.” Redding heard his brother reply: “Are you going to shoot me? Shoot me.” “As he [Tew] backed his car out he pulled up beside of my brother and exchanged some words and fired one shot and shot down the road.” Simmons did not have a weapon. His brother was 8 to 10 feet from Tew when he was shot. Simmons and Hunter were on the raised island when Tew was talking to them, not near the car. Neither Simmons nor Hunter was hitting the other person. The police found Simmons’ body on the paved portion of the parking lot, about one foot from the curb.

Kenneth Baker, a friend of the deceased, had been drinking beer with him, when Simmons started arguing with Hunter and they went outside. He told Redding to talk to his brother. “And then [Redding] walked down there and talked to them. Then he turned around and came back. I was going toward the mail box, the news box in Subs on Wheels shop and I stopped right there. And then Merrick stopped again. I turned around. Then I heard something like a firecracker, gun. I turned back around ... I seen [sic] Sheila running hollering that Smoke had been shot.”

Sheila Hunter testified that she was with another man when Simmons saw her and they began arguing. He did not hit her. She heard Tew say something and looked up to see him pointing a gun at them. Simmons said: “Are you going to shoot?” And, Tew said: “Yeah, I’ll shoot your a__” The District Attorney demonstrated the distance [371]*371between Tew and Simmons but did not place the distance in the record. Hunter said that she and Simmons were on the raised island, not in the paved portion of the parking lot when Simmons was shot.

Hunter admitted that she had told the DA and the defendant’s attorney another version of the encounter between Tew and Simmons that she ran away before the fatal shot was fired and did not see it. Hunter testified that she told defendant’s counsel she ran before the shot was fired and went behind Tew’s car. She was asked: “So you had already passed the back of his car before the shot was fired? Yeah. I might have been three or four steps from behind the back of the car.”

Daisy Irvin lived next door to Hunter’s mother, and Hunter told her that she had taken some hamburger and pork chops from Simmons’ refrigerator. Simmons had come to her mother’s house, “mad,” and had gone on to the beer tavern where he met Hunter. Kenneth Baker testified that Simmons and Hunter were arguing “[s]omething about some meat. . . .” Irvin said that Hunter told her that when Simmons saw her with this other man “she ran and she was screaming and said that she heard a gunshot fire and she looked back and she saw [Simmons] lying on the ground.” Irvin asked Hunter what would have happened if Tew had not come to her rescue, and “she said either he would have hurt me bad or killed me.” Irvin also testified that she heard Merrick Redding say that his mother had sued Tew for killing her son and he (Redding) was going to wind up with Tew’s Cadillac and house.

The defendant offered in evidence a prior conviction of Redding for burglary, and convictions of Hunter for theft and loitering for purposes of prostitution. Tew brings this appeal from his conviction for voluntary manslaughter. Held:

1. Defendant contends the court erred in charging the jury on the offense of voluntary manslaughter, and the jury erred in returning a verdict finding him guilty of voluntary manslaughter. We do not agree. “A person commits the offense of voluntary manslaughter when he causes the death of another human being ... as the result of a sudden, violent, and irresistible passion resulting from serious provocation sufficient to excite such passion in a reasonable person. . . .” OCGA § 16-5-2 (a). The issue here is whether Tew acted “solely as the result of a sudden, violent, and irresistible passion resulting from serious provocation sufficient to excite such passion in a reasonable person. . . .” Veal v. State, 250 Ga. 384, 385 (297 SE2d 485). “When a homicide is neither justifiable nor malicious, it is manslaughter, and if intentional, it is voluntary manslaughter.” Washington v. State, 249 Ga. 728, 730 (292 SE2d 836); Starr v. State, 134 Ga. App. 149 (1) (213 SE2d 531); Gainey v. State, 132 Ga. App. 870 (1) (209 SE2d 687). And, in the trial of a murder case if there be any evidence, how[372]*372ever slight, as to whether the offense is murder or voluntary manslaughter, the trial court should instruct the jury on both offenses. Brooks v. State, 249 Ga. 583, 585 (292 SE2d 694). “While words and threats alone are generally not sufficient provocation, the issue of whether a reasonable person acts as the result of an irresistible passion may be raised by words which are connected to provocative conduct by the victim.” Veal v. State, supra at 385; Washington v. State,

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Tew v. State
346 S.E.2d 833 (Court of Appeals of Georgia, 1986)

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Bluebook (online)
346 S.E.2d 833, 179 Ga. App. 369, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/tew-v-state-gactapp-1986.