Hamilton v. State, 295 Ga. 295

Hamilton was convicted of malice murder and possession of a firearm during a felony in connection with Parrish’s death; the shooting occurred June 21, 2008.
Stock s testimony conflicted, but jury could credit him as shooter against prior inconsistent statements.
A letter to Parrish’s family allegedly by
Handwriting analysis linked a letter to Stocks and Hamilton handwriting samples; Stocks’s sample did not match the Parrish letter.
After trial, handwriting and ballistic evidence existed but did not definitively tie Hamilton to the gun or letter; jury weighed circumstantial and direct evidence.
Appellate review affirmed the verdicts, denying sufficiency and evidentiary challenges.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Sufficiency of the evidence	Hamilton contends evidence fails to show guilt beyond reasonable doubt	State argues jury could credit Stocks’s testimony and circumstantial evidence	Evidence sufficient to support convictions beyond reasonable doubt
Admission of intoxication testimony	Evidence of alcohol/drug use before the shooting is improper character evidence	Testimony is res gestae and admissible as part of the events surrounding the crime	Testimony properly admitted as res gestae

Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307 (U.S. 1979) (standard for review of sufficiency of evidence)
Greeson v. State, 287 Ga. 764 (2010) (defers to jury on weight and credibility of testimony)
Vega v. State, 285 Ga. 32 (2009) (jury may credit eyewitness testimony over inconsistencies)
Evans v. State, 275 Ga. 672 (2002) (circumstantial evidence and reasonable hypotheses rule)
Rogers v. State, 290 Ga. 18 (2011) (reasonableness of hypotheses jury determination)
Cunningham v. State, 279 Ga. 694 (2005) (res gestae admissibility of intoxication evidence)