MCKINNEY v. THE STATE
S23G0448
In the Supreme Court of Georgia
Decided: March 5, 2024
NOTICE: This оpinion is subject to modification resulting from motions for reconsideration under Supreme Court Rule 27, the Court‘s reconsideration, and editorial revisions by the Reporter of Decisions. The version of the opinion published in the Advance Sheets for the Georgia Reports, designаted as the “Final Copy,” will replace any prior version on the Court‘s website and docket. A bound volume of the Georgia Reports will contain the final and official text of the opinion.
We granted defendant Jerrion McKinney‘s petition for certiorari to consider the рroper construction of an evidence rule,
In August 2021, a Fulton County grand jury issued a 37-count indictment against McKinney and Julian Conley. The indictment charged McKinney with twelve counts of violating Georgia‘s Gang Act, two counts of aggravated assault, and one count each of possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. The charges stem from the State‘s allegations that on July 4, 2020, McKinney and Conley participated in an “armed takeover” of an area of Atlanta, placing barricades in the roadway and prohibiting others from passing. The charges against Conley, who is not a party to this appeal, include murder for the shooting death of eight-year-old Secoriea Turner.
At issue in this pre-trial appeаl is the State‘s attempt to introduce evidence of other acts by McKinney through Rule 418. Rule 418 (a) provides:
In a criminal proceeding in which the accused is accused of conducting or participating in criminal gang activity in violation of Code Section 16-15-4, evidence of the accused‘s commission of criminal gang activity, as such term is defined in Code Section 16-15-3, shall be admissible and may be considered for its bearing on any matter to which it is relevant.
The rule also contains a notice requirement. See
In MсKinney‘s case, the trial court considered the State‘s request to introduce evidence of the following three other acts under Rule 418: (1) a May 2015 incident in which McKinney took a stolen firearm to his school and pointed it at a classmate‘s head; (2) a February 2016 incident in which McKinnеy shot himself in the foot with a firearm and then hid the gun in nearby bushes, claiming he had been the victim of a drive-by shooting; and (3) an April 2017 incident in which McKinney robbed two victims at gunpoint. The State argued to the trial court essentially that evidence of the commission of any offense included in the definition of “criminal gang activity” in
The State appealed, arguing that the trial court abused its discretion by excluding some evidence of McKinney‘s prior gang activity, becausе the plain language of Rule 418 does not require the State to show a connection between a gang and the other act. A panel of the Court of Appeals reversed in part and remanded in part. See McKinney, 366 Ga. App. at 251. The Court of Appeals agreed with the State that the еvidence of criminal gang activity admissible under Rule 418 “is that activity defined in
Given the plain language of Rule 418, the trial court must find, prior to admitting the proffered evidence, that the conduct alleged, if proven, would constitute a violation of one of the listed statutes in
OCGA § 16-15-3 or the commission of one of the crimes specified inOCGA § 16-15-3 . It does not require the trial court to find anynexus between the alleged conduct and an intent to further gang activity.
Id. The Court of Appeals therefore determined that the trial court erred in excluding the other acts on the basis that they did not fall within Rule 418, although the Court of Appeals remanded fоr the trial court to consider whether the acts should be excluded under Rule 403. See id. at 258-259 (2)-(3). We granted McKinney‘s petition for certiorari.
McKinney appears to argue in his brief to this Court that admissibility of evidence under Rule 418 requires a showing that the other act at issue was committed to further the interests of a gang.2 We disagree.
“When we consider the mеaning of a statute, we must presume that the General Assembly meant what it said and said what it meant.” Deal v. Coleman, 294 Ga. 170, 172 (1) (a) (751 SE2d 337) (2013) (citation and punctuation omitted)). “To that end, we must afford the statutory text its plain and ordinary meaning, we must view the statutory text in the context in which it appears, and we must read the statutory tеxt in its most natural and reasonable way, as an ordinary speaker of the English language would.” Id. at 172-173 (1) (a) (citations and punctuation omitted).
Starting with the text, Rule 418 by itself contains no requirement of a connection between the other act and gang membership or interests in order for the act to be admissible. Rather, it provides thаt in gang prosecutions, “evidence of the accused‘s commission of criminal gang activity, as such term is defined in Code Section 16-15-3, shall be admissible and may be considered for its bearing on any matter to which it is relevant.”
McKinney argues that the trial court correctly concluded that, consistent with Rodriguez, Rule 418 must be construed in the light of both
That does not necessarily mean that the converse is true, i.e., that
Moreover, Rule 418 by its terms applies to all criminal prosecutions under
McKinney‘s only other argument is that construing Rule 418 as not requiring a nexus with gang membership or interests would lead to an absurd result in that it would afford prosecutors virtually unchecked power to obtain admission of other criminal acts in gang prosecutions. See Rodriguez, 284 Ga. at 805 (1) (“The various provisions of a statute should be viewed in harmony and in a manner which will not produce an unreasonable or absurd result.” (citation and punctuation omitted)). “But the fact that an application of clear statutory text produces results that [a litigant or others] may think are unfair or unreasonable does not render the statute nonsensical or ‘absurd.‘” Domingue v. Ford Motor Co., 314 Ga. 59, 67 (2) (c) n.7 (875 SE2d 720) (2022). And although “this Court may construe statutes tо avoid absurd results, . . . we do not have the authority to rewrite statutes,” Riley v. State, 305 Ga. 163, 168 (3) (824 SE2d 249) (2019), so when the text is plain, we must follow it. And as we have explained, the plain text of Rule 418 cannot be read to require the nexus for which McKinney argues.
Nevertheless, the breadth of Rule 418 is cabined by other rules of evidence. The Court of Appeals remanded the case for the trial court to consider whether evidence of the May 2015 school incident and the February 2016 shooting incident should be excluded under Rule 403. See McKinney, 366 Ga. App. at 258-259 (3). And the State does not dispute that Rule 403 generally applies to evidence otherwise admissible under Rule 418.
Indeed, we have made abundantly clear that “the Rule 403 exclusionary rule generally applies to all evidence even when another provision of the Evidence Code provides that certain evidence ‘shall’ be admissible.” Wilson v. State, 312 Ga. 174, 189 (2) (860 SE2d 485) (2021) (citation and punctuation omitted). Such an approach “eliminates due process concerns posed by [other-acts evidence] that might be so prejudicial that the admission of that evidence would violate the defendant‘s fundamental right to a fair trial.” Id. at 189-190 (2). Under Rule 403, “[r]еlevant evidence may be excluded if its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, confusion of the issues, or misleading the jury or by considerations of undue delay, waste of time, or needless presentation of cumulative evidence.” “[O]f course, the trial court must address whether . . . evidence is relevant under
For these reаsons, the Court of Appeals correctly concluded that Rule 418 “does not require the trial court to find any nexus between the alleged conduct and an intent to further gang activity.” McKinney, 366 Ga. App. at 258 (2). We therefore affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case to that cоurt with instructions that it remand the case to the trial court to consider whether the other acts at issue should be excluded under Rule 403 or any related rules.
Judgment affirmed. All the Justices concur.
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