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The Georgia Supreme Court has upheld the murder conviction of a Dalton man who ran over another man with a pickup truck while the victim was on the phone with a 911 dispatcher, rejecting claims of trial errors and ineffective legal counsel raised on appeal.

Frank Scott Bozzie was convicted in June 2014 of malice murder, felony murder and aggravated assault in the June 10, 2013, killing of 54-year-old Horace Richard Morgan in Whitfield County. He is serving life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Prosecutors said the killing followed a chain of violent confrontations that began at a McDonald's on East Walnut Avenue in Dalton, where Bozzie deliberately rammed his pickup into a van carrying his ex-girlfriend and another passenger, then beat the vehicle and one of the passengers with a baseball bat. He then drove to a house at 504 Gay Street, where the woman and her companion had been staying and where Morgan was watching her two young children.

According to testimony at trial, Morgan called 911 and told the dispatcher he wanted Bozzie off his property, staying on the line as the confrontation escalated. Bozzie revved his engine before accelerating toward Morgan, who was about 40 feet away, striking him and dragging him more than 30 feet until the truck became stuck at the edge of a wooded lot with Morgan pinned underneath.

Morgan suffered broken ribs, a fractured pelvis, broken thighbones and severe burns, and the cause of death was ruled mechanical asphyxiation. Bozzie fled on foot and was arrested more than an hour later at a convenience store roughly a mile and a half from where the truck was found, according to sheriff's investigators.

A Whitfield County jury convicted Bozzie on 13 total counts. Judge Jack Partain sentenced him to life without parole plus 20 consecutive years for aggravated assault against the two people in the van, 10 years for criminal damage to property and 12 months for family violence battery. Court records show Bozzie had prior convictions in California for fleeing police in 1996 and for injuring a spouse in 2006.

On appeal, Bozzie argued the evidence was insufficient to support his murder conviction and raised claims of juror misconduct and ineffective assistance of counsel. The Georgia Supreme Court found no merit to any of his claims and affirmed the convictions in full.