WALKER v. STATE (2026)

Jamarius Walker was convicted of malice murder and other crimes in connection with the shooting death of Antonio Geter.¹ On appeal, Walker claims that the trial court erred by allowing a police investigator to testify about his opinion as an expert that Walker was a gang member, as well as by admitting evidence of Walker's prior use of Facebook messaging to arrange gun sales and plan robberies. He also claims that his trial counsel was constitutionally ineffective for failing to move to suppress evidence obtained from Walker's Facebook account.

Those claims fail. The trial court did not abuse its discretion in concluding that the police investigator satisfied the applicable standards for an expert witness. Nor did the court abuse its discretion in admitting Walker's Facebook messages as intrinsic evidence relevant both to his motive to advance Walker's standing in his criminal street gang by robbing and murdering Geter, and to his membership in the gang. And Walker has not established that trial counsel was constitutionally ineffective by failing to move to suppress evidence obtained from Facebook because a motion to suppress on the only basis that Walker offers would not clearly have succeeded. So Walker's convictions are affirmed.

1. Evidence at Trial

The evidence at trial showed the following.

On April 13, 2020, Geter was driven by an acquaintance named Carnell Phillips to a street corner in Augusta. On the way, Geter made a phone call to learn exactly where he was supposed to go, and Phillips heard him mention a “Glock 19” on that call. Phillips realized that Geter was going to buy a gun. He asked Geter if Geter knew the person he was going to buy the gun from, and Geter said he knew him from Facebook. Geter then called a third party to confirm that the gun seller was trustworthy.

Geter and Phillips arrived at a cul-de-sac and encountered a young man later identified as Walker. They pulled over. Walker came to the driver's door, but Phillips told him, “No, go around to the back. I don't have nothing to do with this.” Walker went to the back passenger side and opened the door. In that instant, Phillips heard Walker say, “Give it up,” followed by a gunshot.

Phillips ducked down and drove away, returning fire as he went. From the back seat, Geter told Phillips “he was hit.” Phillips sped out of the neighborhood and, once he got to safety, called the police.

When investigators arrived, they found Geter dead from a single gunshot wound to the chest. Next to him was a handgun that had not been fired. Phillips gave a statement to investigators, which was largely consistent with his trial testimony. He also gave police his own gun, which he had fired defensively as he fled. Footage from a neighbor's surveillance camera generally showed the encounter that Phillips described, although the cameras were not close enough to identify anyone or to show in detail what happened. Based on Phillips's account and the surveillance footage, police tested the doors of Phillips's car for fingerprints, and they recovered prints that were later matched to Walker. Investigators then determined that Geter and Walker had been in communication before the murder. One of the last communications made by Geter's cell phone was with a number associated with Walker. And on March 31, 2020 — two weeks before the murder — a video was sent to Geter's Facebook account that showed Walker pointing two guns at the camera and saying, “Nobody.”

The State introduced evidence showing Walker's connection with a criminal street gang. That evidence came through the testimony of Investigator Stefan Hegg, who was qualified as an expert in gang identifications and gang investigations. Investigator Hegg testified that, in his opinion, Walker was a member of the Sex Money Murder gang, a subset of the United Blood Nation. To support that conclusion, he explained certain symbols and signifiers that are important to the Sex Money Murder gang, including a “pistols up” hand sign and the number five or a five-pointed star, and he explained certain terminology used by the gang, like replacing or crossing out the letter C in messages and using the acronyms B-L-A-T-T, for “Blood Love All The Time,” and S-L-A-T-T, for “Slime Love All The Time.” Investigator Hegg then described photos and messages that had been retrieved from Walker's Facebook account, which were shown to the jury. One photo showed Walker and two other men making signs associated with different Bloods subsets, and the caption said, “we went brazy,” replacing the C in crazy with a B. Other photos showed a suspected high-ranking Bloods member, Christian Robinson, and other men making Bloods-related signs, with captions using gang language. Videos showed Walker, Robinson, and other men holding guns and making gang signs associated with the Bloods and Sex Money Murder.

