TN Supreme Court Refuses to Overturn Man’s Felony Murder Conviction

The Tennessee Supreme Court recently denied an appeal by a man from Knoxville attempting to have his felony murder conviction overturned. The man, Travis Kinte Echols, had been sentenced to life in prison and appealed claiming that there had been a number of errors during his trial.

Echols claimed that the trial court failed to suppress a statement the defendant made to the police which he said was the product of an unlawful arrest. Echols appealed his case to the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals which found that the arrest lacked probable cause. Despite the unlawful arrest, the Court of Appeals said that the statement qualified as harmless error and thus did not serve as grounds for reversal.

Echols appealed again and the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case. In a unanimous decision, the justices rejected Echols’ argument that his conviction should be reversed because the police did not have probable cause when they arrested him back in 2005.

Echols was arrested and ultimately convicted of murdering Robert Steely in the parking lot of the Townview Towers apartment complex in East Knoxville. During his interrogation, Echols waived his right to remain silent and, in the course of a conversation with officers, admitted to shooting Steely, but said that he only did so in self-defense. Specifically, Echols admitted to shooting Steely and then disposing of the weapon. This claim of self-defense did not ring true to the jury and they found him guilty of felony murder during a robbery of Steely, ultimately sentencing him to life in prison.

The Supreme Court heard the case and disagreed with the Court of Criminal Appeals. The High Court ruled that the police were able to establish probable cause for the warrantless arrest of Echols and, given this probably cause, the statement Echols later made to investigators was admissible at trial. The Supreme Court did find that the trial court incorrectly limited cross-examination of two witnesses, but that these errors were harmless and did not affect the final result of the trial. As such, the judgment of the lower court convicting Echols of felony murder was upheld.

To read the full opinion, click here.

The defense says DA knew of Judge Baumgartner's misconduct

by Lee Davis


The Christian/Newsom case saw another development today as defense attorneys Tom Dillard and Stephen Ross Johnson responded to the prosecution’s motion to have Judge Blackwood removed due to supposed unethical conduct. The defense fired back with a motion of their own accusing district attorney Randy Nichols and his staff of hiding information about Judge Baumgartner’s misconduct while he was still presiding over the case.

The defense counsel’s motion said that they agree that a motion to recuse was appropriate and should have been granted, however, the motion should not be against the current judge. “A motion to recuse should have been filed years ago in this case concerning Judge Baumgartner.”

The current controversy involves the decision by Judge Blackwood to order new trials of the defendants in the Christian/Newsom murder case following news that Judge Baumgartner was addicted to narcotic pills and abused his position to win sexual favors from some of those that he presided over. An investigation by the TBI showed that many of the crimes were committed while Baumgartner was presiding over the Christian/Newsom murder trials.

Previous releases of information have made clear that others were aware of Baumgartner’s misdeed. For instance, two prosecutors who were working on the Christian/Newsom case reported seeing Baumgartner swearing his way down I-40 following jury selection in Nashville for Vanessa Coleman’s trial. It was also revealed that District Attorney Nichols confronted Baumgartner about such behavior and that the judge admitted to drinking a bottle of wine every night to help him sleep.

The defense attorneys brought forward not only these known instances of prosecutorial awareness of Baumgartner’s problems but another not previously made public: “During this visit, former Judge Baumgartner told Mr. Nichols that he was drinking a bottle of wine a night while at the same time going to the Bradford Rehabilitation Clinic (an outpatient center in Knoxville) and Alcoholics Anonymous meetings.”

Not only did Nichols allegedly know this information, but he also kept it secret from the defense attorneys in the Christian/Newsom case. The defense said that there were many other cases before Judge Baumgartner at the time and that attorneys across the region with clients before the judge would have wanted to know about his conduct. The motion said that despite this “extraordinary step of an ex parte direct inquiry of Judge Baumgartner about his problems…” nothing was ever disclosed by Nichols or his office.
For his part, Nichols’ special counsel, John Gill, responded to the allegations saying that the District Attorney’s meeting with Baumgartner had nothing to do with any particular case and therefore was not ex parte contact.

Ex parte communication refers to any contact between a judge and one party of the case without the presence of the other party. Such communication is frowned upon. The prosecution has hinted that the current judge, Blackwood, has engaged in such contact with unidentified people and has complained that it is objectionable. The defense denies any such one-sided communication with the judge, as has Blackwood.

