Rashad v. State

897 S.E.2d 760

RASHAD

v.The STATE.

S23A0864

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Decided: February 6, 2024

Superior Court, Floyd County, William Farnsworth Sparks, Judge

Katherine Morgan Mason, Law Office of the Public Defender, 902 Greene Street, Augusta, Georgia 30901, for Appellant.

Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Deputy Attorney General, Paula Khristian Smith, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Christopher M. Carr, Attorney General, Matthew Blackwell Crowder, Assistant Attorney General, Department of Law, 40 Capitol Square, S.W., Atlanta, Georgia 30334, Leigh Ellen Patterson, District Attorney, Emily Griffin Johnson, A.D.A., Floyd County District Attorney’s Office, 3 Government Plaza, Suite 108, Rome, Georgia 30161, for Appellee.

McMillian, Justice.

Appellant Hassan Shareef Rashad was convicted of the malice murder of two-year-old Adrian Mitchell, Jr. and other crimes.¹ Rashad now appeals, contending that the evidence was insufficient to sustain his convictions and that his trial counsel provided constitutionally ineffective assistance. For the reasons that follow, his claims fail, and so we affirm.

1. Viewed in the light most favorable to the jury’s verdict, the evidence at trial showed the following.

In the summer of 2017, Rashad entered into a romantic relationship with Sydney Dean, who had two children from past relationships, Adrian and L.D. The couple began living together in September 2017, and after about a month, their relationship started to deteriorate: Rashad verbally abused Sydney and began isolating her from her family, starting with her father. Still, Rashad and Sydney continued living together.

Throughout Sydney and Rashad’s relationship, witnesses observed concerning details related to Adrian and Rashad. Sydney’s neighbor noticed bruises and dark marks on Adrian after Rashad moved in. In separate instances, that neighbor and Sydney’s father, Daryl Dean, each saw Adrian shaking when he was with Rashad. Adrian’s sister L.D., who was eight years old at trial, testified that Rashad would "hang [Adrian] upside down and then start whoopping [sic] him" even if he had not done anything wrong. And as Sydney recounted, once in September 2017 after returning home, where Rashad was with Adrian at the time, she found a broken wooden back scratcher and saw a "mark" on Adrian’s chest. When she asked Rashad what happened, Rashad replied that Adrian had broken the back scratcher by banging it on the floor. As for the mark on Adrian’s chest, he said Adrian was clumsy.

(a) The October 2017 Leg Injury

On October 8, 2017, Adrian was taken to the hospital, where doctors concluded that his leg was fractured. The day prior, Adrian had been playing and running around at home, as Daryl, who had been with Adrian alone that day for a period of time, testified and captured on video. At one point, Sydney and Rashad returned home, and Daryl left. Adrian was walking around "fine" and did not complain of leg pain after Daryl left, as Sydney later testified at trial. Sydney then left to run errands, leaving Adrian alone at home with Rashad. When she returned, before entering the house, she heard Adrian screaming. When she went inside and asked Rashad why Adrian was "screaming like he [was] dying[,]" Rashad replied that he was just trying to change Adrian’s diaper. Sydney then took Adrian with her to do another errand. At this time, she later recounted at trial, Adrian was "whimpering," though she could not tell if anything was wrong with his leg.

After returning home, Sydney noticed that Adrian "was holding onto the couch .. [and] acting like he couldn’t walk on his leg." At another point, she saw Adrian lying "balled on the ground." Despite this concerning behavior, she put Adrian in bed that night and went to sleep. The next morning on October 8, Sydney woke up, saw Rashad changing Adrian’s diaper, and heard Adrian "hollering" again. Rashad told Sydney that he thought something was wrong with Adrian’s leg. Now thinking that Adrian had a sprained ankle, Sydney took him to the hospital.

Doctors who examined and treated Adrian then concluded that he had a fractured leg. Dr. Garrett Barnes, who was working in the emergency room that day, testified that Adrian showed a type of leg fracture that usually requires significant force, such as force from a high-height fall or a car accident. This fracture, he testified, was consistent with a fracture caused by an adult holding a child and slamming him down. Dr. Melissa Davis, a pediatrician who examined Adrian the next morning, recounted that Adrian had a severe fracture of his left tibia, which was rarely seen in children and usually needed very high energy to create, such as energy from a motor vehicle accident.

