In the Supreme Court of Georgia

Decided: September 6, 2023

S23A0736. WILKERSON v. THE STATE.

BOGGS, Chief Justice. 

Appellant Kentavous Wilkerson challenges his 2019 

convictions for felony murder and other crimes in connection with 

the shooting death of Bradley Green and the non-fatal shooting of 

Rodney Greene. On appeal, Appellant contends that (1) the evidence 

was constitutionally insufficient to support his convictions, (2) the 

trial court erred in failing to instruct the jury on voluntary 

manslaughter, and (3) the trial court abused its discretion in 

denying the motions for mistrial that he made following the 

prosecutor’s statements to the jury indicating that Appellant had 

been in jail for more than two years before trial. For the reasons that 

follow, we affirm.1

1 The crimes occurred on July 15, 2017. On May 28, 2019, a Sumter 

County grand jury indicted Appellant for felony murder, possession of a 
2

Viewed in the light most favorable to the verdicts, the evidence 

at trial showed as follows. On July 15, 2017, hundreds of people 

attended an event known as the “Southside Reunion” at a park on 

the south side of Americus, Georgia. More than 100 members of the 

“Gangster Disciples” street gang, whose territory was on the south 

side of Americus, were present at the event. Sakeitha Waters, 

Appellant’s sister, attended the event and bought a marijuana 

cigarette for five dollars from Greene, who was affiliated with the 

Gangster Disciples. She did not feel that she had gotten her money’s 

worth and argued with Greene, but he refused to refund her money, 

so she snatched a small plastic bag containing pills from his pocket. 

Waters then called Appellant and asked if he wanted some pills. 

firearm during the commission of a felony, aggravated assault against Green, 

and aggravated assault against Greene. At a trial from July 15 to 18, 2019, the 

jury found Appellant guilty of all charges. The trial court sentenced Appellant 

to serve life in prison with the possibility of parole for felony murder, a 

concurrent term of 20 years for the aggravated assault of Greene, and a term 

of five years for possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony,

consecutive to the sentence for felony murder. The count of aggravated assault 

against Green merged. Appellant filed a timely motion for new trial, which he 

amended with new counsel on June 18, 2021. On February 8, 2023, the court 

denied Appellant’s motion. Appellant filed a timely notice of appeal, and the 

case was docketed to this Court’s April 2023 term and submitted for a decision 

on the briefs. 
3

After Appellant overheard Greene make threats to Waters during 

the call, Appellant asked where she was and asked her to pick him 

up. When the phone call ended, Waters returned the pills to Greene, 

he refunded her money, and the two of them separated. Waters then 

left the park, picked up Appellant, and returned to the park with 

him. 

Appellant was affiliated with the “Bloods” street gang, which 

operated on the north side of Americus, and he arrived at the park 

wearing a red bandana, a color associated with the Bloods gang. 

Appellant walked directly to Greene, and the two men argued for 

several minutes. Greene, described by a witness as “amped,” told 

Appellant that he was “not supposed to be on the south side” and

threatened to “f**k [him] up” and make him “bleed” if he did not 

leave. Appellant told Greene that he did not want to fight. Several 

people approached Appellant and Greene and tried to calm the 

situation, with Rogers Jackson and Daryl Lewis leading Appellant 

down a street and away from Greene and the reunion, as others 

attempted to hold Greene back. Greene, however, followed
4

Appellant down the street and continued to verbally threaten him. 

Jackson testified that Appellant said that “he wanted to walk away 

peacefully,” and Jackson described Appellant as “chill” during the 

altercation. However, Jackson added that Appellant kept reaching 

in his back pocket like he had a gun and “warned that he was not 

going to be fighting” and that “it’s not going to be good.” Other 

witnesses also testified that Appellant was flashing a gun as he was 

moving down the street, with one witness stating that Appellant 

“was showing [Greene] the pistol” to make Greene know that if it 

came to a fight, Appellant “was going to shoot him.”