Read: “DA Randy Nichols hid signs of ex-judge Richard Baumgartner's misdeeds, attorneys contend,” by Jamie Satterfield, published at KnoxNews.com.

Location:Tatarrax Dr,Manhattan,United States

TN Court of Criminal Appeals Rejects Petition From Defendant With Life Sentence

• State of Tennessee v. David Edward Niles

The Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals recently rejected a petition from a man serving a life sentence for first-degree murder. The defendant, David Edward Niles, was convicted in January of 2010 for the death of Laura Parker. Niles claimed that circuit Court Judge Robert Crigler erred by denying his motion to suppress evidence that was sized during the search of his residence. Niles also said there was not sufficient evidence to convict him and that the judge abused his discretion in denying a motion for money for a psychiatrist.

According to the appeal, public defenders working for Niles discovered he had told one of his jailers that God told him to kill Parker because she was an unfit mother to their 4-year-old son. Niles then told his attorneys that he initially believed God told him this but later though it may have been the devil. 

Judge Crigler ruled that Niles had already been examined once and was found competent to stand trial. The Court here agreed, saying that Niles provided “only unsupported assertions” that a psychiatrist might have been of help in his case, failing to show that testimony from an expert was necessary in order to receive a fair trial.

Before his trial, Niles attempted to have evidence seized at his residence suppressed. A detective, Brian Crews, had asked Niles’ wife, Patricia, about ammunition for the gun her husband was found with the night of the shooting. Patricia allowed Crews and another detective to enter the home to get the ammunition. While they were in the house they found receipts for a replacement barrel and firing pins. Both items ended up being important pieces of evidence that were used to prove that he had planned the killing weeks in advance. 

Crews also asked if police could have a day planner and the computer at the home, but his wife objected saying she needed it for schoolwork. The detective ended up making copies of both. The Court decided that Mrs. Niles freely, specifically and intelligently gave her consent to the search. The day planner and computer were never used as evidence so the issue regarding their copying is moot. 

The Court of Criminal Appeals also said that the record of the case showed that there was “overwhelming evidence of premeditation,” including evidence indicating that an attempt was made to conceal the crime prior to the murder. 

Niles confessed to another one of his jailer’s that he had done research on the internet about how to defeat ballistics testing by using a replacement barrel and firing pin. Thus the Court found that “there was sufficient evidence supporting Niles’s conviction for first degree premeditated murder.”

To read the full opinion, click here. 

See Our Related Blog Posts:

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Supreme Court Overrules Sixth Circuit and Reinstates Murder Convictions

by Lee Davis

• Parker v. Matthews

Earlier this week the U.S. Supreme Court restored murder convictions against a Kentucky man who broke into his estranged wife’s home and killed his mother-in-law before raping and killing his wife. 

A three-judge panel from the Sixth Circuit decided to overturn the nearly 30-year-old convictions which the Supreme Court was a decision “based on the flimsiest of rationales.”

David Matthews had a stormy marriage with his late wife, Mary Marlene Matthews and the two fought and reconnected many times. Just weeks before the murders, Matthews spent time in jail on charges that he sexually abused his wife’s 6-year-old daughter. In June of 1981, Matthews bought a gun and broke into the home he shared with his wife, entering the room where her mother was sleeping and shooting her at point-blank range. He then spent several hours having sex with his wife before shooting her too. When he was arrested later that day he had already started the process of destroying evidence, cleaning clothes and burying guns in the backyard. 

A jury convicted Matthews of first-degree murder, and sentenced him to death. This was over his objections that the crimes occurred due to an extreme emotional disturbance on his part. The Sixth Circuit granted him relief after a series of appeals but the Supreme Court struck down the ruling, saying it was based on invalid grounds. The Court said that there is no evidence that the lower courts improperly shifted the burden of proving extreme emotional distress onto Matthews. The high court further stated that the jury had an appropriate basis to find Matthews did not suffer from an extreme emotional disturbance. 