Through Investigator Hegg, the State also introduced evidence of Walker's history of using Facebook messages to discuss and plan robberies, although Investigator Hegg acknowledged that it was unknown whether any of the message exchanges actually resulted in a robbery. In one exchange from March 25, 2020 — less than a month before Geter was killed — Walker and Robinson planned to rob someone known as “Flip Gee,” who was thought to be carrying about $1000 with him. Walker said, “Let's do it right now,” and Robinson replied, “All right. Finna set it up.” In another exchange that started on the following day, a Facebook user under the name RicoLand Kae messaged Walker that he had “a mean a** lick,” meaning a robbery, in mind. Walker responded, “I need to come down there BSAP,” which Investigator Hegg said was likely a gang-related communication because the A in ASAP was replaced with B for Blood. The next morning, Walker messaged RicoLand Kae, “Me and three was talking about that lick yesterday. We might as well do it.” Walker and other Facebook users then exchanged messages using gang language in which they planned the robbery.

Investigator Hegg also testified about the importance of guns to gangs. He explained that gang members can get guns in different ways, including by stealing them. Referring to the fact that Walker was only 16 years old when he shot Geter, Investigator Hegg noted that “juveniles, especially, are very, very attractive to gangs,” because they are prosecuted less severely for gun offenses. And he discussed more Facebook messages from Walker's account related to this topic. On April 3, 2020 — 10 days before Geter was killed — Walker posted a photo on Facebook advertising a handgun for sale. Other Facebook users messaged Walker that he was likely “trying to slime somebody,” meaning he was using the supposed gun sale as bait for a robbery victim. One user, Kenneth Williams, whom Investigator Hegg described as a “very, very, very famous Blood in Augusta,” messaged Walker, “$80,” and Walker responded, “I'm finna slatt some, twin, just chill.” A similar exchange with another user, Maurice Holland, happened later that same day: Holland inquired about the gun, and Walker replied, “Finna slatt some, twin.” Investigator Hegg explained that in these messages, Williams and Holland were offering to buy the gun, and Walker was telling them that he was actually trying to rob someone and the gun was not really for sale. By contrast, an hour later, when a third user, Devin Allen, offered $100 for the gun, Walker responded, “You tryin’ to buy it?” Investigator Hegg explained that Allen belonged to a gang that was in a feud with Williams's local gang, and that robbing Allen could help Walker gain favor with Williams.

2. Qualification of Expert in Criminal Street Gangs

Walker contends that the trial court erred in qualifying Investigator Hegg as an expert on criminal street gangs. A trial court's decision to allow expert testimony (or not) is reviewed for abuse of discretion. See Peavy v. State, 324 Ga. 295, 300, 929 S.E.2d 761 (2026).

The admissibility of expert testimony is governed by OCGA § 24-7-702(b) (Rule 702(b)). That rule allows a witness who is qualified as an expert “by knowledge, skill, experience, training, or education” to testify in the form of opinion or otherwise if (1) his “scientific, technical, or other specialized knowledge will help the trier of fact to understand the evidence or to determine a fact in issue,” (2) his testimony is “based upon sufficient facts or data,” (3) his testimony is “the product of reliable principles and methods,” and (4) the expert has “reliably applied the principles and methods to the facts of the case.” OCGA § 24-7-702(b). Those standards, which enact the principles identified in Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, 509 U.S. 579, 113 S.Ct. 2786, 125 L.Ed.2d 469 (1993), require the trial court to “act as a gatekeeper” to ensure that an expert is qualified and his testimony is going to be reliable and helpful to the factfinder. Peavy, 324 Ga. at 300, 929 S.E.2d 761. The proponent of the expert testimony has the burden of showing that the proposed expert meets these standards. See id. at 300, 929 S.E.2d 761.