When Greene was 20 or more feet away from Appellant, 

Appellant turned toward Greene and pulled out a gun. A witness 

testified that, as Greene was “coming back towards” the crowd and 

was no longer facing Appellant, Appellant fired a shot and hit 

Greene in the buttocks. After being shot, Greene ran between two 

cars toward the crowd. After two or three seconds, as Appellant “was 

tracing” Greene through the crowd with the gun, Appellant fired 

again but missed Greene and instead struck bystander Green in the 
5

chest. One witness described Appellant as taking a “coward shot,” 

saying that Appellant “had got far enough away from the scene and 

was safe, and fired back into a crowd of people.” Multiple witnesses 

testified that although Greene was belligerent, Greene was 

unarmed and never struck, swung at, or charged Appellant. After 

the shooting, Appellant fled the scene with Waters; the gun was 

never recovered. After the shooting, Greene ran into Jackson, who 

drove Greene to the hospital. While Greene survived, bystander 

Green, who was taken by ambulance to the hospital, died from the

gunshot wound. 

Appellant elected not to testify but called a number of defense 

witnesses, including Waters, his father, and his cousin. Waters 

testified that Greene reached in the front of his pants as though he 

were going for a weapon when Appellant and Greene were arguing 

face-to-face, but admitted that she never saw Greene with a gun. 

Vincent Wilkerson, Appellant’s cousin, testified that once the 

shooting started, he walked to his car to leave the event. As he was 

doing so, Greene, who was holding a “.38 snub nose” revolver, came 
6

“running towards [him]” and was “hollering” at him. Greene got into 

the passenger side of a car, sitting with one leg in the car and one 

leg outside the car. Greene was by himself. Vincent added that 

Greene pulled down his pants and showed him where he had been 

shot. Vincent could see the bullet sticking out of Greene’s “butt.” 

Vincent testified that he assured Greene that he would be “all right. 

It’s only a flesh wound.” Vincent spoke with Greene for several 

minutes, and no one else came to the car during that time. 

Christopher Wilkerson, Appellant’s father, testified that, during the 

initial part of the altercation between his son and Greene, Greene 

put his hand on the handle of a gun that was in his waistband but 

did not pull it out. Christopher did not see the shooting. Both 

Vincent and Christopher acknowledged that the first time they had 

told anyone that Greene was armed was in conversation with 

defense counsel a few weeks before trial. Another defense witness

testified at trial that she had only heard two shots and never saw 

Greene with a gun, but in her statement to the police on the night of 

the crimes, which was played for the jury, she said that she thought 
7

she had heard three shots and that she had seen smoke near Greene 

but did not see him with a gun. 

The State called Jackson as a witness again to rebut Vincent’s 

testimony of his encounter with Greene. Jackson testified that

shortly after the shots were fired, he saw Greene and they both ran 

to Jackson’s car. According to Jackson, Greene was not holding a 

gun. Jackson added that, when they got to Jackson’s car, Jackson 

reclined his passenger seat and Greene laid face down on it, facing 

the backseat of the car. Jackson testified that Greene did not speak 

to anyone before Jackson drove him to the hospital. 

1. Appellant argues that the evidence was constitutionally 

insufficient to support his convictions because the evidence showed 

that he acted in self-defense. We disagree. 

When evaluating the sufficiency of the evidence as a matter of 

federal due process, we view the evidence presented at trial in the 

light most favorable to the verdicts and consider whether it was 

sufficient to authorize a rational trier of fact to find the defendant 

guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of the crimes of which he was 
8

convicted. See Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (99 SCt 2781, 

61 LE2d 560) (1979); Moore v. State, 311 Ga. 506, 508 (858 SE2d 

676) (2021). This “limited review leaves to the jury the resolution of 

conflicts in the evidence, the weight of the evidence, the credibility 

of witnesses, and reasonable inferences to be made from basic facts 

to ultimate facts.” Rich v. State, 307 Ga. 757, 759 (838 SE2d 255)

(2020) (cleaned up). 

