Chambers v. Hall, 305 Ga. 363

On Sept. 13, 2002 three masked, armed men robbed Mikey’s Pizza; victims included employees Anthony Lloyd and Ryan Mantz and three female employees.
During the robbery a gun was pointed at Mantz, he was pushed to open the cash register, then pushed aside while robbers took cash and checks; the three female employees were ordered to sit in a back room.
Chambers was tried (with co-defendants), convicted by a jury of armed robbery (Mantz), four counts of kidnapping (the three females and Mantz), five counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, and firearm possession; he received concurrent and consecutive sentences totaling multiple years.
Chambers filed habeas relief arguing, inter alia, that the kidnapping convictions lacked sufficient asportation under Garza; an evidentiary hearing was held and the habeas court denied relief, finding the movements were more than incidental and posed independent danger.
Chambers obtained a certificate of probable cause; the Georgia Supreme Court granted review on two questions: sufficiency of asportation for Mantz’s kidnapping conviction and whether the aggravated assault conviction as to Mantz merged into the armed robbery conviction.

Issue	Chambers' Argument	Warden's/State's Argument	Held
Whether movement of Mantz supported kidnapping under Garza (asportation)	Movement was minimal and incidental to the robbery; insufficient asportation	Habeas court had found movement more than incidental; respondent here concedes relief	Reversed: movement was minimal, integral to armed robbery, and posed no independent danger — kidnapping conviction for Mantz vacated
Whether aggravated assault of Mantz merged into armed robbery	Aggravated assault merges because it contains no element beyond armed robbery when arising from same act	Habeas court did not recognize merger; respondent concedes relief	Reversed as to merger: aggravated assault count as to Mantz merges into armed robbery and that conviction/sentence set aside

Garza v. State, 284 Ga. 696 (2008) (establishes four-factor asportation test for kidnapping: duration, occurrence during separate offense, whether movement is inherent to that offense, and independent danger)
Wilkerson v. Hart, 294 Ga. 605 (2014) (not all Garza factors must favor asportation, but reversal required if none do)
Bradley v. State, 292 Ga. 607 (2013) (aggravated assault with a deadly weapon merges into armed robbery when part of the same act or transaction)
Long v. State, 287 Ga. 886 (2010) (deadly-weapon element of aggravated assault is equivalent to offensive-weapon element of armed robbery)
Chatman v. Brown, 291 Ga. 785 (2012) (Garza applies retroactively in habeas proceedings)