The Court wrote, “As the Kentucky Supreme Court observed, Matthews’ claim of extreme emotional disturbance was belied by ‘the circumstances of the crime’ - including the facts that he borrowed money to purchase the murder weapon the day of the murders, that he waited several hours after buying the gun before starting for his wife’s home, and that he delayed several hours between shooting his mother-in-law and killing his wife.” Furthermore, “The claim was also belied by his behavior after the murders, including his ‘[taking] steps to hide the gun and clean his clothes.’”
      

Despite the testimony during the trial by Matthews’ psychiatrist who attempted to show the disturbance the defendant was under at the time of the murders, the Court ruled that the jury was entitled to consider the doctor’s testimony along with their own “common-sense understanding of emotional disturbance.” The Court held that the Sixth Circuit went astray by resolving the matter in favor of the physiatrist’s testimony which was an act overstepping its authority. 

To read the full opinion, click here. 

Read: “Double Homicide Verdict Restored by High Court,” by Barbara Leonard, published at CourthouseNews.com.

See Our Related Blog Posts:

Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals: No recovery for man released from prison 17 years too late

Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals: Is Evading Arrest a Violent Felony? 

Defense Rests in Hemy Neuman Murder Trial

The defense rested in the Hemy Neuman Murder Trial late last week. Neuman, accused of murdering Rusty Sneiderman in front of his child's day care facility in November 2010, has plead not guilty by reason of insanity. The defensive strategy was to provide intensive expert testimony on the mental capacity of Neuman.

The Defense called two experts to testify as to the sanity of Neuman and his ability to recognize the difference between right and wrong at the time of the shooting. One expert was forensic psychiatrist, Tracy Marks. In an attempt to prove insanity, Marks spent the majority of her testimony discussing Neuman's suicidal thoughts, hallucinations, and symptoms of bipolar. She stated that Neuman had been experiencing suicidal thoughts and tendencies months before he ever hired Andrea Sneiderman, the wife of the victim who was allegedly engaged in an elicit affair with Neuman. During the defense's opening statement, the defense mentioned that Neuman had been visited by demons. Marks detailed an encounter with a demon in February 2010 where the demon supposedly told Neuman that he was worthless. Another demon, appearing in July 2010, told Neuman that Andrea Sneiderman's children were actually Neuman's children, and that they were being abused by their father, Rusty. One month later, that same demon allegedly told Neuman that he needed to kill Rusty Sneiderman in order to "protect them from suffering the same fate he did as a child in terms of being abandoned or rejected." Marks stated that certain statements and actions by Andrea Sneiderman fueled the fire in Neuman. Specfically, Marks said Andrea regularly complained to Neuman about tension in her marriage. She once emailed Neuman several pictures of her children without their father in the pictures. Neuman interpreted his absence to mean he was abusing the children.

The second expert that testified for the defense was forensic psychiatrist, Adriana Flores. Dr. Flores, along with Dr. Marks, diagnosed Neuman as mentally ill and suffering from bipolar disorder and psychosis. Dr. Flores expressed the opinion that because of his mental state, Neuman did not know the difference between right and wrong at the time of the shooting. The Prosecution has argued, however, that Neuman did know the difference between right and wrong because he disguised himself at the crime scene, he threw the gun in the lake after the shooting, and he lied to police about his involvement. Thus, on cross-examination, the prosecution asked Dr. Flores if it was possible that Neuman was lying. She responded that, "It's always possible."

Neuman informed the Court many times that he would not be testifying during his defense. However, the defense played taped interviews with Neuman in front of the jury. In these tapes, Neuman discussed the difficult childhood he experienced with an emotionally abusive father and an absent mother. Neuman became visibly upset when the tapes were played in court.

After the defense rested, the prosecution called a rebuttal witness, forensic psychiatrist Pamela Crawford to try and provide testimony from an expert who believed Neuman was faking his mental illness. The prosecution ended its rebuttal this morning. Closing arguments are expected to begin tomorrow morning. Once closing arguments are over, it will be up to the jury to decide the fate of Hemy Neuman.

Prosecution Rests in Hemy Neuman Murder Trial

The Prosecution rested their case last week in the trial of Hemy Neuman, the man accused of shooting Rusty Sneiderman in front of his child's day-care facility in November of 2010. The focus of the majority of the State's case was on the widow of Rusty Sneiderman, Andrea Sneiderman. I detailed the testimony of Mrs. Sneiderman in an earlier post. Her testimony was so compelling, it deserved its own blog entry.

