Anderson v. State, 296 Ga. 524

On Feb. 24, 2005, Antonio Anderson and co-defendant Major Duggan met Marcus Key purportedly to buy marijuana; a shooting in Key’s Chevy Tahoe killed Key. Both Anderson and Key had guns. Anderson and Duggan later surrendered and were arrested.
Trial testimony: witness Sheffield heard shots and Anderson say “get the f**k out of the truck”; Duggan testified both men drew guns; Anderson claimed self-defense at trial but did not testify.
Jury convicted Anderson of malice murder and related offenses; sentences included life for murder plus other terms. Some counts were merged or vacated as a matter of law.
During trial, the judge repeatedly addressed the prosecutor by first name or formal surname and addressed defense counsel both formally and by first name and belittling monikers in the jury’s presence; no contemporaneous objection or recusal motion was made.
On appeal Anderson argued (1) the judge’s remarks showed favoritism and prejudiced the jury and (2) trial counsel was ineffective for failing to object or seek recusal. The Supreme Court of Georgia affirmed.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Judicial partiality from judge’s informal/derogatory references to counsel	Judge’s repeated use of prosecutor’s first name and belittling references to defense counsel in front of jury created impression of favoritism and prejudiced Anderson	No contemporaneous objection or recusal motion was made; remarks did not comment on evidence or alter the proof	Not preserved for direct review; even on merits, did not require reversal because remarks did not affect evidence or rulings
Ineffective assistance for failing to object/move to recuse	Trial counsel’s failure to object or move for recusal was professionally deficient and prejudiced the defense	Counsel had reasonable basis not to object given courtroom demeanor; no reasonable probability outcome would differ; successor judge found no adverse rulings traceable to bias	Claim fails: performance not shown deficient and no Strickland prejudice established
Sufficiency of the evidence to reject self-defense	(Anderson did not challenge sufficiency)	State: evidence was sufficient to support convictions beyond reasonable doubt	Court independently reviewed per practice and found evidence sufficient to let jury reject self-defense and sustain convictions

Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307 (standard for reviewing sufficiency of the evidence)
Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (ineffective assistance requires deficient performance and prejudice)
Sifuentes v. State, 293 Ga. 441 (credibility/resolution of conflicts is for the jury)
Peoples v. State, 295 Ga. 44 (decision not to object must be patently unreasonable to be deficient)
Stacey v. State, 292 Ga. 838 (contemporaneous objection rule to preserve error)
State v. Hargis, 294 Ga. 818 (timeliness rule for recusal motions)
Duggan v. State, 285 Ga. 363 (related co-defendant appeal)