Court Opinion

ID: 9623426
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 06:33:14.038589+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:02:16.226192
License: Public Domain

Benham:, Justice,
dissenting.
Assuming, without deciding, that counsel provided deficient performance when he failed to timely object to the firearms expert’s hearsay testimony that the manufacturer designed the holster for a Colt .45 gun17 and that the testimony was inadmissible,18 I respectfully disagree with the majority’s conclusion in Division 2 that the testimony was prejudicial. First, the impact of the hearsay testimony was substantially mitigated on cross-examination when the firearms expert testified that the holster could have accommodated other caliber guns made by 10 to 12 different manufacturers, as long as the gun had a 1911 frame similar to the Colt .45. Based on this cross-examination testimony, the jury need not “only” have concluded that the holster connected appellant to a .45 caliber gun.
There was other evidence connecting appellant, a known drug dealer, to the crime that may have factored more heavily into the jury’s deliberations than the holster. Stokes v. State, 281 Ga. 825 (8) (c) (642 SE2d 82) (2007) (admission of hearsay not prejudicial where there was other evidence of facts at issue). Prior to the murder, appellant had a violent history with Jones, threatening to kill him on at least one occasion and beating and pistol-whipping him on another occasion in August 2003 just a month before the murder on September 27, 2003. There was evidence that the hostility between the accused and the victim was related to their shared romantic interest in Boyd who was an eyewitness to the murder. Boyd testified that, moments before the murder, appellant said Jones was a “dead man,” ran out of the apartment with a gun to where Jones was waiting in a *395vehicle for Boyd, and shot Jones three times. The coroner confirmed that Jones was killed with bullet wounds to the head and trunk of the body. The police found .45 caliber bullets and shells at the scene, including the interior of the vehicle in which Jones’ body lay. The firearms examiner testified that all the bullets were fired from the same weapon. Thus, with or without evidence of the holster itself or hearsay evidence that the manufacturer designed the holster for a Colt .45 gun, a jury could have, with reasonable probability, concluded that appellant shot Jones and, because of the .45 caliber bullets at the scene, that the murder weapon was a .45 caliber gun. It has not been shown but for the admission of the hearsay testimony of the holster’s design that appellant would have been acquitted. Strickland v. Washington, 466 U. S. 668 (104 SC 2052, 80 LE2d 674) (1984). Thus, appellant cannot prevail on his claim of ineffective assistance of counsel.
Decided March 17, 2008
Reconsideration denied April ll, 2008.
Gerard B. Kleinrock, for appellant.
Gwendolyn Keyes Fleming, District Attorney, Barbara B. Conroy, Assistant District Attorney, Thurbert E. Baker, Attorney General, Mary N. Kimmey, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee.
I am authorized to state that Presiding Justice Hunstein and Justice Carley join this dissent.

 When asked what type of holster was found in appellant’s apartment, the expert testified:
It’s a Galco brand leather holster.... And when this holster was submitted, I called the Galco company and talked to a technical representative and asked them what model of weapon this holster was designed for. And he related to me that it was designed for a Colt .45 caliber pistol with a three and a half inch barrel.

 See Velazquez v. State, 282 Ga. 871 (3) (655 SE2d 806) (2008) (expert’s reliance on hearsay goes to the weight of the expert’s opinion, not its admissibility); Brewer v. State, 280 Ga. 18 (2) (622 SE2d 348) (2005); Roebuck v. State, 277 Ga. 200 (1) (586 SE2d 651) (2003).