The focus continued to stay on Mrs. Sneiderman as the State called various witnesses to testify about Mrs. Sneiderman's actions and how they corresponded with Neuman's actions. Aside from providing numerous witness accounts detailing the intimate relationship observed between Neuman and Mrs. Sneiderman, the State turned its attention to the part she may have played in the shooting. As emphasized before, she has never been charged with aiding in the murder of her husband, and it is unlikely that she ever will. However, the State seemed to want to paint a picture of a detailed, planned out shooting in which Andrea Sneiderman was aware. While this is purely speculative, if evidence is presented that Mrs. Sneiderman was aware of the shooting, the jury might be more inclined to believe that Hemy Neuman planned it and told Mrs. Sneiderman his plans, contradicting his insanity defense.

The State called Lt. Barnes, the police officer who initially took Neuman's statement after the shooting. Among other things, he testified that he became suspicious of Mrs. Sneiderman and her relationship with Neuman when she adamantly denied having an affair with Neuman and when she waited 6 days after the shooting to tell police she believed Neuman was the shooter. He also testified that when Neuman came to give his statement, he was presented with records indicating his rental of the van witnesses saw Neuman drive off in after the shooting. Given this evidence, Lt. Barnes stated that Neuman said, "It doesn't look good" in regards to the case against him.

The State also called FBI Special Agent Freiman who examined Mrs. Sneiderman's iPhone and iPad. He testified that he found several suspicious searches conducted on her iPad including: "gun", "range", and "can police trace a cell phone call?" The State also called FBI Special Agent Chad Fitzgerald who conducted an analysis of the cell phone correspondence between Mrs. Sneiderman and Neuman dating from May 2010 to November 2010. He stated that Mrs. Sneiderman corresponded with Neuman 1,446 times during that time. He further stated that during that same amount of time, she only corresponded with her husband 882 times.

The defense began their case late last week. It will be interesting to see what evidence they produce of Neuman's psychological behavior in order to further his defense.

Tennessee Court of Appeals Reduces First Degree Murder Conviction

• STATE OF TENNESSEE v. DAVID HOOPER CLIMER, JR

Court of Appeals, Jackson, TN

The Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals recently reduced the first-degree murder conviction of a Gibson County man accused of killing and dismembering his own mother. In this disturbing case, the state failed to include sufficient proof of premeditation to survive a challenge on appeal. However, the Appeals Court decided that there was sufficient evidence to support a lesser, second-degree murder conviction.

The case began in January 2008, when Climer led authorities to the remains of his mother, Dorris DeBerry. Climer had buried DeBerry in woods in northwest Madison County, Tennessee. Investigators believe DeBerry was killed in late November 2007 and that Climer buried her remains around December 5, 2007. The mother and son had lived together in a mobile home near Gibson, Tennessee prior to her death.

Climer admitted to authorities that he was responsible for dismembering his mother’s body, but was vehement that he had not killed her. He was sentenced to life in prison on the first-degree murder charge after a jury found him guilty and on the abuse of a corpse count. The abuse of a corpse charge was intended to run concurrently with his life sentence.

On appeal, Climer’s attorneys argued that the evidence was insufficient to support a premeditated murder conviction. Moreover, his attorney claimed that Climer was suffering from insanity when he decapitated his mother’s corpse. The insanity claim was rejected on appeal.


The Court noted, "that the parties’ opening and closing statements, in which the State would have argued its theory of the case to the jury, have not been included in the record on appeal. According to the State’s brief, the prosecution’s theory of the case was that the appellant killed his mother and dismembered her body and hid it to conceal his crime." Obviously, the Court struggled to find premeditation and when it could not find the proof included in the record, it was reluctant to infer it from the mere gruesomeness of the crime.  In a fairly unusual move, the court reversed the conviction for first degree murder absent sufficient proof of premeditation.

The Court reduced Climer’s conviction to second-degree murder and remanded the case to a trial court for resentencing. Climer’s conviction of abuse of a corpse was affirmed. His resentencing is set for early April in Humboldt County. Here is a link to the full opinion: STATE OF TENNESSEE v. DAVID HOOPER CLIMER, JR.

Read: “Climer sentence reduced: Court of Criminal Appeals overturned the first-degree murder conviction,” by Jordan Buie, published at JacksonSun.com.

