MARIETTA - The Georgia Supreme Court has reversed its own ruling that stood for nearly three decades, and said two men can be charged with felony murder in a Cobb County case from 2007.

District Attorney Pat Head called the reversal "a very good decision that corrected a bad decision made 29 years ago."

Georgia's felony murder statute states that a person commits murder "when, in the commission of a felony, he causes the death of another human being."

But in 1981, the high court ruled in State v. Crane that if the person killed was committing a felony, his or her accomplices could not be charged with murder.

According to documents in the Cobb case, three men - Carlester Jackson, Warren Woodley Smith and Jerold Daniels - drove from Maryland to Georgia in January 2007 to commit an armed robbery. They went to Cobblestone Apartments, near Pat Mell Road and South Cobb Drive, looking for Arthur Hogan, who they believed was involved in the drug trade.

After spotting Hogan in the parking lot, Daniels approached Hogan with a handgun, while Jackson acted as a lookout nearby. Smith waited in the SUV.

Hogan, who was armed, exchanged gunfire with Daniels, killing him before fleeing. Jackson, who was arrested at the scene, confessed to his role in the crime and implicated Smith and Daniels. Smith fled but was later extradited from Rhode Island.

Jackson and Smith were both charged with felony murder.

Last June, Cobb Superior Court Judge Tain Kell dismissed the felony murder charges against Jackson and Smith based on the Crane decision.

Head's office appealed, and the Supreme Court voted 4-3 to reverse Crane.

In the court's majority opinion, written by Justice David Nahmias, recognizes that the legislature's intent behind the statute is "to furnish an added deterrent to the perpetration of felonies which, by their nature or by the attendant circumstances, create a foreseeable risk of death." One commits murder if he "causes the death of another," the statute says, but it does not specify that the death must occur at the hand of the defendant, nor does the law specify which person must die in the course of a felony.

Crane "was poorly reasoned," the opinion says, and "is so incongruous with the rest of Georgia law, it has not been consistently applied by this Court or the Court of Appeals in the ensuing three decades."

Others voting for the majority were Presiding Justice George Carley and Justices P. Harris Hines and Harold Melton.

In her dissent, Chief Justice Carol Hunstein said the ruling is "blatant judicial activism."

In a separate dissent, Justice Hugh Thompson writes that "unless and until the General Assembly declares that the element of causation in the felony murder statute actually means proximate causation, we should adhere to our interpretation of the statute as set forth in Crane."

Said Head: "The four justices went back and read the statute and reached the same conclusions we had reached. It shouldn't make any difference who the victim is."

It "doesn't happen very often" that the state Supreme Court reverses itself, Head said. "I'm delighted."

Jackson remains in Cobb County Jail without bond on charges of armed robbery and felony murder.

Georgia Department of Corrections records show a Warren Woodley Smith incarcerated at Calhoun State Prison for Cobb convictions including possession of marijuana with intent to distribute.

Attorneys for the men could not be reached for comment.