Ross v. State, 296 Ga. 636

Lynitra Ross was convicted of malice murder for her role in a murder-for-hire plot that resulted in the shooting death of Richard Schoeck; trial and conviction followed a jury verdict and life sentence.
Schoeck (the wife) solicited Ross to recruit her boyfriend Reginald Coleman to kill her husband, agreeing to pay $10,000 plus a car and property; transfers of money and the Impala to Coleman/Ross occurred before the murder.
Coleman shot Richard Schoeck at Belton Bridge Park on February 14, 2010; the scene did not bear signs of a robbery and the victim was shot multiple times.
Investigators used Sprint “tower dump” data obtained by court order under 18 U.S.C. § 2703(d) to identify calls around the time of the murder; those records led to production of Coleman’s and Ross’s phone records and ultimately to evidence linking Ross to the plot.
Ross moved pretrial to suppress the tower-dump records on federal-law and Fourth Amendment grounds; the motion was denied, and at trial Ross expressly declined to object when the tower-dump evidence was offered.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Admissibility of Sprint “tower dump” records (suppression)	Ross argued the records were obtained in violation of federal law and should be suppressed.	State argued records were obtained by court order under federal statute and were business records owned by the provider; Ross lacked standing and also waived objection at trial.	Court held Ross waived appellate review by declining to object at trial; alternatively, she lacked standing to challenge provider-owned tower-dump/billing records and suppression is not an available federal remedy.
Ineffective assistance of counsel for not excluding tower-dump records	Ross argued counsel was ineffective for failing to prevent admission of the tower-dump evidence.	State argued objection was meritless and failure to raise a meritless objection is not ineffective assistance.	Court held counsel was not ineffective because the underlying objection lacked merit.

Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307 (standard for sufficiency of the evidence)
Monroe v. State, 272 Ga. 201 (procedural waiver of suppression when no objection at trial)
Registe v. State, 292 Ga. 154 (no Fourth Amendment standing to challenge provider-owned phone records)
Hampton v. State, 295 Ga. 665 (remedy under federal electronic-communications statutes is civil action, not suppression)
Hayes v. State, 262 Ga. 881 (failure to make meritless objection cannot support ineffective-assistance claim)