ATLANTA — The Georgia Supreme Court announced Monday that it was upholding the September 2017 felony murder conviction of high-ranking Sureños13 street gang member Elijah Rodriguez for a July 2015 Norcross murder.
According to authorities, on July 17, 2015, Gwinnett County Police found the body of Kevin Rivera with multiple gunshot wounds in the parking lot of the Forest Vale apartment complex in Norcross.
The high court said that the trial court denied Rodriguez's motion for a new trial, which was appealed to the Georgia Supreme Court.
Rodriguez's lawyers argued that the evidence was not sufficient to support his conviction for felony murder and the "predicate felony," or secondary felony, of aggravated battery. They further argued that the trial court made an error by denying his "motion to sever."
The high court justices vacated Rodriguez's sentence for aggravated battery, saying that the charge actually merges with the felony murder charge by "operation of law" - or more simply, a technicality.
However, the Supreme Court says they are upholding the remainder of his convictions, including the felony murder conviction for the 2015 murder.
According to detectives, Rodriguez and Rivera had been in a physical altercation in a Norcross hotel room prior to Rivera's death. Rodriguez told detectives he was at a nightclub in DeKalb County on the night of the murder. Instead, detectives found him in the area.
Police said Rodriguez was attempting to purchase a pistol from a fellow gang member in order to commit the crime.
The prosecution admitted a photograph of Rodriguez sitting on a bed holding two firearms and a pistol at his side just minutes prior to Rivera's murder.
The prosecution also presented evidence that Rodriguez attacked a fellow inmate in the Gwinnett County Detention Center to keep him from testifying against him at trial and he continued to arrange multi-kilogram methamphetamine transactions while in jail awaiting his court date.
Rodriguez was found guilty of felony murder, conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute methamphetamine, conspiracy to traffic in methamphetamine, aggravated battery, 3 counts of criminal gang activity, influencing a witness, and aggravated assault by the trial court. The aggravated assault conviction and sentence were overturned by the Georgia Supreme Court.
The maximum sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole, plus 135 years had been handed down to Rodriguez as a result of his conviction in the trial court. The maximum sentence for aggravated assault in Georgia is 20 years, so his sentence would be reduced by that amount.
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