COLLIER v. STATE (2026)

Appellant Justin Collier appeals his convictions for felony murder and other crimes related to the shooting death of Joshua Torrance.¹ On appeal, Collier argues that the trial court erred by denying two of his motions for mistrial — one that he made during the State's opening statement and one that he made during the State's rebuttal in closing. Collier also argues that the trial court abused its discretion by admitting into evidence audio recordings of two jail calls Collier made. For the reasons stated below, we affirm.

1. The evidence at trial showed the following. At the time of the crimes, Collier was a 19-year-old college student who bought and sold cell phones as a “side hustle,” using various apps like OfferUp, Craigslist, and Facebook Marketplace.

On the morning of the shooting, Torrance reached out to Collier on OfferUp regarding an iPhone that Collier had posted for sale. Over messages exchanged within the app, Collier, who used the alias “Isaiah Goggins,” agreed to sell Torrance the phone.² Torrance gave Collier the address of his apartment complex but then proposed meeting at a fast-food restaurant next door, and Collier agreed.

Security footage obtained from that restaurant, which was admitted into evidence and played for the jury, showed that Torrance arrived on foot at 9:32 a.m. and waited on the restaurant's outdoor patio for Collier to arrive. At 9:33 a.m., Collier's gray Kia sedan ³ pulled into the restaurant's drive-through lane and stopped adjacent to the patio, with only the rear of Collier's vehicle visible in frame on the recording. Torrance then approached Collier's driver's side door, and the two conversed there until 9:39 a.m., when Torrance suddenly sprinted away towards the road. Collier's vehicle then circled the restaurant and turned onto the road in the direction of Torrance's apartment without stopping.

Torrance's sister testified that Torrance returned to their apartment and showed her an iPhone but left again a short while later. Though there was no footage of Torrance's second encounter with Collier outside Torrance's apartment complex, additional footage from security cameras at the fast-food restaurant and an adjacent pharmacy showed what happened shortly thereafter. At 10:15 a.m., Torrance reentered the restaurant's parking lot through some bushes. After jogging for a few paces, Torrance turned to look behind him and then slowed to a walk as he moved past the restaurant's drive-through window. A few moments later, Collier entered the parking lot along the same path and began to run after Torrance.⁴ When the two were about five parking spaces apart, Torrance turned again, saw Collier, and then ran out of frame as Collier chased after him.

A separate camera on the restaurant's left-rear corner recorded Collier jumping over some low bushes in pursuit of Torrance. A third camera on the restaurant's right side captured Torrance running at a full sprint from behind the restaurant and into the drive-through lane of an adjacent pharmacy, leaving the frame. Collier ran after him, then stopped, extended his right hand, and shot at Torrance from a distance of at least ten to 15 yards. Collier then turned around and walked back the way he came, retracing his route around the restaurant and back toward the apartment complex.

A camera from the rear of the pharmacy captured Torrance's flight from a different angle as he sprinted along the drive-through lane, but the recording froze for several seconds while Torrance was still running. When the recording resumed, Torrance was no longer in frame. The same camera showed that about 90 seconds later, Collier's Kia sedan drove the wrong way past the pharmacy's drive-through window and down the lane, following Torrance's path.

Torrance was soon found by a pair of maintenance workers lying on the ground and not moving, and the workers immediately informed police officers nearby. Torrance was then transported to the hospital but was pronounced dead shortly thereafter. A subsequent autopsy revealed that he died from a single gunshot wound to his back.

Investigators found a single shell casing near where Collier shot at Torrance, and an expert opined that this shell casing and the bullet retrieved from Torrance's body were both fired from a Glock nine-millimeter pistol. Torrance did not have a firearm on him when he was found, and no other firearm, shell casings, or bullets were found near him or along the route that he and Collier had run.

On May 31, 2018 — the day after Torrance was shot — a police officer in downtown Atlanta observed Collier's vehicle parked on the wrong side of the road. The officer observed a male approach Collier's vehicle with a large sum of money in his hand and engage in some type of transaction with Collier, and the officer further noted that there were several cell phone boxes and an empty box for a Glock handgun in Collier's Kia. Though the officer issued Collier a traffic citation, he did not arrest Collier at that time because Collier was not yet a suspect in Torrance's killing. Collier later turned himself in.

