Court of Criminal Appeals Overturns Murder Conviction
Imagine that you are the defendant in a trial where you have been charged with first-degree premeditated murder. At your trial, the state has introduced evidence that it thinks demonstrates that you did the following: declarations previously made by you that you intended to kill the victim, evidence that you procured of a weapon prior to the murder, that you used a deadly weapon on an unarmed victim, that you killed the victim in a particularly cruel manner, that you inflicted multiple wounds on the defendant, that you destroyed or hid of evidence of the killing, and that you were noticeably calm immediately after the killing. Then, when the judge begins to instruct the jury as to what evidence can be considered in deciding whether an individual has committed first-degree murder, he gives the following list of relevant evidence: declarations previously made by a defendant of an intent to kill, evidence of procurement of a weapon by a defendant prior to a killing, use of a deadly weapon upon an unarmed victim, particular cruelty of a killing, infliction of multiple wounds, destruction or secretion of evidence of a killing and a defendant’s calmness immediately after a killing. See anything wrong with that picture?
The Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals certainly did. In a case styled State v. Garrett, the Court of Appeals ruled that a judge whose conduct pretty much amounted to the description given above had made an improper commentary as to the evidence rather than instructing the jury as to the law and overturned a guilty verdict that had been rendered against the defendant. The Court of Appeals found, and rightly so, that the instruction given by the trial judge was too prejudicial to the defendant in order for a verdict rendered against him to be considered a fair outcome. This ruling makes sense when you consider that a jury had just been exposed to several different types of evidence and was later instructed by the judge that those specific types were relevant and could sustain a murder conviction. Thus, the judge seemed to be not only endorsing the value of those types of evidence but also bolstering the credibility of such evidence and persuading the jury that such evidence was adequate to convict the Defendant.
It is very likely that the judge in this case made an honest mistake and gave what he thought was an appropriate instruction that happened to go too far. Tennessee criminal defendants should not be punished for the mistakes made by any member of the justice system, honest mistake or not, and need a vigilant criminal defense attorney who will know when a defendant’s rights are in jeopardy and will work to protect those rights.
State v. Garrett, 36 TAM 11-19, 1/24/11, Knoxville, Witt, 10 pages.
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