Doctors also observed other injuries on Adrian’s body. They noticed that Adrian had scratches on his neck, which Dr. Davis noted seemed attributable to fingernails. Dr. Davis also observed other external injuries and marks, including: a 3.5 centimeter bruise on one of Adrian’s cheeks; bruising on his chest; circular abrasions around his nipples that made her wonder if his nipples had been twisted; and severe bruising in his groin area, which was rare to find in young children, whose bruises often occurred on knees or elbows, places that could hit the ground if a child fell. Internally, Dr. Davis found that Adrian had hepatitis (diffuse inflammation of the liver) that probably resulted from an "acute event."²

Suspecting abuse, Dr. Davis called the Georgia Division of Family and Children’s Services (DFCS), which then implemented a safety plan that temporarily placed Adrian and L.D. under the care of Sydney’s mother, Joyce Greene, and that permitted only supervised contact between Sydney and her children while prohibiting contact between the children and Rashad.³

In February 2018, the children were returned to Sydney’s custody. At this point, Sydney still lived with Rashad.

(b) April 2018

After the children were returned to Sydney’s custody, she usually worked night shifts in Calhoun from 7:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m., while Rashad worked in Cartersville from about 7:00 or 7:30 a.m. to 4:00 or 5:00 p.m. Sydney would usually return from work at about 7:40 a.m., and Rashad would usually leave for work at around 7:00 a.m. For a period of time, Sydney’s sister would watch the children between when Rashad left for work and when Sydney got home. A few weeks before Adrian’s death in April, however, Sydney asked her sister to stop watching the children, because Sydney did not want her sister to get "cussed out" by Rashad. After that, Adrian and L.D. were left alone from the time Rashad left for work until the time Sydney returned home.

(i) April 12, 2018

On the morning of April 12, Sydney, taking Adrian with her, dropped L.D. off at school and then ran errands with Adrian. After Sydney and Adrian returned home, she cleaned the house and he ran around. At one point, Adrian knocked a TV onto himself. Sydney picked him up, and after he "wiggl[ed] to get back down," she set him down and he continued to play.

Later that day, Sydney took Adrian to a bank to get a money order. Security footage and photos from the bank on April 12 at around 1:30 p.m. captured Adrian looking around, playing with a toy, and reaching for and kissing Sydney, who smiled and laughed. Following the bank trip, Sydney took Adrian with her to pick up L.D. from school at around 2:30 to 2:45 p.m. A teacher at L.D.’s school, who saw Adrian in the car when Sydney came to pick up L.D., testified that Adrian appeared then "like he did every day when [she] spoke to him."

Sydney returned home with both children at about 3:00 p.m., fed them at about 4:30 p.m., bathed them, and then left for work at about 6:15 p.m. for her twelve-hour shift, which began at 7:00 p.m.⁴ Rashad returned home at some point between Sydney feeding the children and her leaving for work. When Sydney got her first break from work that night at around 9:00 or 10:00 p.m., she and Rashad spoke on the phone for about an hour. In that call, Sydney did not receive any indication from Rashad that anything was wrong with Adrian,

(ii) April 13, 2018

At about 2:30 a.m., Sydney received a text from Rashad asking her how hard Adrian had hit himself and telling her that Adrian had a mark on his head. Sydney returned to work, since at the time she "just didn’t think it was … serious." Rashad then sent her a photo of Adrian’s head with red marks on it that Sydney had not seen before she left for work. At about 3:00 a.m., Sydney texted that it was hard for her to concentrate at work.

Early in the morning at about 6:00 a.m., after Sydney texted Rashad to ask if he was up, he texted: "I hope this boy is okay [ ]b/c he acted like his [sic] is so sleepy." Sydney texted back that she was worried about Adrian. At about 6:50 a.m., as she was getting off work, she and Rashad spoke on the phone, and Rashad told her that Adrian had a seizure. In that call, Rashad also told Sydney that Adrian was okay before he left for work and that he had stuck a spoon in Adrian’s mouth to keep his teeth from "chittering," causing a mark on his mouth.

Once Sydney got home, she picked up Adrian, but he would not wake up. At 8:03 a.m., Sydney called 911, reporting that Adrian had a seizure the night before.⁵ Adrian was taken to Floyd Medical Center emergency department at 8:18 a.m. After about two hours there, Adrian was flown to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta.

Numerous medical personnel testified about their observations of Adrian on April 13. Nathaniel Rench, a paramedic who picked up Adrian that morning, recalled that Adrian seemed "lifeless" when Sydney handed him over, that Adrian had bruises "pretty much everywhere"—his face, body, limbs, genitals, legs, arms—and that the bruises seemed to be in different stages of healing. Additionally, Adrian’s left pupil was swelling and was bigger than his right, which indicated to Rench that Adrian likely had a brain injury.

Dr. Cline Jackson, an emergency department...