Collier testified in his own defense at trial as follows. Collier met with Torrance at the restaurant to sell him an iPhone. According to Collier, he and Torrance initially had a friendly conversation while Torrance confirmed that the phone worked as advertised. But rather than paying Collier, Torrance suddenly ran away with the phone.

Collier “saw where he ran” and drove to Torrance's apartment complex to look for him. According to Collier, he “just ․ want[ed] [his] property back,” and he “was mad.” “At that point,” he had not seen whether Torrance had a gun, and Torrance “didn't seem ․ too big of a threat.” Collier pulled into the complex's parking lot, parked and walked around, looking for Torrance. Collier called Torrance twice, but no one answered. After looking for Torrance for about 20 minutes, Collier got back in his car, was “frustrated,” and decided to leave. But as he left, Torrance “walked right in front of [his] car.”

Collier honked his horn, parked, got out of his car, and said, “bro, give me my f**king phone back.” According to Collier, Torrance responded “f**k you,” and “ran off” on a “trail” to the fast-food restaurant. Collier “still wanted [his] property back,” so he followed Torrance up the trail. When he got to the restaurant's parking lot, he shouted, “bro give me my s**t back.” Torrance “t[ook] off,” and Collier “started chasing after him.” Collier then “saw him look back and fire a shot, and that's when [Collier] stopped” and “fired one shot.”

Collier testified that he was “scared” and responded “no” when asked if he would have shot his gun if Torrance had not shot at him. Collier stated it “was [his] first time ever shooting a gun” and that he was “not about that life.” In response to a question from his counsel, Collier conceded that the pharmacy's security footage showed his vehicle traveling down the drive-through lane using the same path as the victim. Collier testified that he “was looking for ․ [the] victim” and that he “was scared at that time.” According to Collier, he did not think he had hit Torrance, and so he did not realize that he had shot and killed Torrance when he left the scene.

2. In his first enumeration of error, Collier contends that the trial court abused its discretion by denying a motion for mistrial he made during the prosecutor's opening statement. For the reasons below, we disagree.

(a) The circumstances of Collier's first motion for mistrial were as follows. During the State's opening, the prosecutor described how a detective identified Collier as “Isaiah Goggins” (the alias of the person who communicated with Torrance on OfferUp). According to the prosecutor, records obtained from OfferUp showed that the Isaiah Goggins account was registered to “justincollier2@aol.com” and had an associated phone number. The prosecutor then told the jury that the detective took the email and phone number he received from OfferUp and “r[a]n[ ] [them] through GCIC. That's the Georgia Crime Information Center. If you ever get pulled over and they ask for your license —” At that point, Collier's attorney interrupted and asked the judge if counsel could approach the bench, but their subsequent conference was not transcribed by the court reporter.

When the State resumed its opening, the prosecutor continued where he had left off and said, “if you ever get pulled over and the officer asks you for your driver's license and registration, he's going to run you through that system. And so he ran ․ Collier through that system and found that” the phone number the detective had obtained from OfferUp matched the number on Collier's driver's license application. The prosecutor then completed his opening statement without further objections or interruption.

After two witnesses had testified,⁵ Collier's counsel again asked to approach the bench. The trial judge instead excused the jury and said:

The first thing I want to put on the record is there was a first objection made by [Collier's counsel] in the State's opening that wasn't able to be transcribed by the court reporter. The basis of the objection ․ was a reference by the State to the ․ GCIC[.] ․ [T]he objection was essentially saying that this implied that [Collier] had a criminal history of some kind.

The court then asked Collier's counsel if he wanted to be heard further on the matter, and Collier's counsel stated that it was “improper to refer to the GCIC” because it “suggest[s] that someone has a record.” After some further argument, counsel stated, “to perfect the record, ․ and you said we would do it at a later time, I have to move for a mistrial for that reference.”

After hearing argument from both parties, the court stated that, in some instances, running a GCIC record check “simply will have a photo from your driver's license.” As a result, the court explained, the GCIC does not “exclusively contain[ ] people who have been arrested before.” Though the court agreed that the State's opening “could [have] be[en] cleaner,” it stated:

I think there's a way that we can remove any potential impressions and keep it clean. So I think we would want to elicit that [a person can be in the GCIC's database without a criminal history] at some point during the State's case, but I'm not seeing the manifest necessity that demands a mistrial at this point based on the reference to the GCIC itself ․ in [the State's] opening.

The trial court then denied Collier's motion for mistrial. Collier's counsel did not request a curative instruction, and none was given.

