ARQUIMIDES GONZALEZ v. HART
S15A0884
Supreme Court of Georgia
September 14, 2015
297 Ga. 670 | 777 SE2d 456
HINES, Presiding Justice.
interview); Teasley, 293 Ga. at 762-763 (3) (a) (despite fact that an officer not involved in the interrogation had already ordered defendant‘s arrest, defendant was not in custody at time of his interview where he drove himself to police station of his own accord and willingly spoke with detective and where neither defendant nor interrogating officer was aware that arrest was imminent); Fennell v. State, 292 Ga. 834 (2) (741 SE2d 877) (2013) (defendant not in custody where he agreed to ride to police station at officers’ request, was not handcuffed or restrained, and was given a beverage and permitted to answer his phone numerous times during the interview). Accordingly, the trial court properly admitted Smith‘s statement at trial.
3. Though we find no error in the jury‘s verdicts, we have noted an error with regard to Smith‘s sentences. As set forth in footnote 1, supra, the trial court imposed a life sentence for felony murder predicated on aggravated battery and in addition imposed a 20-year concurrent term for the same aggravated battery. Because the aggravated battery merges into the felony murder predicated thereon, the trial court erred in sentencing Smith on the aggravated battery. See
Judgment affirmed in part and vacated in part. All the Justices concur.
DECIDED SEPTEMBER 14, 2015.
Miller & Key, J. Scott Key, for appellant.
David McDade, District Attorney, James A. Dooley, Assistant District Attorney; Samuel S. Olens, Attorney General, Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Deputy Attorney General, Paula K. Smith, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Christian A. Fuller, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee.
S15A0884. GONZALEZ v. HART.
(777 SE2d 456)
This Court granted prisoner Arquimides Gonzalez‘s application for a certificate of probable cause to appeal the denial of his petition for a writ of habeas corpus, posing the single question of whether the habeas court correctly applied this Court‘s decision in Garza v. State, 284 Ga. 696 (670 SE2d 73) (2008). For the reasons that follow, we reverse the judgment of the habeas court and remand.
In 2007, a jury found Gonzalez guilty of family violence battery,1 two counts of aggravated assault, kidnapping with bodily injury, and two counts of aggravated battery in connection with two incidents involving his ex-girlfriend. He was sentenced to life in prison for the kidnapping with bodily injury; 20 years in prison for each aggravated assault and each aggravated battery, to be served consecutively to each other and to the life sentence; and 12 months in prison for family violence battery, to be served consecutively to all other sentences, for an aggregate sentence of life plus 81 years in prison. On motion for new trial, Gonzalez successfully argued to the trial court that one of the counts of aggravated assault should have merged with a count of aggravated battery for the purpose of sentencing, so even though the motion for new trial was denied on other grounds, on July 2, 2008, these counts were merged and he was resentenced for an aggregate sentence of life plus 61 years in prison. On direct appeal to the Court of Appeals, Gonzalez contended that the trial court erred in refusing to merge the two aggravated battery counts for the purpose of
On May 24, 2010, Gonzalez filed a pro se petition for a writ of habeas corpus raising three grounds: (1) ineffective assistance of trial counsel for failing to request a jury charge on false imprisonment as a lesser included offense of kidnapping with bodily injury and for mentioning his immigration status to the jury; (2) ineffective assistance of appellate counsel for failing to raise insufficiency of the evidence regarding the kidnapping with bodily injury charge under Garza; and (3) cruel and unusual punishment in the imposition of a life sentence for the kidnapping with bodily injury inasmuch as the evidence viewed in light of Garza would not support the conviction. Following an evidentiary hearing, at which Gonzalez‘s former appellate counsel testified, on August 7, 2014, the habeas court issued its order denying habeas relief. In so doing, it determined, inter alia,2 that under Garza there was sufficient evidence to establish that Gonzalez committed the charged offense of kidnapping with bodily injury beyond a reasonable doubt, including the element of asportation, and consequently, it rejected Gonzalez‘s claim that his appellate counsel was ineffective for failing to raise on appeal insufficiency of the evidence of kidnapping in light of Garza. However, the habeas court‘s determination in this regard was in error.