At trial, Appellant claimed that he acted in self-defense, and 

the trial court instructed the jury to consider that affirmative 

defense. “[A] person is justified in using force which is intended or 

likely to cause death or great bodily harm only if he . . . reasonably 

believes that such force is necessary to prevent death or great bodily 

injury to himself . . . .” OCGA § 16-3-21 (a). “When a defendant 

presents evidence that he was justified in using deadly force, the 

State bears the burden of disproving the defense beyond a 

reasonable doubt.” Birdow v. State, 305 Ga. 48, 50 (823 SE2d 736)

(2019). However, “[a]s we have explained before, issues of witness 

credibility and the existence of justification are for the jury to 
9

determine, and it is free to reject a defendant’s claim that he acted 

in self-defense.” Ivey v. State, 305 Ga. 156, 159 (824 SE2d 242) (2019)

(cleaned up). 

The evidence here authorized the jury to reject Appellant’s 

claim that he shot the victims because he reasonably feared for his 

life. Although many witnesses testified that Greene was the 

aggressor during the altercation and several members of Appellant’s 

family testified that Greene was armed, multiple witnesses testified 

that Greene was unarmed, that Greene never moved to strike 

Appellant, and that the confrontation was entirely verbal before 

Appellant opened fire. And even the defense witnesses who testified 

that Greene had a weapon did not testify that they saw him draw 

the weapon before the shooting or that Appellant was aware of the 

weapon. Moreover, at the time of the shooting, Greene and 

Appellant were no longer arguing face-to-face, and Appellant was 

separated from Greene by a distance of 20 or more feet. Greene was 

also hit in the buttocks, supporting witness testimony that he was 

turned away from Appellant at the time of the shooting. Finally, 
10

there was testimony that Appellant “was tracing” Greene through a 

crowd while Greene was running away from Appellant when he fired 

the shot that struck and killed Green, an innocent bystander.2 When 

viewed in the light most favorable to the verdicts, the evidence 

presented at trial was sufficient to authorize a rational jury to find 

beyond a reasonable doubt that Appellant did not shoot at Greene 

in self-defense and that Appellant instead was guilty of the crimes 

for which he was convicted, including felony murder and aggravated 

assault. See Jackson v. State, 315 Ga. 543, 550-551 (883 SE2d 815) 

(2023) (holding that where, among other things, there was evidence 

showing that the victims were not armed at the time of the shooting 

and that one of the victims was walking away from the defendant 

2 We note that the trial court charged the jury on the doctrine of 

transferred intent. Under that doctrine, “when an unintended victim is struck 

down as a result of an unlawful act actually directed against someone else, the 

law prevents the actor from taking advantage of his own wrong and transfers 

the original intent from the one against whom it was directed to the one who 

actually suffered from it.” Smith v. State, 315 Ga. 357, 364 (882 SE2d 289) 

(2022) (cleaned up). Similarly, the trial court charged on the principle of 

transferred justification, under which “no guilt attaches if an accused is 

justified in shooting to repel an assault, but misses and kills an innocent 

bystander.” Howard v. State, 307 Ga. 12, 22 (834 SE2d 11) (2019) (cleaned up).
11

when he was shot, the jury was authorized to reject the defendant’s 

claim of self-defense). 

2. Appellant contends that the trial court committed plain 

error in failing to charge the jury on voluntary manslaughter. We 

disagree. 

Although Appellant requested a charge on voluntary 

manslaughter, the trial court informed the parties that it would not 

give the charge. In its charge to the jury, the trial court did not 

charge on voluntary manslaughter, and Appellant did not object to 

the court’s failure to do so. For that reason, we review Appellant’s 

claim for plain error only. See OCGA § 17-8-58 (b); Davis v. State, 

312 Ga. 870, 873 (866 SE2d 390) (2021) (explaining that the failure 

to charge the jury on voluntary manslaughter could be reviewed only 

for plain error where the appellant “made a written request for a 

jury charge on voluntary manslaughter” and argued the point at the 

charge conference but “did not object to the omission of the charge 

after the trial court instructed the jury”). Reversal is not authorized 

under plain error review unless “the instruction was erroneous, the 
12

error was obvious, the instruction likely affected the outcome of the 

proceedings, and the error seriously affects the fairness, integrity, 

or public reputation of judicial proceedings.” Davis, 312 Ga. at 873-

874. “We need not analyze all of the elements of this test when, as 

in this case, the defendant has failed to establish one of them.” Jones 

v. State, 314 Ga. 466, 469 (877 SE2d 568) (2022) (cleaned up).