The trial court here did not abuse its discretion in concluding that Investigator Hegg's testimony met these standards. At the pretrial hearing on Walker's motion to exclude Investigator Hegg's testimony, Hegg testified about the bases for his knowledge, skill, experience, and training with respect to criminal gang culture: He had received formal training in the area of gangs and gang identification, and he had been an investigator with the sheriff's office and the district attorney's office for about six and a half years, where he had worked on over 500 investigations concerning gang members, including over 100 in which he was the lead investigator, and had contact with gang members in the area over 300 times. He also worked with the recently created gang unit in the Attorney General's office. As for his methods, Investigator Hegg explained that when trying to identify gang members, he looked for “clusters of identifiers,” a method also used by other gang investigators. An identifier could be a person's name, a photo of someone “throwing up a hand sign,” words and conversations on social media, or conversations that use specific verbiage. And Investigator Hegg explained that, because a single identifier does not mean that a person is a gang member, “we look for the clusters.” To aid in this process, Investigator Hegg referred to a database of gang information that is shared among law enforcement agencies. Considered as a whole, this evidence supported the trial court's decision to allow Investigator Hegg to testify as an expert under Rule 702.

Walker primarily argues that Investigator Hegg's methods — looking for “clusters of identifiers” and reviewing shared law enforcement databases of gang information — were not reliable because they were “subjective”: they were not peer-reviewed, could not be tested, and did not have a known rate of error. But the United States Supreme Court has explained that these considerations “do not constitute a definitive checklist or test,” and that they “may or may not be pertinent in assessing reliability, depending on the nature of the issue, the expert's particular expertise, and the subject of his testimony.” Kumho Tire Co., Ltd. v. Carmichael, 526 U.S. 137, 150, 119 S.Ct. 1167, 143 L.Ed.2d 238 (1999) (cleaned up).² When the subject matter is something sociological, like the behaviors of people in criminal street gangs, the “ideal experimental conditions and controls” that are part of hard scientific study may not apply. See Carrizosa v. Chiquita Brands Int'l, Inc., 47 F.4th 1278, 1317–18 (11th Cir. 2022). Instead, courts evaluating potential expert testimony about gangs may look to other indicia of reliability, like the expert's personal knowledge and experience, training, and education. See id.; Kilpatrick v. Breg, Inc., 613 F.3d 1329, 1336 (11th Cir. 2010). And by those measures, the court here was within its discretion in concluding that Investigator Hegg was qualified. He spent years as an investigator of gang cases, worked on hundreds of cases, and interacted with hundreds of gang members. He demonstrated knowledge of gang culture, indicators, and individual figures. And he explained his methods — which he testified were also used by other gang experts — and how he arrived at his conclusion. So it was not an abuse of discretion for the trial court to conclude that his methods were sufficiently reliable under Rule 702.

Walker's other arguments fail, too. Walker asserts that Investigator Hegg was not an “objective” expert because he worked for the prosecution, but he offers no authority to support that someone who works for law enforcement cannot be an expert, and, to the contrary, such experts are frequently qualified in Georgia courts. See, e.g., Chapple v. State, 323 Ga. 830, 834–35, 926 S.E.2d 616 (2026) (GBI agent qualified as expert to discuss “the use of infrared photography to detect gunshot soot, particles, and residue on black polyester clothing”); Arnold v. State, 321 Ga. 434, 441, 915 S.E.2d 576 (2025) (GBI agent qualified as expert in fingerprint examination); Reddick v. State, 321 Ga. 73, 83, 911 S.E.2d 638 (2025) (GBI agent qualified as expert in bullet-trajectory analysis); Pritchett v. State, 314 Ga. 767, 769, 879 S.E.2d 436 (2022) (GBI agent qualified as expert in crime scene analysis); Clark v. State, 309 Ga. 473, 476, 847 S.E.2d 364 (2020) (four different GBI employees qualified as experts in, respectively, forensic pathology, DNA testing, latent fingerprint analysis, and firearms identification). He contends that Investigator Hegg testified to an “ultimate issue” at trial when he opined that the evidence presented to him showed that Walker was “a member of the Blood Nation, United Blood Nation” and “more specifically ․ Sex Money Murder,” but an expert is allowed to give his opinion about an ultimate issue of fact as long as he does not simply “tell the jury what result to reach.” United States v. Grzybowicz, 747 F.3d 1296, 1310 (11th Cir. 2014). See also OCGA § 24-7-704(a) (“[T]estimony in the form of an opinion or inference otherwise admissible shall not be objectionable because it embraces an ultimate issue to be decided by the trier of fact.”). Finally, he appears to argue that the trial court erred by qualifying Investigator Hegg without applying the Rule 702 standard. It is true that the court did not address that Rule when it qualified Investigator Hegg before trial, but in its order denying Walker's motion for new trial, the court acknowledged that mistake and concluded that Investigator Hegg was qualified under Rule 702. Because the court eventually found that Investigator Hegg was qualified under the right standard, this is not a reversible error. See Bustamente v. State, 323 Ga. 862, 864, 865–66, 928 S.E.2d 106 (2026) (concluding that the trial court did not rely on “improper considerations” in enhancing the defendant's sentence due to lack of remorse because, although the trial court had advised the defendant during the sentencing hearing that an apology before sentencing could “seriously harm [his] appeal,” the court “clarified” in its order denying the motion for new trial that it did not consider the defendant's lack of remorse at the sentencing hearing but rather his lack of remorse at trial and in his police interview); Ash v. State, 312 Ga. 771, 784, 865 S.E.2d 150 (2021) (affirming the trial court's ruling on an evidentiary claim in denying the defendant's motion for new trial, because although the court cited a decision that predated the new Evidence Code, the court “ultimately applied the appropriate evidentiary standard”).

