State v. Goodin

Defendant, Dennis Melvin Goodin, was convicted by a jury of first degree murder in a trial which lasted over seven weeks. Defendant appeals, assigning 16 errors.

A summary of the complicated facts is required to understand the assignments of error. Defendant and others, including the murder victim, Paul DeGeorge, and two others indicted in the murder, Donnie Eay Gardner and Eobert Bullard, were members of a tightly-knit group allegedly formed to commit burglaries. Also members of this ‘clique’ at the time of DeGeorge’s death were Richard Hill, Charles Gardner and Eugene Gardner. On September…