Later in its case in chief, the State called Detective Kyle Kleinhenz to the stand. Detective Kleinhenz testified that he received information from OfferUp showing that the Isaiah Goggins account was registered to “justincollier2@aol.com,” and he obtained the account's registered phone number. Detective Kleinhenz then explained that he ran the information he obtained from OfferUp through a “database”⁶ and learned that the phone number associated with the Isaiah Goggins account matched the number Collier had provided to the State when he obtained his driver's license.

Additionally, during Collier's cross-examination, Collier conceded that he sold a fake phone to another person on June 4, 2018 (four days after he shot Torrance), and that he pleaded guilty to theft by deception in relation to this sale on July 11, 2018. A certified copy of Collier's misdemeanor sentence was admitted at the close of his cross-examination without objection.

After the close of evidence, the court instructed the jury as part of its charge that it was required to “decide[ ] this case based on the evidence” and that “[e]vidence does not include the ․ opening or closing remarks of the attorneys[.]”

(b) “We review a trial court's denial of a motion for mistrial for abuse of discretion, and the trial court's exercise of its discretion will not be disturbed on appeal unless a mistrial is essential to preserve the defendant's right to a fair trial.” Charles v. State, 315 Ga. 651, 657, 884 S.E.2d 363 (2023) (cleaned up). “When determining whether the trial court abused its discretion, this Court will consider the allegedly improper statement, other evidence against the accused, and the actions of the trial court and counsel dealing with the impropriety.” Gobert v. State, 311 Ga. 305, 313, 857 S.E.2d 647 (2021) (cleaned up).

Pretermitting whether Collier's motion was timely, the trial court did not manifestly abuse its discretion by denying Collier's motion for mistrial. Though the prosecutor noted in his opening statement that the detective ran the email address and phone number he received from OfferUp through the GCIC, the prosecutor made clear that the information the detective found in the GCIC's database came from Collier's driver's license application, rather than any prior criminal history. This point was reiterated during Detective Kleinhenz's testimony. And even if the jury had inferred from the prosecutor's initial reference to the GCIC that Collier had a criminal history, the jury also heard evidence that Collier received a traffic citation the day after the shooting and that he pleaded guilty to theft by deception. And so, to the extent the jury inferred Collier had a criminal history, that inference was consistent with other evidence admitted at trial.

Moreover, the evidence against Collier was substantial. As recounted above, it showed that Collier, frustrated that one of his phones had just been stolen, searched for Torrance, and, upon finding him, chased him from the apartment complex, through the parking lot of the fast-food restaurant and into the drive-through lane of a pharmacy before shooting him. Even after Collier left, he immediately came back in his car and drove the wrong way through the drive-through lane in an apparent attempt to continue his search for Torrance. And although Collier claimed that he shot Torrance in self-defense after Torrance shot at him, no gun was found near Torrance's body or along the path of the chase. In this context, the prosecutor's passing remark about the GCIC did not deprive Collier of his right to a fair trial. As such, the trial court did not abuse its discretion by denying Collier's first motion for mistrial. See Byrd v. State, 323 Ga. 273, 278, 925 S.E.2d 102 (2026) (holding that the trial court did not manifestly abuse its discretion by denying a motion for mistrial following brief testimony from a witness that the defendant had previously been in prison).

3. Collier next argues that the trial court erred by admitting recordings of two phone calls Collier made while in jail. Collier contends that the admission of these calls violated OCGA § 24-4-403 (“Rule 403”), which provides in part that “[r]elevant evidence may be excluded if its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice.” We disagree and accordingly affirm the trial court's ruling.

As recounted above, Collier testified that while he was chasing Torrance, Torrance turned and fired at him, and Collier fired once in response. During Collier's cross-examination, however, the State introduced recordings of two jail calls Collier made to a “friend” named “Amos,” as impeachment evidence. In the first call, Collier told Amos that he “ain't shoot nobody.” In the second call, Collier again asserted that he “ain't do s**t.” Amos then said, “I know, you was with me,” and Collier responded, “exactly.” When asked about the second call, Collier testified that he and Amos “were obviously playing ․ around.”

Collier's counsel objected to the first call, claiming that it was “not really relevant” and that it “could have a prejudicial effect on the jury.” The court denied Collier's relevance objection, stating that Collier was “making a statement about what happened.” When Collier's counsel reiterated his objection, the court noted his “[o]bjection on relevance [to] the first call ․ for the record.” Collier then objected to the admission of both calls on grounds not relevant to the appeal, but the court resolved this second objection and both calls were admitted.