3. Admission of Facebook Messages

Walker claims that the trial court erred in admitting evidence of Walker's prior use of Facebook to sell guns and plan robberies. We review a trial court's evidentiary rulings for abuse of discretion. See Smith v. State, 322 Ga. 881, 883, 922 S.E.2d 406 (2025).

(a) Background

Early in its opening statement, the State said that “the evidence will show that Mr. Jamarius Walker routinely bartered, sold, stole guns from people[.]”Walker objected that the State was referring to uncharged conduct that was “nothing but ․ character assassination” and that the State had not provided the pretrial notice required for introducing evidence of the defendant's “other crimes, wrongs, or acts” under OCGA § 24-4-404(b) (Rule 404(b)). The State responded that Rule 404(b) did not apply because Walker's prior use of Facebook to communicate about buying and selling guns was intrinsic to the charged offenses. In the State's view, the prior messages were part of the same series of transactions as the charged offenses because they showed that Walker was “constantly selling guns” and that “[t]hat's how he lures our victim to the incident location, is under the auspices of purchasing a gun.” The State also argued that evidence of that practice was intrinsic to the gang-related charges, because selling guns was a “common practice” for Walker's gang and he engaged in that practice to increase and maintain his status in the gang. And the State argued that the prior sales were intrinsic to the murder charge because they showed the motive for the killing: “a robbery that turned into a homicide.”

The trial court ruled at trial that the evidence was intrinsic and admissible. The court determined that the evidence was intrinsic because it was being offered “to prove the circumstances immediately surrounding the crime charged, particularly motive.” Speaking to motive, the court noted that the “real issue” in the case would likely be “who was trying to rob whom.” And the court rejected Walker's argument that the evidence was unfairly prejudicial and thus subject to exclusion under OCGA § 24-4-403 (Rule 403). We address the Rule 404(b) and Rule 403 issues in turn.

(b) Rule 404(b)

The question whether this evidence is “intrinsic” is a question about whether Rule 404(b)’s particular limits on admitting evidence apply. Rule 404(b) limits the purposes for which “[e]vidence of other crimes, wrongs, or acts” may be admitted, and it generally requires the State to give the defendant notice before introducing such evidence at trial. OCGA § 24-4-404(b) (emphasis added). But if the evidence in question is not merely evidence of “other” crimes that help prove the charged crimes, but is instead “intrinsic” to the charged crimes, Rule 404(b)’s limits do not apply. See Callaway v. State, 321 Ga. 186, 191, 913 S.E.2d 595 (2025).