A person commits voluntary manslaughter when he causes the 

death of another “under circumstances which would otherwise be 

murder and if he acts solely as the result of a sudden, violent, and 

irresistible passion resulting from serious provocation sufficient to 

excite such passion in a reasonable person.” OCGA § 16-5-2 (a). “A 

trial court is required to grant the defendant’s request for a charge 

on the lesser included offense of voluntary manslaughter if there is 

any evidence, however slight, to support such a charge. Whether 

such slight evidence exists is a question of law.” Munn v. State, 313 

Ga. 716, 721 (873 SE2d 166) (2022) (cleaned up). 

Appellant argues that a voluntary manslaughter instruction 

was justified because Greene seriously provoked Appellant, 
13

emphasizing that the two were involved in a heated argument 

during which Greene pursued, verbally abused, and threatened to 

harm Appellant. However, “neither fear that someone is going to 

pull a weapon nor fighting are the types of provocation that demand 

a voluntary manslaughter charge.” Rountree v. State, 316 Ga. 691, 

694 (889 SE2d 803) (2023) (cleaned up). Accord Burke v. State, 302 

Ga. 786, 790-791 (809 SE2d 765) (2018) (explaining that “acting out 

of fear of bodily harm is not the same as acting in the heat of passion, 

and only evidence of the latter supports a voluntary manslaughter 

conviction”). Moreover, “angry statements alone ordinarily do not 

amount to ‘serious provocation’ within the meaning of OCGA § 16-

5-2 (a). To put it simply, words alone generally are not sufficient 

provocation to excite the passion necessary to give rise to voluntary 

manslaughter.” Rountree, 316 Ga. at 694 (cleaned up).

Indeed, “words alone, regardless of the degree of their 

insulting nature, will not in any case justify the 

excitement of passion so as to reduce the crime from 

murder to manslaughter when the killing is done solely 

on account of the indignation aroused by use of 

opprobrious words.”
14

Id. at 694-695 (cleaned up).

Appellant did not testify at trial, and testimony at trial 

described him as “chill” during the altercation. Moreover, the 

threatening words that witnesses testified were used by Greene 

“were still only words.” Id. at 695. For the foregoing reasons, we 

conclude that Appellant has failed to show that the trial court erred 

by failing to charge the jury on voluntary manslaughter, much less 

that the trial court committed plain error. See id. (holding that 

neither the defendant’s fear arising from evidence that the victim 

brought a gun to his home nor the victim’s use of threatening words 

required a charge on voluntary manslaughter); Behl v. State, 315 

Ga. 814, 816-817 (885 SE2d 7) (2023) (rejecting the defendant’s 

contention that evidence of “‘heated arguments and physical 

beatings’” that preceded the killing of the victim warranted a charge 

on voluntary manslaughter); Collins v. State, 312 Ga. 727, 740 (864 

SE2d 85) (2021) (the defendant’s testimony did not require a charge 

on voluntary manslaughter where the defendant testified that the 

victim called him a “‘mother f**ker’ to his face, threatened to kill 
15

him, and pulled a handgun on him,” but “never testified that he was 

angry or mad or that he had any other response showing he might 

have reacted passionately”). 

3. Appellant contends that the trial court abused its discretion 

in denying motions for mistrial that he made following the 

prosecutor’s statements to the jury indicating that Appellant had 

been in jail for more than two years before trial. We conclude that 

the trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying the motions for 

mistrial.

