Court Opinion

ID: 9852597
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:33:27.609608+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:22:30.390620
License: Public Domain

SMITH, Presiding Judge,
concurring and concurring specially.
I agree with all that is said in the majority, but write specially to emphasize the difficulty created by Garza v. State, 284 Ga. 696 (670 SE2d 73) (2008), and Henderson v. State, 285 Ga. 240 (675 SE2d 28) (2009). Garza adopted a four-part test enumerating factors to consider in determining whether a certain movement constitutes asportation, but provides no guidance for analyzing how to balance these factors. Based upon the Supreme Court’s decision in Henderson, supra, the dissent concludes that “the timing of the movement, and the role it played in the underlying offense, is vital to applying . . . Garza.” This conclusion, in essence, allows the second factor *579(“whether the movement occurred during the commission of a separate offense”) to swallow the fourth factor (“whether the movement itself presented a significant danger to the victim independent of the danger posed by the separate offense”). That the dissent draws such a conclusion from the Supreme Court’s seemingly inconsistent decisions in Garza, supra, and Henderson, supra, demonstrates the difficulties inherent in applying the four-part Garza test. The majority here has done an admirable job in reconciling these issues. In my view, its conclusion that Flores committed kidnapping is the correct result when those four factors are considered as a whole.