Evidence may be considered “intrinsic” to a charged crime when it “pertains to the chain of events explaining the context, motive, and set-up of the crime.” Hamilton v. State, 323 Ga. 779, 788, 927 S.E.2d 222 (2026) (quotation marks omitted). Intrinsic evidence need not relate directly to the victims of the charged offenses to be part of the same “chain of events,” and no “bright-line rule” prescribes how close in time to the charged offenses the evidence must be. See id. (quotation marks omitted). We have said that evidence is intrinsic if it is “linked in time and circumstances with the charged crime,” an “integral and natural part” of an account of the crime, or “necessary to complete the story of the crime for the jury.” Id. (quotation marks omitted). And evidence is “necessary” to tell the story of the offense if it is “reasonably necessary” for the State to complete the story of the crime. Harris v. State, 310 Ga. 372, 379, 850 S.E.2d 77 (2020).

The trial court here determined that Walker's prior use of Facebook to set up robberies with other victims was intrinsic to Walker's charges for murder and participation in criminal street gang activity. We will address this determination as to each crime in that order.³

(i) Murder

The trial court's determination that the Facebook messages were evidence intrinsic to the murder was not an abuse of discretion.

The “story” of this crime, in the State's view, was that Walker shot Geter in the midst of an ongoing scheme he was carrying out in connection with his criminal street gang: He was advertising guns for sale on Facebook to lure victims to an in-person meeting, where he would rob them. And Geter's murder was one such robbery gone wrong. Although the State might have been able to explain what happened with Geter without getting into Facebook messages about other gun sales or potential robberies, those messages — which went back only a few weeks before Geter's murder — could be considered a “natural” part of, or “reasonably necessary” for the State to give the jury the complete picture of, “the chain of events explaining the context, motive, and set-up of the crime.” Hamilton, 323 Ga. at 788, 927 S.E.2d 222 (quotation marks omitted). Put another way, the State's theory was that the Facebook messages were part of an ongoing criminal scheme related to a criminal street gang, of which the transaction with Geter was just the latest part. And we have said that separate offenses with different victims may be intrinsic to a charged offense if they are part of the same “crime spree,” especially where the defendant is shown to have committed similar crimes using similar methods against different victims over a relatively short period. See, e.g., Callaway, 321 Ga. at 192, 913 S.E.2d 595 (evidence that defendant shot two victims from his car in Fulton County was intrinsic to the charged similar shootings of other victims in DeKalb County, where the Fulton County shootings took place within “five miles and four hours” of the charged crimes and evidence relating to the identification of the defendant as the shooter came from the Fulton County victims); Brown v. State, 307 Ga. 24, 29, 834 S.E.2d 40 (2019) (evidence that defendant contacted someone by phone, lured him to leave his home, and then burglarized the home while he was out was intrinsic to charged crimes that also involved “contacting men by telephone to set them up to steal from them”). That is something like what the trial court found was happening here. Walker's ongoing scheme to lure potential robbery victims over Facebook is not exactly like the kind of “crime sprees” we have recognized in our past intrinsic-evidence decisions, but it is not so different that the trial court could not draw a parallel. Thus, although the Facebook messages here may fall close to the line between intrinsic evidence of the charged crime (here, murder) and evidence to which Rule 404(b)’s limits apply, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in concluding that the Facebook messages were intrinsic to the murder under the circumstances of the case.