At trial, Appellant called his cousin, Vincent Wilkerson, as a 

witness. Vincent testified, among other things, that he had seen 

Greene with a gun on the day of the crimes. On cross-examination, 

Vincent acknowledged that the first time that he had told anyone 

about Greene’s possession of a gun was when he told defense counsel 

“a few weeks” before trial. The prosecutor asked Vincent if he knew 

that Appellant had been arrested for murder shortly after the crimes 

and had been incarcerated awaiting trial on the charges for just over 

two years. Vincent responded that he did, and the prosecutor asked 
16

Vincent why, knowing that his cousin “was sitting in jail,” he had 

not told anyone that he saw Greene with a gun during the two year 

period before he informed defense counsel. Appellant moved for a 

mistrial on the ground that the prosecutor had improperly placed 

his character in evidence. The trial court denied the motion, but 

instructed the State to avoid reference to Appellant’s custodial 

status. A curative instruction was given to the jury noting that the 

fact that the defendant was held in jail, if true, was not to be held or 

considered against him. After the defense rested, the State called a 

rebuttal witness, which prompted Appellant to recall Vincent to the 

stand. On cross-examination, the prosecutor again asked Vincent 

why he waited two years to inform anyone that he had seen Greene 

with a gun, knowing that Appellant was in jail awaiting trial on 

charges relating to the shooting of Greene. Appellant did not move 

for a mistrial at that time. Instead, only after Appellant engaged in 

further direct examination of Vincent and after the evidence was 

closed and the trial court discharged the jury for the day did 

Appellant move for a mistrial. The trial court denied the motion. 
17

Even assuming that Appellant’s second motion for mistrial 

was timely, Appellant has failed to show that the trial court abused 

its discretion in denying both the first and second motions. “Whether 

to grant a motion for mistrial is within the trial court’s sound 

discretion, and the trial court’s exercise of that discretion will not be 

disturbed on appeal unless a mistrial is essential to preserve the 

defendant’s right to a fair trial.” Allen v. State, 315 Ga. 524, 532 (883 

SE2d 746) (2023) (cleaned up). Appellant claims that the prosecutor 

placed prejudicial information about his character before the jury 

and that a mistrial was necessary to preserve his right to a fair trial. 

We disagree.

We have held that “evidence that an accused has been confined 

in jail in connection with the case at issue does not place his 

character in evidence.” Bright v. State, 292 Ga. 273, 275 (736 SE2d 

380) (2013) (quoting Jackson v. State, 284 Ga. 484, 486 (668 SE2d 

700) (2008)). Accord Early v. State, 313 Ga. 667, 671 (872 SE2d 705) 

(2022) (explaining that “the jury would not have been unfairly 

influenced by the fact that a defendant charged with murder was 
18

being detained while awaiting trial”); Rivers v. State, 296 Ga. 396, 

402 (768 SE2d 486) (2015) (“evidence that an accused has been 

confined in jail in connection with the case at issue does not place 

his character in evidence”), overruled on other grounds by State v. 

Lane, 308 Ga. 10, 23 (Appendix) (838 SE2d 808) (2020). Accordingly, 

here, because the prosecutor’s references to Appellant being in jail 

for the charges on which he was on trial did not place his character 

in issue, we conclude that the trial court did not abuse its discretion 

in denying Appellant’s motions for mistrial. See Rivers, 296 Ga. at 

402 (holding that question on cross-examination referencing that 

the defendant had been in jail in connection with the case for which 

he was on trial did not place his character in evidence and did not 

warrant the grant of a mistrial).3 

3 Appellant also contends on appeal that the trial court should have 

granted a mistrial because the prosecutor’s comment undermined the 

presumption of innocence, but Appellant did not raise this ground for mistrial 

at trial, and we therefore do not address it. See Jeffers v. State, 290 Ga. 311, 

314 (721 SE2d 86) (2012) (noting that “standard practice . . . allows parties to 

raise on appeal only the same objections that were properly preserved below” 

and holding that the defendant failed to preserve a ground for mistrial raised 

on appeal that was different from the ground asserted at trial).
19

Judgment affirmed. All the Justices concur.