Murdock v. State, 299 Ga. 177

Adrian Murdock was convicted by a DeKalb County jury of malice murder and two firearms offenses for the November 18, 2010 fatal shooting of Breon Sims; he received life for murder and concurrent five-year terms for firearm convictions.
Facts viewed in the light most favorable to the verdict: a dispute over money escalated from social media to a physical encounter; Murdock struck Sims with a gun and then shot him in the chest; Sims later died.
Murdock moved for a new trial (general and special grounds); the trial court denied the motion and Murdock appealed.
During trial a juror disclosed he had been a past armed-robbery victim and initially worried about impartiality; after the judge’s questioning the juror said he could be impartial and the judge refused to replace him with an alternate.
Murdock’s sister placed a 911 call and later gave a statement to investigators; at trial she testified but claimed not to remember the statement, and an officer was allowed to testify about her prior statement over hearsay objection as a prior inconsistent statement.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Sufficiency of the evidence	Murdock did not challenge sufficiency; implicitly argues reversal not required	State argues evidence supports convictions	Court: Evidence sufficient to support convictions (Jackson standard)
Trial court’s denial of new trial on general grounds	Murdock: record does not show judge exercised discretion as thirteenth juror	State: denial order presumed exercise of discretion absent contrary record	Court: No error; routine denial language is sufficient, presumption judge exercised discretion (Butts)
Refusal to excuse juror for cause	Murdock: juror’s prior armed-robbery victimization made impartiality doubtful; judge should have replaced juror with alternate	State: trial judge observed and rehabilitated juror; substantial discretion to assess impartiality	Court: No abuse of discretion; judge properly rehabilitated juror and refused to replace him
Admission of sister’s out-of-court statement	Murdock: officer’s testimony recounting sister’s statement was hearsay and inadmissible	State: statement admissible as prior inconsistent statement under OCGA § 24-6-613(b); witness failed to recall making it	Court: Admission proper as prior inconsistent statement; alternatively any error was harmless because testimony was cumulative

Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307 (standard for sufficiency of the evidence)
White v. State, 293 Ga. 523 (trial judge’s duty when ruling on new-trial general grounds)
Butts v. State, 297 Ga. 766 (denial language presumed to reflect exercise of discretion on new-trial motion)
Sears v. State, 292 Ga. 64 (trial court’s discretion to determine juror impartiality)
Edenfield v. State, 293 Ga. 370 (trial judge’s unique position to evaluate juror demeanor and rehabilitation)
Rutledge v. State, 298 Ga. 37 (harmless-error analysis regarding cumulative evidence)
Malcolm v. State, 263 Ga. 369 (operation-of-law vacatur of felony-murder verdicts)