McDowell v. Georgia
Annotate this CaseJames McDowell was convicted by jury for the 2002 shooting death of Eric Kemp. In his sole enumeration of error, McDowell contended that, due to the destruction of the .40-caliber handgun prior to trial, the State could not prove an appropriate chain of custody for the handgun at trial, and the trial court erred by allowing the admission of evidence of that handgun. The Georgia Supreme Court found that the relevant portion of the record on appeal revealed that, when the handgun at issue was initially recovered from the car in which McDowell was a passenger, the serial number engraved on the gun was documented by police in the incident report. The gun was later transported to the GBI for ballistics testing, and, again, the serial number of the gun was recorded by the GBI. At some point towards the end of 2012, the gun was inadvertently destroyed, and, though it had been made available to the defense prior to destruction, it was not available at the time of the trial. The Court found only evidence relating to the handgun was admitted at trial, not the handgun itself. "So, McDowell’s argument, which is based on proving the chain of custody of the handgun, is generally misplaced. And, even if we assume without deciding that McDowell’s chain of custody argument could somehow apply to the evidence concerning the handgun which was admitted at trial, as opposed to the handgun itself, McDowell’s argument would still fail." Judgement was affirmed.
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