Court Opinion

ID: 9719356
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:49:47.439573+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:06.497726
License: Public Domain

BLACKBURN, Senior Appellate Judge.
Following a jury trial, Tomone Frazier was found guilty of armed robbery. He now appeals the denial of his motion for new trial, challenging the sufficiency of the evidence and contending that the trial court erred (i) in excluding the testimony of his expert witness regarding eyewitness testimony and (ii) in denying his motion to suppress identification testimony. Discerning no error, we affirm.
On appeal from a criminal conviction, the evidence must be viewed in the light most favorable to support the verdict, and the defendant no longer enjoys a presumption of innocence; moreover, an appellate court determines evidence sufficiency and does not weigh the evidence or determine witness credibility.
*275(Punctuation omitted.) Burden v. State.1 Likewise, when reviewing the denial of a motion to suppress, we construe the evidence presented both at the suppression hearing and at trial in a light favorable to upholding the trial court’s findings and judgment. Thomas v. State.2
So viewed, the record reveals that at approximately 3:30 a.m. on September 8, 2007, the victim was walking to work from her home when she was approached by two men. She had spotted the men come out from behind a nearby bush and slowly cross the street before they approached her. One of the men placed a shotgun to her face and said, “Give me all you got.” She said that she looked him “right in his face” during the incident.
The man with the gun shoved the victim and snatched her purse. She told the robber there was nothing in the purse; he unzipped it, looked inside, threw the purse at the victim, and ran. The victim continued walking while she called 911 to report the crime, describing the men and their travel direction to police. She also told police her location; police arrived in minutes, whereupon she was transported to a nearby location where police had two suspects in custody for her identification. The suspects were in separate police cruisers. The victim first identified Frazier, who was 16 years old at that time, as the assailant with the shotgun. The victim also pointed out to police that Frazier had discarded his black t-shirt on the ground nearby. She identified Frazier as her assailant at trial.
1. We first address Frazier’s assertion regarding the insufficiency of the evidence. “We do not determine the credibility of eyewitness identification testimony. Rather ‘the determination of a witness’ credibility, including the accuracy of eyewitness identification, is within the exclusive province of the jury.’ ” Jones v. State.3 OCGA § 24-4-8 provides that “[t]he testimony of a single witness is generally sufficient to establish a fact.” Here the victim’s testimony alone is sufficient to authorize the jury’s verdict of guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Smith v. State.4
2. Frazier next contends that the trial court erred in excluding the testimony of his expert witness, Dr. Jeffrey Neuschatz, regarding the reliability of eyewitness testimony.
After Frazier provided the State notice of his intent to present the testimony of his expert regarding the unreliability of eyewitness testimony, the State filed a motion to exclude the expert’s testimony. *276At the subsequent hearing on the motion, Frazier made a proffer of Dr. Neuschatz’s qualifications and testimony. The proffer indicated that the expert would testify as to the influences that affect eyewitness memory, including exposure time, stress, change of appearance, and the presence of a weapon. The expert opined that it would be “extremely difficult for jurors and lay people, unfamiliar with the research on eyewitness identification and confession evidence, to appreciate the subtle but important factors that can affect eyewitness identification accuracy. ...” The trial court granted the State’s motion, concluding that “the facts of the case do not warrant expert testimony regarding identification, and that a properly instructed jury will be able to weight the evidence accordingly.”
The applicable standard is clear:
[A]dmission of expert testimony regarding eyewitness identification is in the discretion of the trial court. Where eyewitness identification of the defendant is a key element of the State’s case and there is no substantial corroboration of that identification by other evidence, trial courts may not exclude expert testimony without carefully weighing whether the evidence would assist the jury in assessing the reliability of eyewitness testimony and whether expert eyewitness testimony is the only effective way to reveal any weakness in an eyewitness identification. However, the admission or exclusion of this evidence lies within the sound discretion of the trial court, whose decision will not be disturbed on appeal absent a clear abuse of discretion.
(Citation, punctuation and footnote omitted.) Johnson v. State.5 Because some evidence in Johnson corroborated the victim’s identification of the defendant, the Supreme Court affirmed the trial court’s discretionary decision to exclude the expert testimony.
Citing Brodes v. State,6 where we reversed two armed robbery convictions because similar expert testimony was excluded, Frazier argues (and the dissent below opines) that as in Brodes, no evidence here corroborated the victim’s identification of the defendant and that therefore the trial court abused its discretion in excluding Frazier’s expert testimony. We disagree. The record reflects substantial evidence corroborating the victim’s identification of Frazier as the gunman; therefore, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in excluding the expert testimony on eyewitness identification.
*277The victim here called police immediately after the armed robbery, identifying to police the male gender of her attackers, their minority race, their approximate ages (16 to 18 years old), their approximate relative heights, their shirts (the gunman wore a black long-sleeve t-shirt with something in the middle of the shirt and the lookout wore a similarly marked black short-sleeve t-shirt), the hairstyle of the gunman (short), the hairstyle of the lookout (“twist-ies”), the pants worn by the men (the lookout wore jean shorts and the gunman wore jean pants), and the long-barreled gun used by the gunman. She further gave the location where she was robbed and the direction in which the attackers were traveling on foot when they left her.
Within two minutes of receiving this dispatch, an officer in a patrol car nearby came to a street some three to four blocks away from the crime scene in the described escape direction of the attackers (only two minutes walking time), where at this early hour of the morning there were no other individuals anywhere in the area other than Frazier and a second man, which men fit the description given by the victim. Frazier himself was of the approximate height described by the victim, was male, was of the described minority race, had short hair, was wearing jean pants, was of the approximate age, was standing near a discarded long-sleeve black t-shirt (with something in the middle of the shirt), and was near some bushes where an officer found the described gun. This evidence amply corroborated the victim’s subsequent identification of Frazier as the gunman, which identification took place only minutes later when she was immediately brought by other police to Frazier’s location. She similarly identified the other man found by police there, who fit her description of the “lookout.”
Substantial evidence corroborated the victim’s identification, which supported the trial court’s exercise of its discretion to exclude the expert’s testimony. See Howard v. State;7 Allen v. State.8
3. Frazier also contends that the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress the showup evidence used to identify him the night of the robbery. He maintains that the showup was impermis-sibly suggestive and unreliable.
Here, in its order denying the motion, the trial court, in considering the totality of the circumstances in evaluating the likelihood of misidentification, found that
the victim had sufficient opportunity to view the suspects. Her attention was directed at the suspects before, during, *278and after the crime. Immediately before the incident occurred, the victim noticed the defendant and his co-defendant walking near her location. At the time of the incident, the defendant stood in front of the victim as he displayed a weapon. The victim expressed unwavering certainty in her identification of the defendant at the time of the showup and on the witness stand. The victim’s description led to the quick apprehension of the suspects. There was a short interval of time, ten (10) minutes, between the crime and the showup. The witness’s prior description of the defendant was consistent with the defendant’s appearance at the time of the apprehension and the showup. Finally, the officers conducted the showup with sufficient lighting and gave the victim proper, non-suggestive identification instructions.
As noted earlier, when reviewing a trial court’s denial of a motion to suppress, we construe the evidence most favorably to upholding the court’s findings and judgment, and accept the court’s ruling unless clearly erroneous. Anderson v. State,9
A showup identification has been held to be inherently suggestive, but not necessarily inadmissible. Miller v. State.10 A trial court uses a two-part test in determining whether evidence of pre-trial identification should be excluded. Young v. State.11 First, the court determines whether the identification procedure was impermissibly suggestive, and upon a finding in the affirmative, the court considers whether there was a very substantial likelihood of irreparable misidentification. Id. “An identification procedure is impermissibly suggestive when it leads the witness to an ‘all but inevitable identification’ of a defendant as the perpetrator, or is the equivalent of the authorities telling the witness, ‘This is our suspect.’ ” Thompson v. State.12
Here, even assuming without deciding that the circumstances surrounding Frazier’s identification rendered the showup impermis-sibly suggestive, the evidence is inadmissible only if under the totality of the circumstances, there was a substantial likelihood of irreparable misidentification. Miller, supra, 266 Ga. App. at 383 (1). We listed in Miller, id. at 382, factors to be considered by the trial court in evaluating the likelihood of misidentification, including “the *279opportunity of the witness to view the criminal at the time of the crime, the witness’ degree of attention, the accuracy of the witness’ prior description of the criminal, and the level of certainty demonstrated by the witness at the confrontation.” (Punctuation omitted.) Id.
Here, as found by the trial court, the victim identified Frazier within minutes of the offense in close proximity to where the robbery occurred. The victim was able to observe Frazier and his co-defendant for several minutes before the robbery, and also as Frazier held the gun at her head. Further, the victim’s description of Frazier was substantially correct, she demonstrated a high degree of certainty during the identification, and she expressed no hesitancy in identifying Frazier as the person who had robbed her minutes earlier. Given this evidence, the trial court did not clearly err in finding that no substantial likelihood of misidentification occurred, and thus the trial court did not err in denying Frazier’s motion to suppress.