In Garza, this Court established new factors for assessing the asportation element of Georgia‘s pre-2009 kidnapping statute;3 the movement required to establish asportation had to be more than “merely incidental” to other criminal activity, and four judicially-created factors were to be considered before a court could reach the conclusion that more than “merely incidental” movement had occurred. Id. at 702 (1). Sellars v. Evans, 293 Ga. 346, 347, n. 1 (745 SE2d 643) (2013). The four factors to be considered are: (1) the duration of the movement; (2) whether the movement occurred during the commission of a separate offense; (3) whether such movement was an inherent part of that separate offense; and (4) whether the movement itself presented a significant danger to the victim independent of the danger posed by the separate offense. Upton v. Hardeman, 291 Ga. 720, 721 (732 SE2d 425) (2012). However, in general it is not necessary that all four factors be met in order to establish asportation. Wilkerson v. Hart, 294 Ga. 605, 608 (3) (755 SE2d 192) (2014). What must be kept in mind is the purpose of the Garza test, which is to determine whether the movement in question served to substantially isolate the victim from protection or rescue, the evil which the kidnapping statute was originally intended to address. Levin v. Morales, 295 Ga. 781, 782-783 (764 SE2d 145) (2014).
As noted, the charges against Gonzalez stemmed from two incidents of violent behavior involving his ex-girlfriend (“victim“). The first incident occurred in the victim‘s apartment on April 9, 2005, and resulted in Gonzalez‘s convictions and remaining sentences for family violence battery, aggravated assault,
The kidnapping with bodily injury charge in the indictment alleged that Gonzalez did “unlawfully abduct [the victim], a human being, without lawful authority and hold said person against her will, and said person did receive bodily injury, to wit: bruising.” The habeas court detailed the evidence with regard to the incident in the victim‘s apartment giving rise to the kidnapping charge: the victim had been in a relationship with Gonzalez, and the relationship changed when he became very jealous; after an incident in which Gonzalez hit her, the victim moved out of the home they shared; after that, Gonzalez went to the apartment that the victim was sharing with a co-worker; a male friend of the victim had visited her that day and left his shirt, which was hanging in the apartment; the presence of the shirt precipitated an argument between Gonzalez and the victim; while in the bedroom, Gonzalez began hitting the victim in the face; he threw her onto the bed, where he choked her around the neck; the victim did not recall whether Gonzalez hit her with an open hand or with a fist, but thought he used his fist because of the bruises she received; Gonzalez and the victim struggled, and she got out of the bedroom; the victim told Gonzalez that she was going to call the police, and he grabbed her cell phone; the victim was moving toward the door of the apartment when Gonzalez reached her, grabbed her by the hair, and then threw her against the wall or door; and Gonzalez then left, taking her cell phone.
In regard to the element of asportation, the habeas court focused on the act of Gonzalez grabbing the victim by the hair and pulling her back from the door, and concluded that although the duration of that movement was short, it presented a significant danger to the victim independent of the charged offenses of aggravated assault resulting from the apartment incident.4 It also concluded that the movement of pulling the victim back by the hair allowed Gonzalez to exercise additional control over her, throw her into the wall or door, and further isolate her from protection or rescue, as it served to terminate her attempt to flee the apartment and Gonzalez. However, the habeas court misapplied Garza in reaching such conclusions.
First, there is no evidence to support a finding that the movement of pulling the victim back by the hair was anything other than of minimal duration. After the bedroom altercation and Gonzalez‘s
taking the victim‘s cell phone, she went toward the door, Gonzalez caught up to her, grabbed her hair, and threw her against the door or wall. Gonzalez then immediately left the apartment. Thus the act was part and parcel of one violent event. Indeed, such movement occurred during the commission of, and as an inherent part of, the first indicted aggravated assault, and the resulting conviction of family violence battery. The alleged kidnapping, i.e., the grabbing of the victim‘s hair, is inseparable from the family violence battery of throwing the victim against the wall as that is how Gonzalez accomplished such criminal act. Separating Gonzalez‘s grabbing the victim‘s hair from his act of throwing the victim against the wall or door, and labeling it kidnapping starkly illustrates both cumulative punishment under more than one criminal statute for a single course of conduct and the failure to provide fair warning of what type of conduct the kidnapping statute forbids. Garza at 700 (1).
Furthermore, there is no evidence that pulling the victim by the hair presented a significant danger to her that was independent of the family violence battery, as she was not isolated or somehow exposed to an independent danger outside of the one to which she was already being subjected from the family violence battery itself. Sellars v. Evans, supra at 348 (1). The family violence battery and alleged kidnapping with bodily injury were one continuous
Accordingly, under Garza, the evidence was insufficient to show the necessary kidnapping element of asportation. Consequently, the judgment of the habeas court must be reversed, and Gonzalez‘s conviction for kidnapping with bodily injury and the life sentence must be vacated.5
Judgment reversed and case remanded with direction. All the Justices concur.
DECIDED SEPTEMBER 14, 2015.
Sarah L. Gerwig-Moore; Childs & Noland, William H. Noland; James Bates Brannon Grover, Dianna Lee; Law Office of Tanya Miller, Sarah B. Flack, for appellant.
Samuel S. Olens, Attorney General, Patricia B. Attaway Burton, Deputy Attorney General, Paula K. Smith, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Elizabeth M. Haase, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee.