Keller v. State, 308 Ga. 492

Background

Child William Powell (age 2) suffered fatal blunt-force head injuries and a skull fracture on June 7–9, 2013; medical experts concluded injuries were homicidal and inconsistent with an accidental fall.
Randall Guy Keller lived in the home, was present in or near Powell’s bedroom shortly before Powell was found unresponsive, gave multiple inconsistent accounts of how he found the child, and made inculpatory statements to others; phone data showed internet searches for how much force fractures a human skull.
Keller was indicted (May 26, 2015) and tried March 27–April 6, 2017; jury acquitted on malice murder but convicted of felony murder, burglary, drug possession, and related counts; sentenced to life without parole plus consecutive terms.
At trial the State introduced: jail-call recording of Keller saying it was an accident/that he "threw the kids on the couch," cell-phone search records, redacted texts, a counselor-created picture book recounting a child-witness’s statements, and marijuana-test reports.
Keller moved unsuccessfully for continuances, sought suppression of phone data, attempted to call a PTSD expert late in trial (Dr. France) who was excluded for untimely disclosure, and raised multiple ineffective-assistance, evidentiary, severance, and judicial-bias claims on appeal.

Issues

Issue	Keller's Argument	State's Argument	Held
Ineffective assistance of counsel (various alleged failings: failing to review jail call, not timely moving to suppress phone data, not authenticating medical records, not objecting to T.K. picture book)	Counsel performed unreasonably and prejudice presumed or shown because key evidence/admissions mishandled	Counsel’s actions were reasonable or non-prejudicial; many alleged failures would have produced no meritorious motions and Keller made no proffer of missing expert evidence	Strickland governs; Keller failed to show deficient performance or prejudice; ineffective-assistance claims denied
Denial of pretrial continuance	Keller needed more time to retain a medical expert and prepare	Case had been specially set, defense had months, prior continuances, State had witnesses ready; trial court has broad discretion	Denial was not an abuse of discretion; no relief
Exclusion of Dr. France (untimely expert disclosure)	Testimony about Keller’s PTSD was crucial to show impairment; exclusion prejudiced defense	Defense failed to timely disclose under reciprocal discovery and acted in bad faith; State prejudiced by surprise	Trial court acted within discretion to exclude; no prejudice shown (Keller testified about PTSD himself); error if any was harmless
Admissibility of cell-phone search data / sufficiency of warrant particularity	Search was effectively warrantless or warrant deficient; trial counsel ineffective for failing to move to suppress	Warrant described phone and contents sufficiently; even if defective it was not warrantless; evidence admissible and outcome unaffected	Warrant adequately particularized; no basis for suppression; failure to move was not deficient or prejudicial
Admission of T.K.’s counselor-made picture book (Crawford/hearsay issue)	Book is testimonial and admission violated confrontation rights because counselor did not testify	T.K. testified and was cross-examined; book was cumulative and largely overlapping with live testimony	No ineffective assistance for failure to object; admission harmless because testimony was cumulative
Severance of burglary and drug counts from murder/child-cruelty counts	Burglary/drug counts were unrelated and prejudicial character evidence	Crimes were temporally and factually connected and showed Keller’s agitated state; joinder permissible	Trial court did not abuse discretion denying severance; counts were part of series of connected acts
Motion for mistrial over missing warrant disclosure	State failed to provide search warrant in discovery; prejudicial	Defense delayed asking for mistrial and waived contemporaneous objection; discovery referenced warrant	Motion untimely; appellate review waived; no relief
Jury taking redacted texts/searches to deliberations (continuing-witness rule)	Allowing documents into jury room violated continuing-witness rule	Texts/searches are original documentary evidence, not written testimony	Admission and jury access proper; continuing-witness rule inapplicable
Alleged trial judge bias	Judge displayed animus toward defense counsel and made prejudicial remarks	Keller failed to timely move to recuse or preserve the claim; no contemporaneous objection	Issue waived for appeal for failure to promptly seek recusal or raise in motion for new trial

Key Cases Cited

Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307 (1979) (standard for sufficiency of evidence review)
Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984) (two-prong ineffective-assistance test: deficiency and prejudice)
Reid v. State, 286 Ga. 484 (2010) (refusal to presume prejudice for attorney error)
Preston v. State, 282 Ga. 210 (2007) (no reasonable expectation of privacy in jail phone calls)
Groh v. Ramirez, 540 U.S. 551 (2004) (warrant particularity principles)
Leili v. State, 307 Ga. 339 (2019) (magistrate may make practical finding re: electronic evidence preservation)
Hampton v. State, 295 Ga. 665 (2014) (failure to make meritless motion is not ineffective assistance)
Price v. State, 305 Ga. 608 (2019) (need for proffer to show prejudice from excluded testimony)
Hudson v. State, 284 Ga. 595 (2008) (reciprocal discovery rules; exclusion for late disclosure)
Lane v. State, 299 Ga. 791 (2016) (continuance rulings reviewed for abuse of discretion)
Harrell v. State, 297 Ga. 884 (2015) (joinder and severance standards)
Williams v. State, 302 Ga. 474 (2017) (intrinsic evidence/inextricably intertwined doctrine)
Davis v. State, 285 Ga. 343 (2009) (continuing-witness rule; documentary evidence may go to jury)