State v. Oliver

Citations

• 2025 Ohio 5856

Syllabus

Aggravated murder; murder; felonious assault; unlawful termination of pregnancy; having weapons while under disability; prior calculation and design; sufficiency of the evidence; manifest weight of the evidence; jury instructions; prosecutorial misconduct. The State provided sufficient evidence that Appellant was complicit in the shooting death of the victim, the unlawful termination of her pregnancy, and injury to the second victim. Appellant was more than a mere bystander when he set up the drug transaction, lured the victims to the place where the shooting occurred, and was seen on video before and after the shooting with the other two accomplices. The trial court did not err in giving a general instruction on complicity and aiding and abetting as opposed to giving the instruction after each count. There was no prosecutorial misconduct or improper burden shifting during the State's closing argument.