Court Opinion

ID: 9574220
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:03:26.769163+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:44:15.049026
License: Public Domain

Weltner, Chief Justice,
dissenting.
The majority would reverse the conviction of felony murder in this case and order a new trial for the failure of the trial judge to instruct the jury on the elements of voluntary manslaughter as an included offense to murder.
1. OCGA § 16-5-2 (a) provides:
A person commits the offense of voluntary manslaughter when he causes the death of another human being 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; . . .
2. Throughout the trial, Woody’s defense was justification in the nature of self-defense. (“I was trying to protect myself.”) I reiterate here the testimony as set out in fn. 3 of the majority opinion:
Q: You were on the defense the entire time, weren’t you?
A: I was trying to protect myself.
*330Decided July 9, 1992.
Walter B. Harvey, for appellant.
Timothy G. Madison, District Attorney, Jeffrey G. Morrow, Assistant District Attorney, Michael J. Bowers, Attorney General, Susan V. Boleyn, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Peggy R. Katz, Staff Attorney, for appellee.
Q: That’s all you were doing. I mean that’s why you put the loaded gun in your pocket for self-protection. And then after he started beating you, you were just trying to protect yourself?
A: Yes, sir.
Q: And after he got you on the ground, that wasn’t enough was it?
A: No, sir, it wasn’t enough for him. It was enough for me.
Q: As a matter of fact, you were begging. How many times did you beg for your life that night?
A: Twice. . . .
Q: [So you were] — fighting for your life?
A: No, I couldn’t fight.
Q: I mean, you were struggling for your life weren’t you?
A: I was struggling trying to get away from him.
3. It is clear that the evidence shows nothing that would warrant a finding by the jury that Woody acted “solely as a result of a sudden, violent, and irresistible passion resulting from severe provocation.” To the contrary, the evidence shows that Woody was either guilty of murder or entitled to acquittal on self-defense.
4. The evidence and Woody’s own account of the event demonstrate clearly that the trial court correctly declined to give the requested charge on voluntary manslaughter. See Swett v. State, 242 Ga. 228, 230 (248 SE2d 629) (1978); Saylors v. State, 251 Ga. 735, 736 (309 SE2d 796) (1983); and Stewart v. State, 257 Ga. 211, 213-214 (356 SE2d 515) (1987).
I am authorized to state that Justice Hunt joins in this dissent.