(ii) Gang Act Charges

The trial court's conclusion that the Facebook messages were intrinsic to Walker's charged violations of the Street Gang Terrorism and Prevention Act stands on even firmer footing. Evidence of Walker's prior gang-related activity was directly relevant to the Gang Act charges because it showed that Walker was part of the gang, and association with a criminal street gang is an element of a Gang Act charge. See OCGA § 16-15-4(a) (making it unlawful “for any person employed by or associated with a criminal street gang to conduct or participate in criminal gang activity through the commission of any offense enumerated in paragraph (1) of” OCGA § 16-15-3); Pierce v. State, 319 Ga. 846, 851, 907 S.E.2d 281 (2024) (to obtain a conviction under the Gang Act, the State must prove, among other things, the defendant's association with the gang); Lupoe v. State, 300 Ga. 233, 245, 794 S.E.2d 67 (2016) (same). And the prior Facebook messages were intrinsic as to those Gang Act offenses. See Pierce, 319 Ga. at 856–57, 907 S.E.2d 281 (evidence of other gang members’ crimes was intrinsic to the Gang Act charges against the defendant, because the State had to prove the existence of a gang and that the gang engages in criminal activity). And the same is true of evidence showing that Walker engaged in actual gun sales over Facebook (as opposed to posting guns for sale to lure victims to rob them). Just like the robberies, Walker's actual gun sales were intrinsic to the Gang Act charges: the gun sales were crimes, because Walker was under 18 and could not legally possess a gun, see OCGA § 16-11-132(b), and they were “criminal gang activity,” because the statutory definition of that term includes “[a]ny criminal offense ․ that involves violence, possession of a weapon, or use of a weapon[.]” OCGA § 16-15-3(1)(J). Because Walker was engaging in criminal gang activity even when he was just selling guns over Facebook, evidence of those sales was relevant to establishing elements of the Gang Act charges, and so the trial court did not abuse its discretion in concluding that the Facebook messages were intrinsic to those charges. See Pierce, 319 Ga. at 856–57, 907 S.E.2d 281.

(c) Rule 403

Walker claims that the prior Facebook messages should have been excluded under Rule 403. That rule says that relevant evidence may be excluded if, among other things, “its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice.” OCGA § 24-4-403. Walker is correct that intrinsic evidence still must satisfy Rule 403, see Williams v. State, 302 Ga. 474, 485, 807 S.E.2d 350 (2017), but he has not shown that his prior Facebook messages had to be excluded under that rule. The probative value of the messages was high: they tended to show that Walker was in a criminal street gang, which was an element that the State had to prove, and they also tended to show his motive for robbery and murder. And although evidence that Walker was in a gang was certainly prejudicial, the danger of unfair prejudice was low, because the Facebook messages were relevant to and highly probative of Walker's guilt of the charged crimes. See Pierce, 319 Ga. at 851, 858, 907 S.E.2d 281 (risk of unfair prejudice from evidence of defendant's gang membership did not outweigh “significant probative value” because defendant's membership in a gang was an element the State had to prove); Fleming v. State, 306 Ga. 240, 245, 830 S.E.2d 129 (2019) (risk of unfair prejudice from evidence of defendant's gang membership did not outweigh probative value because defendant's gang affiliation “establish[ed] a connection between [defendant] and the shooters” and “provide[d] context for his participation in” the charged offenses). The evidence that Walker was in a gang was not evidence of “scant or cumulative probative force, dragged in by the heels for the sake of its prejudicial effect” — that is, the kind of evidence Rule 403 was designed to exclude. See Pierce, 319 Ga. at 858, 907 S.E.2d 281. And in the case of Facebook messages showing actual gun sales, the danger of unfair prejudice was even lower, because selling or buying guns does not inherently reflect badly on a person's character, see Thompson v. State, 302 Ga. 533, 543, 807 S.E.2d 899 (2017), and a minor-in-possession crime is much less serious than murder, see Willis v. State, 315 Ga. 19, 28, 880 S.E.2d 158 (2022) (evidence of defendant's prior convictions for relatively minor crimes was unlikely to sway the jury against him given the seriousness of the charged offenses). So the trial court did not abuse its discretion in concluding that Rule 403 did not require it to exclude the Facebook messages.

