Supreme Court of Georgia
Hawkins v. the State.
August 20, 2018818 S.E.2d 513
Summary
The court affirmed Hawkins's convictions for malice murder and firearm offenses. It held that the evidence supported a parties-to-a-crime instruction, and that the unobjected-to omission of an accomplice-corroboration instruction did not affect the trial's outcome because substantial independent evidence corroborated the accomplice's testimony. The court also upheld admission of authenticated Facebook messages and found no abuse of discretion in admitting them despite disclosure four days before trial because Hawkins showed neither prosecutorial bad faith nor prejudice.