Judgment affirmed.

Andrews, P J., Smith, P. J., Adams and Bernes, JJ., concur. Mikell, J., concurs and concurs specially. Barnes, P. J., concurs in part and dissents in part.

 Burden v. State, 290 Ga. App. 734 (660 SE2d 481) (2008).

 Thomas v. State, 269 Ga. App. 116 (603 SE2d 689) (2004).

 Jones v. State, 214 Ga. App. 788 (449 SE2d 330) (1994).

 Smith v. State, 246 Ga. App. 191, 192 (1) (539 SE2d 881) (2000).

 Johnson v. State, 272 Ga. 254, 257 (1) (526 SE2d 549) (2000).

 Brodes v. State, 250 Ga. App. 323, 325 (1) (551 SE2d 757) (2001).

 Howard, v. State, 286 Ga. 222, 228 (4) (686 SE2d 764) (2009).

 Allen v. State, 268 Ga. App. 519, 527-528 (2) (602 SE2d 250) (2004).

 Anderson v. State, 238 Ga. App. 866, 874 (5) (519 SE2d 463) (1999).

 Miller v. State, 266 Ga. App. 378, 382 (1) (597 SE2d 475) (2004).

 Young v. State, 272 Ga. App. 304, 310 (4) (a) (612 SE2d 118) (2005).

 Thompson v. State, 240 Ga. App. 26, 31-32 (7) (521 SE2d 876) (1999).