We assume without deciding that Collier's claim is preserved for ordinary appellate review and accordingly review the trial court's decision for an abuse of discretion. See Whited v. State, 315 Ga. 598, 605, 883 S.E.2d 342 (2023) (applying an abuse of discretion standard to a preserved Rule 403 claim concerning the admission of a jail call). We have explained that “exclusion of evidence under Rule 403 is an extraordinary remedy which should be used only sparingly.” Pierce v. State, 319 Ga. 846, 857, 907 S.E.2d 281 (2024). “And when we review a trial court's admission of evidence under Rule 403, we look at the evidence in a light most favorable to its admission, maximizing its probative value and minimizing its undue prejudicial impact.” Id.

The trial court did not abuse its discretion by admitting the first jail call under Rule 403 because the probative value of the call was not substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice. We have explained that the “probative value of evidence is a combination of its logical force to prove a point and the need at trial for evidence on that point.” State v. Flowers, 320 Ga. 882, 889, 912 S.E.2d 527 (2025). Here, Collier's statement that he “ain't shoot nobody” proved that he had offered a prior, inconsistent account of the incident, and the State needed this evidence at trial because it directly contradicted Collier's testimony that he had shot Torrance in self-defense. This recording was therefore highly probative. And Collier has not shown how evidence that he gave a different account of the shooting to his friend was unfairly prejudicial. See Williams v. State, ––– Ga. ––––, ––––, 934 S.E.2d 487, 497 (2026) (“Evidence is not unfairly prejudicial for purposes of Rule 403 simply because it inculpates the defendant, as all evidence that inculpates the defendant is ‘inherently prejudicial.’ ” (quoting Wilson v. State, 315 Ga. 728, 738, 883 S.E.2d 802 (2023))).

Because the probative value of Collier's first jail call was high and was not substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, the trial court did not abuse its discretion by declining to exclude the call under Rule 403. See Early v. State, 313 Ga. 667, 671, 872 S.E.2d 705 (2022) (holding that the trial court did not abuse its discretion by overruling a Rule 403 objection to the admission of a video of the defendant while in jail in which the defendant made a statement that was inconsistent with his claim of self-defense at trial); Smith v. State, 302 Ga. 717, 724, 808 S.E.2d 661 (2017) (holding that the trial court did not abuse its discretion by admitting the recording of a jail call over a Rule 403 objection, where the defendant's statement on the call that he “didn't do it” was “not consistent with ․ the defense theory of justification presented at trial”).

As for Collier's claim regarding the second call, we note that though he enumerated as error the admission of both calls, his brief only included legal argument regarding the admission of the first call. But even construing his arguments with respect to the first call as applying to both calls, we conclude that he has failed to show an abuse of discretion regarding the admission of the second call for the same reasons his claim failed with respect to the first call.

In the second call, Collier again denied involvement in the shooting altogether, stating that he “ain't do s**t.” Amos then appeared to set up a false alibi by saying, “I know, you was with me,” to which Collier responded, “exactly.” As noted above, Collier testified that he and his friend were “playing around.” This presents two possibilities: either Collier and his friend were indeed planning a false alibi defense that Collier ultimately abandoned before trial, or he and his friend were not being serious. But even if the jury construed Collier's statements as a plan to raise a false alibi defense when, as Collier testified, he was really just “playing ․ around,” the resulting unfair prejudice would be minimal: the State had already properly impeached Collier's claim of self-defense using the recording of the first call, and so the effect of the second call was comparatively minor. As such, Collier's claim regarding the second call fails as well.

4. In his final claim of error, Collier contends that the trial court abused its discretion by denying a motion for mistrial Collier made during the State's closing argument. We disagree.

