Morrell v. State

897 S.E.2d 841

MORRELL

v.The STATE

S23A1166

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Decided: February 6, 2024

Superior Court, Chatham County, James F. Bass, Judge

David T. Lock, David T. Lock, LLC, P.O. Box 14286, Savannah, Georgia 31416, for Appellant.

Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Deputy Attorney General, Clint Christopher Malcolm, Assistant Attorney General, Meghan Hobbs Hill, Assistant Attorney General, Christopher M. Carr, Attorney General, Elizabeth Haase Brock, Assistant Attorney General, Department of Law, 40 Capitol Square, S.W., Atlanta, Georgia 30334-1300, Shalena Cook Jones, District Attorney, Lyle Burnham, Chatham County District Attorney’s Office, 133 Montgomery Street, Suite 600, Savannah, Georgia 31401, for Appellee.

Peterson, Presiding Justice.

Karonta Morrell appeals his convictions related to the shooting death of Jonathan Lang.¹ On appeal, Morrell argues that the evidence was insufficient to support his convictions. He also argues that he cannot obtain full and fair appellate review because the record contains several deficiencies. We affirm because the evidence was sufficient to support Morrell’s malice murder conviction, and Morrell fails to show how any deficiencies in the record have harmed him.

The evidence at trial showed the following. On March 1, 2016, Kovasa Lindsay was visiting her mother, Tonya Murcherson, who lived with Ashley Lindsay, Kovasa’s sister. Lang was there, and at some point he got into an argument with Harry Rawls, III, Kovasa’s boyfriend, who was drunk and had been cursing at the family;

Morrell heard Lang and Rawls arguing, approached the house, and asked Lang, "cuz, you okay?"² Rawls jumped off the porch and told Morrell, "you ain’t got nothing to do with this." Rawls and Morrell began arguing, and Morrell pulled a gun from the back of his pants and pointed it at Rawls’s head. The family told Kovasa that she "better go get" Rawls because Morrell would shoot Rawls.

As Kovasa tried to pull Rawls away, he threw a drink at her face. Murcherson left the porch, approached Rawls, and slapped him; he responded by slapping her to the ground. Lang and Ashley then left the porch and tried to pull Rawls away. When Rawls began to walk toward Morrell, Morrell fired his gun, but hit Murcherson and Lang instead of Rawls. Murcherson was struck in the shoulder. Lang collapsed and told Morrell, "oh, cuz, you shot me." Morrell apologized, saying he did not mean to shoot Lang, and Lang told him to leave before the police arrived. Morrell was the only person with a gun during the argument.

Police arrived and found Lang lying on the sidewalk. Lang told a police officer that he was walking across the street when someone shot him, and Lang claimed not to know who shot him. Lang died later that day from a single gunshot that entered his arm and struck his torso.

Morrell met with Lang’s mother about a day after the shooting and admitted to pulling out a gun and shooting Lang by mistake. Lang’s mother urged Morrell to turn himself in to the police.

Quantina Bostic knew Morrell from the neighborhood. Bostic witnessed the shooting, was interviewed by police the day after, and identified Morrell in a photo lineup as the person who shot and killed Lang. During the interview, which was recorded, Morrell called Bostic on her cell phone and said that he needed to "get to" a witness who was talking to the police. Morrell talked about being on the run and said that he would get "his people" to talk to this witness, who was likely staying at Murcherson’s house. Morrell said that he did not want to "hit them folks," which a detective testified meant that Morrell did not want to shoot or kill them if he did not have to and was instead willing to pay for the witness’s refusal to cooperate with police. Another detective testified that he listened to recorded phone calls Morrell made from jail and overheard Morrell threaten to "do away with" Kovasa, which the detective interpreted as killing her. Kovasa testified that she heard Morrell made threats against her for cooperating with the police, and she and her children were put under police protection and relocated due to Morrell’s threats. During the recorded call with Bostic, Morrell said that he was hiding at his girlfriend’s house, and police later found and arrested him there.

About a week before his trial was originally set to begin, Morrell called Bostic, attempting to get her not to testify. Morrell acknowledged that Bostic could get into legal trouble for refusing to go to court to testify and discussed ways he could help get her out of such trouble. Morrell also discussed the other witnesses who would testify against him and said the prosecutor "ain’t going to be able to do s**t" if he "gets to" those witnesses.

[1, 2] 1. Morrell argues that the evidence was insufficient as a matter of federal constitutional due process to support his murder conviction.³ He argues that he was not present during the altercation leading to Lang’s death. He alternatively argues that, even if he were present, the trial evidence shows that his actions were justified or that, at most, he was guilty only of voluntary manslaughter based on provocation. We disagree.

[3, 4] When evaluating the sufficiency of evidence as a matter of federal constitutional due process, the proper standard of review is whether a rational trier of fact could have found the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. See Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979). We do not resolve conflicts in the evidence or determine the credibility of witnesses; instead, we view the evidence in the "light most favorable to the verdict, with deference to the jury’s assessment of the weight and credibility of the evidence." Hayes v. State, 292 Ga. 506, 506, 739 S.E.2d 313 (2013) (citation and punctuation omitted).

[5] With respect to Morrell’s first argument, the jury could easily find that Morrell was present during the crime, as several eyewitnesses placed him there. Morrell’s own statements also placed him there, as Lang’s mother testified that he apologized to her for firing the shot that killed Lang.

[6] As for his alternative argument, it likewise has no merit. Morrell argues that the evidence showed that he acted in defense of self or others or committed voluntary manslaughter. But he did not present a justification defense to the jury, arguing only that the State’s witnesses were not credible and that his alleged actions amounted to voluntary manslaughter.⁴ And, in any event, the evidence that Morrell acted in defense of self or others was not so strong that the jury was required to find justification. See, e.g., Williams v. State, 316 Ga. 147, 150 (1), 886 S.E.2d 818 (2023) (although the State bears the burden of disproving a defendant’s claim that his actions were justified, it is the jury’s role to determine whether that burden has been met, and the Jury is free to reject any evidence in support of a justification defense).

[7] The trial court thoroughly charged the jury on voluntary manslaughter, stating that to find Morrell guilty of that offense, rather than murder, it had to find that he acted solely as a result of sudden, violent, and irresistible passion resulting from the serious provocation sufficient to excite such, passion in a reasonable person. See OCGA § 16-5-2 (a). Morrell argues that the altercation between Rawls and Lang, which also involved Murcherson, was sufficient provocation. But we have made clear that fighting is not the type of provocation that would support a voluntary manslaughter jury charge, see e.g., Wilkerson v. State, 317 Ga. 242, 247 (2), 892 S.E.2d 737 (2023), much less demand a voluntary manslaughter conviction, see, e.g., Burke v. State, 302 Ga. 786, 790-791, 809 S.E.2d 765 (2018) (explaining that "acting out of fear of bodily harm is not the same as acting in the heat of passion, and only evidence of the latter supports a...