4. Ineffective Assistance of Counsel

Walker claims that his trial counsel provided constitutionally ineffective assistance by not moving to suppress the Facebook messages on the ground that the search warrants that produced them were not supported by probable cause. To establish that counsel was constitutionally ineffective, a defendant must show both that counsel's performance was professionally deficient and that he suffered prejudice as a result. See Strickland v. Washing-ton, 466 U.S. 668, 687, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 (1984); Williams v. State, 324 Ga. 15, 20, 928 S.E.2d 75 (2026). To show deficiency, the appellant must show that his lawyer performed “in an objectively unreasonable way,” Heyward v. State, 319 Ga. 588, 592, 905 S.E.2d 590 (2024) (quotation marks omitted), which generally means showing that “no reasonable lawyer would have done what his lawyer did, or would have failed to do what his lawyer did not,” Evans v. State, 315 Ga. 607, 611, 884 S.E.2d 334 (2023) (quotation marks omitted). To show prejudice, he must show that, but for counsel's deficient performance, there was a “reasonable probability” that the result of the trial would have been different. Heyward, 319 Ga. at 592, 905 S.E.2d 590 (quotation marks omitted).

The messages from Walker's Facebook account were obtained under two search warrants. In the affidavit for the first warrant, the requesting officer attested that (1) Phillips said that while he was driving Geter, he heard Geter on the phone with an unknown man say he would be at their destination with a gun to sell; (2) Phillips said that Geter was shot at their destination by an unknown man who had touched or opened the doors of Phillips's car; and (3) Walker's fingerprints were found on Phillips's car doors. The second warrant was almost the same, except that rather than mentioning the fingerprints, it just said the shooter was “later identified as Jamarius Walker.” Both warrant applications requested Facebook records associated with three user IDs: ola.walk.52, LILGETER, and espn.walk.1, and both said that investigators wanted those records “due to communication that could have occurred between Geter and Walker and other[s] associated with this investigation.” At the motion-for-new-trial hearing, counsel testified that he did not move to suppress the messages because he believed the warrants were supported by probable cause.

When a defendant claims that his counsel performed deficiently by failing to file a motion to suppress, he must show that a motion to suppress on the “specific basis” that he proposes “would clearly have succeeded” if counsel had raised it. Moss v. State, 322 Ga. 757, 767, 922 S.E.2d 56 (2025) (quotation marks omitted). The only specific basis for suppression that Walker proposes is that the warrant applications did not show with evidence that Walker and Geter had communicated through Facebook, but instead said only that such communications “could” have happened. In Walker's view, that means the warrants lacked probable cause because they were “merely relying on possible evidence of criminal activity” with “no concrete link between what officers knew at the time and the information that was to be found.”

A motion to suppress on that basis would not clearly have succeeded. Probable cause does not require proof that a search will uncover evidence of a crime, but only “the fair probability on which reasonable and prudent people, not legal technicians, act.” Jones v. State, 321 Ga. 137, 142, 913 S.E.2d 700 (2025) (cleaned up). And when a magistrate reviews a warrant application to determine whether probable cause exists, he may take into account not only all the evidence set forth in the affidavit, but also reasonable inferences that can be drawn from the affidavit, “factual and practical considerations of everyday life,” and “common-sense conclusions about human behavior.” Id. (quotation marks omitted). Under that standard, the warrant applications here were supported by probable cause. Consider what the magistrate had in front of him. The probable-cause statements in the applications said that Geter got a ride with Phillips to a specific location, that along the way Geter spoke on the phone to someone who said he would be at that location with a gun to sell, and that when Geter and Phillips arrived at the location, Geter was shot by Walker. Based on those facts, a magistrate could reasonably conclude that a search for communications between Geter and Walker had a fair probability of turning up evidence of a crime. And the magistrate could presume, as a “practical consideration of everyday life,” id., that many people use Facebook to communicate, and so there was a fair probability that Geter and Walker did, too. The fact that the magistrate and law enforcement were not certain that the search would turn anything up did not mean there was not a “fair probability” that it would. See, e.g., Pugh v. State, 318 Ga. 706, 714, 899 S.E.2d 653 (2024) (warrant for defendant's cell phone records was supported by probable cause where the affidavit showed evidence that the defendant was connected to the crime and that he was using his cell phone around the time of the crime, even though the affidavit did not tie the phone records themselves to the investigation of the crime). A reasonable lawyer could therefore determine, as Walker's counsel did, that a motion to suppress was not likely to be granted. This claim of error therefore fails. See Moss, 322 Ga. at 768–69, 922 S.E.2d 56 (appellant did not show his counsel was ineffective for failing to file a motion to suppress because “a reasonable lawyer could look at the search warrant in this case and conclude that it satisfied the Fourth Amendment, or at least that a motion to suppress asserting the contrary claim would not clearly succeed”).

Walker also claims — in one half of one sentence — that the warrants lacked particularity. See US Const. Amend. IV (a search warrant must “particularly describ[e] the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized”); Jones, 321 Ga. at 147–48, 913 S.E.2d 700. But “[i]t is the appellant's burden to show error by identifying in the record the thing that he challenges on appeal and citing authority to show why that thing represents an error.” Williams, 324 Ga. at 21, 928 S.E.2d 75. Walker does not make any separate argument about particularity, discuss or quote the warrants’ statements of places to be searched or things to be seized, or cite any authority other than the general particularity standard. To the extent that Walker has asserted a separate claim that counsel should have moved to suppress the Facebook messages because the warrants lacked particularity, he has not met his burden to show that counsel performed deficiently.

Judgment affirmed.

FOOTNOTES

1.   Geter was killed on April 13, 2020. On October 25, 2022, a Richmond County grand jury indicted Walker for malice murder (Count 1), felony murder predicated on armed robbery (Count 3), felony murder predicated on aggravated assault (Count 5), two counts of possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony (Counts 7 and 10), aggravated assault against another victim, Carnell Phillips (Count 8), criminal damage to property in the second degree (Count 11), and six counts of violating the Street Gang Terrorism and Prevention Act related to the other charges (Counts 2, 4, 6, 9, 12, and 13). Counts 11, 12, and 13 — the criminal-damage count and two of the Gang Act counts — were nolle prossed before trial. Walker was tried before a jury from January 22 to 24, 2024, and he was found guilty on all remaining counts. The trial court initially sentenced Walker on January 24, 2024, but it later issued a corrected sentence after Walker and the State raised certain sentencing errors while litigating Walker's motion for new trial. After making those corrections, the trial court sentenced Walker to life in prison for malice murder, 20 years in prison for the associated Gang Act count, to be served consecutively to the sentence for malice murder, 20 years in prison for aggravated assault, to be served concurrently, and five years of probation for each of the firearm-possession counts, each to be served consecutively, for a total sentence of life in prison plus 20 years followed by 10 years of probation. The remaining counts merged for sentencing or were vacated by operation of law.The court's sentence-correcting order is inconsistent as to whether Walker's 20-year sentence for aggravated assault will run concurrently with his life sentence for malice murder or concurrently with his 20-year sentence for the Gang Act count. Because neither party has raised this issue on appeal, and because it does not affect Walker's total sentence, we do not resolve that inconsistency.Walker filed a timely motion for new trial, which he later amended through new counsel. The trial court held an evidentiary hearing on the motion and then denied it on July 1, 2025. Walker filed a timely notice of appeal, which he amended later that same day. The case was docketed to the April 2026 term of this Court and submitted for a decision on the briefs.

2.   Because Rules 701 and 702 of our Evidence Code are modeled after Rules 701 and 702 of the Federal Rules of Evidence, “we look to the decisions of federal appellate courts, especially the United States Supreme Court and the Eleventh Circuit, that have construed and applied these Rules.” Miller v. Golden Peanut Co., LLC, 317 Ga. 22, 26, 891 S.E.2d 776 (2023).

3.   Evidence does not always have to be intrinsic to every charged crime in order to be admissible as intrinsic evidence. See, e.g., Pierce v. State, 319 Ga. 846, 856–57, 907 S.E.2d 281 (2024) (concluding that evidence of criminal gang activity committed by other gang members was intrinsic to the Gang Act charge against the defendant because it went to the existence of a criminal street gang, while not addressing whether that evidence was intrinsic to the other charges against the defendant). But here, we address whether the Facebook evidence was intrinsic to both the murder and the gang charges because that question matters for our consideration of whether the evidence satisfies Rule 403, as explained further below.

Pinson, Justice.

All the Justices concur.