Griffin v. State, 309 Ga. 516

On May 31, 2015, 13-year-old Antonio Griffin, Zykieam Redinburg, and Tobias Daniels confronted brothers Mikell and Rodregus Wright; Mikell was shot and killed and an attempted robbery of Rodregus occurred.
Redinburg pleaded and testified for the State at the joint trial of Daniels and Griffin.
A jury convicted Griffin of malice murder and attempted armed robbery of both brothers; he was sentenced to life plus concurrent and consecutive terms; the felony-murder count was vacated by operation of law.
Before trial defense counsel argued a detective had recorded a telephone call between Griffin and a minor (Zyonnia Grant) without a court order, making the recording inadmissible under OCGA §16-11-66(b); the State conceded it could not play the recording but planned to elicit testimony about the call.
At trial Grant testified about the phone call without objection; Griffin contended on appeal counsel was ineffective for failing to object because the recorded conversation and testimony about it were inadmissible.
The court also addressed a Batson/McCollum challenge to defense peremptory strikes (the defense had struck only white jurors) and independently reviewed sufficiency of the evidence.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether counsel was ineffective for failing to object to Grant's testimony about a recorded phone call	Griffin: testimony inadmissible under OCGA §16-11-66(b) because recording lacked superior court order	State: recording itself inadmissible, but testimony by a party to the call is not proscribed; objection would likely be futile	Court: No deficient performance; appellate authority does not clearly bar such testimony and failure to raise a novel legal theory is not ineffective assistance
Whether the trial court erred in reseating a juror after a McCollum/Batson challenge to defense peremptory strikes	Griffin: court erred by combining Batson steps and finding the strike not race-neutral	State: the court properly evaluated the challenge; Daniels precedent supports the ruling	Court: Rejected Griffin; affirmed trial court and followed Daniels decision
Whether the evidence was sufficient to support the convictions	Griffin did not contest sufficiency at trial or on appeal	State: evidence was sufficient	Court: Sua sponte review under Jackson standard finds evidence sufficient

Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307 (establishes the legal-sufficiency standard)
Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (sets two-part ineffective-assistance test)
Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79 (prohibits racially motivated peremptory strikes)
Georgia v. McCollum, 505 U.S. 42 (applies equal-protection limits to defendants' peremptory strikes)
Daniels v. State, 306 Ga. 559 (affirming co-defendant's convictions and rejecting the same Batson/McCollum arguments)
London v. State, 333 Ga. App. 332 (involved admissibility of a recording)
Fetty v. State, 268 Ga. 365 (indicates parties to a conversation may record/divulge it)
Sawyer v. State, 308 Ga. 375 (counsel not ineffective for failing to raise novel legal arguments)
Ventura v. State, 284 Ga. 215 (futile objection does not constitute ineffective assistance)