As mentioned above, Collier testified that he had never fired a gun before he shot Torrance and that he was “not about that life.” During its closing argument, the State questioned the veracity of those statements by referencing the surveillance video showing Collier calmly walking back to his car after the shooting, stating:

He knows he shot somebody. This ․ theory of [“]I didn't know ․ I shot him,[”] he knew. And that's why ․ after he shoots and he's just walking calmly as if nothing happened, he's trying to avoid drawing attention to himself. Okay. ․ [H]e can't have it both ways, ․ [“]I'm not ․ about that life. I bring this gun ․ to these serious situations. I get shot at for the first time, and I just ․ walk calmly ․ back to ․ my car.[”] That's ․ inconsistent with common sense.․ If ․ this is the first time something happened to you, and ․ you got shot at, you're trying to get out of there the fastest way you can. You're not walking back to your car calmly. You're running ․ to your car so you can hurry up and get away, especially if you believe him where he says, [“]well, I don't know ․ where he went.[”] You're not trying to walk back to the car all calm when this is the first time in your life you ever ․ been shot at and you're not [“]about that life[”] and all of that? No. No.

At this point, Collier's counsel interjected and called for a bench conference, where he objected and moved for a mistrial on grounds that the State “suggested that [Collier] has [been] shot [at] on another occasion.” The State responded that its intent was to argue that, if it was truly someone's first time being shot at, “[y]ou're not going to be walking back to the car. You're going to hurry up and get out of that situation as soon as you can.”

After hearing from both parties, the trial court overruled Collier's objection and denied his motion for mistrial. The trial court's reasoning for its ruling is unclear, however, as it was not fully transcribed by the court reporter: “(Inaudible) prior conviction which is — (inaudible). Objection denied.” The trial court then said before the jury, “Mr. Lee, you can continue. The jury will recall the evidence that was presented.”

On appeal, Collier contends that the prosecutor's suggestion that Collier had previously been involved in a shooting was an improper reference to “prejudicial matters which are not in evidence,” in violation of OCGA § 17-8-75, and as such, the trial court was either required to issue a curative instruction sufficient to “remove the improper impression from [the jurors’] minds” or to “order a mistrial.” OCGA § 17-8-75. Because, in Collier's view, the trial court did not issue any curative instruction, it was required to order a mistrial, and its failure to do so was an abuse of discretion. See State v. Jackson, 306 Ga. 626, 629, 831 S.E.2d 798 (2019) (“A decision whether to grant a mistrial based on an improper argument is reserved to the broad discretion of the trial court.”).

We have explained that a “prosecutor has wide latitude in the conduct of closing argument,” and that although a prosecutor “is prohibited from injecting into closing argument extrinsic and prejudicial materials that have no basis in the evidence, a prosecutor is allowed to argue inferences that can reasonably be made from the evidence presented at trial.” Mitchell v. State, 323 Ga. 772, 778, 927 S.E.2d 212 (2026) (cleaned up). Because that is what the prosecutor did here, no curative instruction or order of mistrial was required.

The prosecutor's argument invited the jury to draw a reasonable inference from evidence presented at trial — including Collier's own testimony that he had never been involved in a shooting and the security footage — that Collier was not being truthful. We see no “statements of prejudicial matters which are not in evidence” here. OCGA § 17-8-75. See Mitchell, 323 Ga. at 778, 927 S.E.2d 212 (holding that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in overruling an objection to facts not in evidence where the disputed remark was the result of a reasonable inference the prosecutor drew from facts in evidence); Ridley v. State, 315 Ga. 452, 453, 883 S.E.2d 357 (2023) (same). As such, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying Collier's motion for mistrial.

Judgment affirmed.

FOOTNOTES

1.   The crimes occurred on May 30, 2018. On September 14, 2018, a Fulton County grand jury returned a four-count indictment charging Collier with malice murder (Count 1), felony murder (Count 2), aggravated assault (Count 3), and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony (Count 4). At the conclusion of a trial held from June 12 to June 16, 2023, the jury found Collier guilty of felony murder, aggravated assault, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony, but not guilty of malice murder. The trial court sentenced Collier to life in prison for felony murder and a suspended term of five years in prison for possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony, and it merged Collier's aggravated assault charge into his conviction for felony murder.On July 17, 2023, Collier filed a motion for new trial, which he later amended through new counsel. Following a hearing on January 16, 2026, the court denied Collier's motion by written order entered January 20, 2026. The case was docketed for this Court's April 2026 term and submitted for a decision on the briefs.

2.   Torrance also used an alias.

3.   Collier identified himself as the driver of the Kia sedan during his testimony.

4.   Collier identified himself on the security footage at trial.

5.   Collier's counsel requested to approach the bench after the State had completed its direct examination of its second witness, but before that witness had been cross-examined.

6.   Detective Kleinhenz did not specify what database he used.

Colvin, Justice.

All the Justices concur.