On Mаy 16, 2009, Tremaine Marcus Cobb was shot and killed in a Waffle House parking lot in Augusta, Georgia. A Richmond County grand jury indicted appellant Nicholas Johnson, along with co-defendants Joseph Ty’re Downs and Jonathan Harrell, for crimes related to the shootout. A jury found Johnson guilty of felony murder and two counts of aggravated assault, and Johnson appeals.
I.
Viewed in the light most favorable to the jury’s verdict, the evidence shows that on May 16,2009, Johnson, along with Downs and
After being kicked out of Club Fusion, Burley and his friends drove to a nearby Waffle House and went inside. When Burley stepped out of the Waffle House, J ohnson and Downs approached him in the parking lot. Bray, Cobb, and others saw Johnson and joined Burley in the parking lot. At the time Johnson approached Burlеy in the parking lot, Burley did not have a gun, but Johnson and his accomplices were armed with pistols. An argument ensued, and Johnson, along with his accomplices Downs and Harrell, fired multiple shots at Burley and his friends. Burley was struck in the thigh, Bray was injured, and Cobb was struck with a fatal bullet to his head. Harrell admitted that he and Johnson both fired multiple shots at Burley’s group while they were in the parking lot. For his part, Bray admitted that he grabbed a rifle from another member of Burley’s group, Terrance Hanna, and fired at least one shot at Johnson and his accomplices; those shots prompted additiоnal return fire.
Hanna had witnessed Burley’s earlier argument with Johnson at Club Fusion. Hanna also saw Johnson (whom he identified in court) approach Burley in the Waffle House parking lot. Hanna testified thаt Johnson started shooting first, and confirmed that Bray attempted to return fire. A few weeks after Cobb’s death in the shooting, Hanna returned to Club Fusion wearing a shirt bearing the phrase “Rest in Peace Trеmaine” with a picture of Cobb on it. While he was at the club, Hanna got into a fight with Downs, who claimed responsibility for shooting Cobb.
A surveillance camera captured the shootout in the Wafflе House parking lot, and that footage shows Johnson and his accomplices firing their weapons at Bray, Cobb, Burley, and their associates. Investigators also collected multiple shell casings from guns of various calibers at the scene, including nine .40 caliber shells and fourteen .45 caliber shells; Cobb’s death was the result of a .40 caliber bullet that struck him in the head. Harrell, in turn, testified that
II.
Johnson first contends that the State did not produce sufficient evidence at trial to рrove beyond a reasonable doubt that he was guilty of felony murder or the aggravated assault charges. We disagree.
As discussed above, the State’s evidence of Johnson’s guilt included the surveillance video, accomplice testimony, testimony regarding the shell casings found at the scene, testimony from a ballistics expert that Cobb was killed by a .40 caliber bullet, testimony from оne witness that Johnson was shooting a .40 caliber gun, witness testimony generally identifying Johnson as one of the people who fired a gun into the gathered group, and testimony that Johnson and his group fired first. Johnson’s sufficiency challenge appears to suggest that the State failed to show that he was the person who fired the fatal shot. But that claim cannot succeed becausе the evidence reflects, at a minimum, that Johnson and his accomplices intended to fire their weapons repeatedly into the group. That is enough. See Pyatt v. State,
III.
Johnson’s next enumeration is that the trial court erred by refusing to sever his trial from the trial of co-defendant Downs. Johnson now contends that he and Downs had antagonistic defenses and that the “convoluted and contradictory” nature of the evidence in this case demanded that he and Downs be tried separately But
Prior to trial, Johnson’s co-defendant Dоwns filed a motion to sever, arguing that because there was a motive that pertained only to Johnson—badbloodbetween him and Bur ley — Downs’s trial should be severed from Johnson’s. But Johnson did not join in thаt motion. Consequently, he failed to obtain a ruling on the issue, and cannot raise it for the first time in this Court. Hill v. State,
Moreover, even if this error had been preserved, аntagonistic defenses are insufficient to require severance in a non-death penalty case absent a showing of prejudice. Krause v. State,
IV.
Johnson’s final contention is that the trial court abused its discretion in denying the jury’s request to watch, during deliberations, the surveillance video that was shown at trial. Here, too, we disagree. Whether to grant a jury’s request to review video evidence is squarely within the trial court’s discretion. See Morris v. State,
Judgment affirmed.
Notes
On April 12,2011, Johnson was indicted for the following crimes: malice murder; felony murder predicated on the aggravated assault of Cobb; aggravated assault perpetrated on Exzavius Bray; aggravated assault perpetrated on Denvanquez “Petey” Burley; possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime by a convicted felon, predicated on the aggravatеd assault and murder of Cobb; possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime by a convicted felon, predicated on the aggravated assault of Bray; and possession of а firearm during the commission of a crime by a convicted felon, predicated on the aggravated assault of Burley. At a trial held November 7-10,2011, the jury found J ohnson guilty of felony murder and two counts of aggravated assault. The State nol prossed the three counts of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. The trial court sentenced Johnson to serve life in prison for felony murder and twenty years each for the two counts of aggravated assault to run consecutive with each other and consecutive with the felony murder charge. On November 14, 2011, Johnson filed a motion for new trial, which was amended on June 1, 2015. Following a hearing on June 7, 2015, the trial court denied his motion on January 14, 2016. Johnson filed a timely notice of appeal, and the case was docketed in this Court to the term beginning December 2016 and was submitted for decision on the briefs.