Truett v. State

311 Ga. 313

857 S.E.2d 690

TRUETT

v.The STATE.

S21A0162

Supreme Court of Georgia.

Decided: April 19, 2021

Clark & Towne, Jessica R. Towne, for appellant.

Penny A. Penn, District Attorney; Christopher M. Carr, Attorney General, Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Deputy Attorney General, Paula K. Smith, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Eric C. Peters, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee.

Boggs, Justice.

Christopher Everett Truett was convicted of malice murder and related crimes arising out of the beating death of his girlfriend's two-year-old son, Wyatt Pruitt. He appeals, asserting as his sole enumeration of error the trial court's exclusion of certain character evidence. For the reasons stated below, we affirm.¹

1. The evidence at trial² showed that on February 23, 2014, Truett and the victim's mother, Dawn Shutts, had been in a romantic relationship for several weeks, and he had moved in with her and her two children. Wyatt, the younger child, was feeling ill and was "up and down all night." On February 24, Truett told Shutts that one of the family dogs had pushed Wyatt down the stairs. He had a bruise over his eye but otherwise appeared fine, and Shutts did not think much of it. As she left for work on February 25, she noticed scratches on Wyatt's eyes and made a doctor's appointment for him. Wyatt was crying and screaming and did not want Shutts to leave. Truett was the only person with Wyatt that day.

During the morning, Shutts received several text messages from Truett: that his feelings were hurt because Wyatt did not like him, that Wyatt was "tripping hard," having temper tantrums, harming himself, and that he had wet and soiled himself. Shutts responded to the messages and told Truett to give Wyatt a bath. Later, Truett sent still more messages: that Wyatt had fallen in the tub and hurt himself and that a dog had pushed him down again. Truett added, "Get home. Something's wrong." A few minutes later Truett sent another message, "Get home now, baby." Shutts returned home to find Wyatt lying on the sofa, unresponsive. He was "cold and stiff," blood was coming out of his mouth, and he had bruises all over his face and body that were not there earlier that morning. Shutts exclaimed to Truett, "What did you do to my kid?" Truett responded that Wyatt was still breathing, but Shutts saw that Wyatt was not breathing and told Truett to call 911. Truett "hesitated," but then called and handed the phone to Shutts. The 911 dispatcher instructed her on how to perform CPR, and she continued until the police arrived. When she looked up, Truett had disappeared.

A sheriff's deputy took over CPR until paramedics arrived. He observed that Wyatt's face appeared "battered." A paramedic who arrived a few minutes later testified that Wyatt appeared to be dead, but he and other paramedics still attempted to revive him. They transported Wyatt to the hospital, where an ER physician continued attempts to revive him, although he testified that Wyatt was in "complete cardiac standstill" and rigor mortis had already set in. The physician testified that, based on the state of the rigor mortis and lividity in the child's body, he had been dead for over an hour when he arrived at the hospital, approximately one-half hour after the 911 call was placed. He also testified that Wyatt had numerous bruises, scratches, and ruptured blood vessels in his face, as well as bruises on his ears, extremities, and abdomen. He testified that the abdominal injuries indicated bleeding from the liver, which required a "high-energy force." He concluded that Wyatt's injuries were "completely inconsistent" with a fall down the stairs and that the injuries were not caused by CPR.

A medical examiner and Director of Pediatric Forensic Medicine for the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, who was qualified without objection at trial as an expert in the field of pediatric and forensic pathology, performed an autopsy on Wyatt's body. She testified that Wyatt had suffered severe, multiple, wide-ranging injuries due to beating, squeezing, twisting, and strangulation. She observed extensive bleeding in the tissues of the head and bruises and abrasions on his head, face, lips, and ears. She also observed ruptured blood vessels in his face and marks on his mouth, jaw, and neck that in her opinion were due to compression of the neck, indicating an asphyxiation or strangulation event. Bilateral bruises on the side of his head indicated that his head had been squeezed, and his brain was markedly swollen. She also observed internal bleeding in his genitalia, indicative of a twisting or squeezing injury. In his abdomen, consistent with significant external bruising, she observed extensive bleeding, primarily due to an eight-centimeter laceration to his liver that she described as "huge" and "severe"; this was the immediate cause of Wyatt's death through loss of blood. About 20 percent of Wyatt's blood supply was pooled in the abdomen. She also observed injuries to his diaphragm, right lung, pancreas, and soft tissues of the abdomen. She concluded that the cause of death was multiple blunt force injuries to the abdomen, such as punching or kicking, with blunt impact injuries to the head as a contributing factor. In the medical examiner's opinion, the injuries were inflicted deliberately and were not due to falling down stairs, CPR efforts, or medical intervention.³

In light of the severity of Wyatt's injuries and Truett's sudden disappearance, the police immediately "pinged" Truett's cell phone number; the last location of the phone was in an overgrown, swampy area behind the subdivision where Shutts lived. Officers set up a perimeter around the area and began searching; Truett was spotted "low crawling" in a creek bed, headed away from the subdivision. Officers shouted for him to come out, but he continued to elude them in the heavy underbrush and swamp until a K-9 officer brought in an apprehension dog and announced that he was about to release the dog and "that she will bite." Truett then stood up and surrendered. After he was arrested, the police discovered that at some point he had removed the battery from his cell phone, rendering the phone untraceable. During Truett's police interview, he gave inconsistent accounts of how the injuries to Wyatt occurred. When a police sergeant remarked that Truett appeared to have skin under his fingernails, Truett immediately began "picking" at his hands and then attempted to urinate on his hands when he was escorted to the restroom. Wyatt's DNA was recovered from under one of Truett's fingernails.

At trial, Truett testified and denied having harmed Wyatt. He testified that he was a "great father" to his own four-year-old daughter and that she stayed with him frequently. He presented seven character witnesses who testified to Truett's reputation for positive conduct with children and for peacefulness. Truett further testified that he ran away from Shutts’ home because he was frightened when Shutts asked him, "What did you do to my kid?" He acknowledged smoking marijuana on the day of Wyatt's death and the day before, and that he was "aggravated" with Shutts and wanted to go home "the whole time."

2. In his sole enumeration of error, Truett contends that a new trial is required because the court erroneously prevented him from asking his character witnesses "if they would be comfortable with him around their children" or about specific instances of good character.⁴

The relevant section of the Evidence Code is OCGA § 24-4-405, which provides in its entirety:

(a) In all proceedings in which evidence of character or a trait of character of a person is admissible, proof shall be made by testimony as to reputation or by testimony in the form of an opinion.

(b) In proceedings in which character or a trait of character of a person is an essential element of a charge, claim, or defense or when an accused testifies to his or her own character , proof may also be made of specific instances of that person's conduct. The character of the accused, including specific instances of the accused's conduct, shall also be admissible in a presentencing hearing subject to the provisions of Code Section 17-10-2.

(c) On cross-examination, inquiry shall be allowable into relevant specific instances of conduct.

(Emphasis supplied.)⁵ See generally Strong v. State , 309 Ga. 295, 313-314 (3), 845 S.E.2d 653 (2020) (discussing application of OCGA §§ 24-4-404 (a) and 24-4-405 (b) ).

The trial court held a pretrial hearing on August 17, 2015. The same day, the State and Truett filed numerous motions addressing evidentiary issues. Among Truett's motions was a "Motion for Pre-Trial Ruling" in which he asked the trial court to allow character witnesses for the defense to testify under OCGA § 24-4-405 (a) to "the defendant's reputation, demeanor and attitude toward and around children" and to their "opinion as to defendant's character including specific, pertinent character traits exhibited by defendant within the context of the charges against him." During the argument on this motion, the court and the parties discussed OCGA § 24-4-405 (a) at some length, but subsection (b) and the exception regarding a testifying defendant were never mentioned; Truett did not raise that provision of the Evidence Code, nor was there any indication from Truett at that time that he planned to testify.⁶

The court ruled that Truett could ask the character witnesses if Truett was "a good father. He's good around children. That would be basically the extent. You just can't get into specific acts of good character. You can't let the witness go on and on about, well, I've observed him, you know, the kids." At the hearing, Truett also sought leave to ask the character witnesses whether they "would trust him with their child." The trial court ruled out that testimony as going beyond a pertinent character...