Earlier:

Federal sentencing discretion under attack

GPS and Tracking Criminals in Tennessee

Life without the possibility of parole for a 14 year old?

The Supreme Court will take up the Eighth Amendment again this term, specifically to rule on whether the prohibition on “cruel and unusual punishment” allows the imposition of a sentence of life without the possibility of parole for a fourteen year old convicted of homicide.

            Similar issues have already been addressed by the Supreme Court in two cases, Roper v. Simmons and Graham v. Florida.  In Roper, the Court abolished the death penalty for juveniles and in Graham the Court held that a sentence of life without parole cannot be imposed on a juvenile for the conviction of a non-homicide offense.  Inherent in the decision of those cases was the idea that juveniles are both more apt to be rehabilitated and morally less culpable than adults.

            The Current Case (Miller v. Alabama, Jackson v. Hobbs) will probably revolve around similar arguments and is likely to be buttressed by emerging scientific evidence related to brain development.  Both of the Petitioner’s briefs cite this literature in making the argument that young adolescents are particularly prone to impulsive behavior and negative peer pressure.  The petitioners also cite many state and federal laws that recognize the immaturity and impulsivity of young adolescents. 

Tennessee has many such examples of the special legal status of adolescents.  A minor cannot apply for a marriage license without a parent’s permission.  T.C.A. §36-3-106.  A child under the age of 15 must wear a helmet when riding a bicycle. T.C.A. §55-52-105.  Children younger than 16 have a weekday curfew of 10:00 and a weekend curfew of 11:00.  T.C.A. §39-17-1702. 

The two states involved in these cases (Arkansas and Alabama) have mandatory life sentences without the possibility of parole for first degree murder.  The importance of this is that when a child is tried as an adult, their age is not taken into account either at trial or at sentencing.  In Tennessee, there are three options for punishment for a first degree murder conviction; death, life imprisonment, or life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.  The sentence is imposed at a sentencing hearing and an explicit factor considered is “the youth … of the defendant at the time of the crime.”  T.C.A. 39-13-204.

The imposition of mandatory sentences is problematic in the typical case but even more so when the convicted is a young adolescent.  If any determination calls out for individualized attention it is the sentencing of minor.  It will be interesting to see what the Supreme Court thinks, oral arguments are scheduled for March 20.

For more of the subject (including Amicus briefs):see Miller v. Alabama and Jackson v. Hobbs.  Also, to see a map illustrating state by state the number of juveniles are currently serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole, look here.

Supreme Court Throws Out Murder Conviction After Prosecutors Fail to Turn Over Damaging Confession

In Smith v. Cain, the Supreme Court just issued a ruling holding that one New Orleans man’s murder conviction must be reversed because prosecutors failed to mention that the sole eyewitness to the crime had earlier admitted to not being able to identify the killer.

The decision was overwhelming, 8-1, with Justice Clarence Thomas serving as the only dissenter. The case highlights a problem of prosecutors’ hiding potentially damaging evidence. The Court also called attention to the guarantee that the government must turn over evidence that may be favorable to a defendant. Such a guarantee arose in the 1963 Supreme Court decision Brady v. Maryland.

Chief Justice Roberts, writing for the majority, stated that, “We have observed that evidence impeaching an eyewitness may not be material if the state’s other evidence is strong enough to sustain confidence in the verdict.” He continued by adding, “That is not the case here.”

The case concerns Juan Smith who was charged with killing five people during a 1995 armed robbery of a New Orleans home. A single eyewitness, Larry Boatner, identified Smith as being involved in the killings. Boatner testified at trial that he had been “face to face with Smith during the initial moments of the robbery.”

Later, during a jury trial, Smith was convicted of five counts of murder. On appeal, Smith obtained files that showed that Boatner had told police on the night of the killings that he “could not ID anyone because (he) couldn't see faces.” Prosecutors failed to turn over the potentially devastating detective’s report to Smith before trial.

While weighing whether the information ought to have been revealed Roberts discussed Brady v. Maryland, which requires prosecutors to turn over evidence that would be favorable to the defendant and “material” to his guilt or punishment.

The Court held that Boatner’s comments met that burden. “Boatner's testimony was the only evidence linking Smith to the crime. And Boatner’s undisclosed statements directly contradict his testimony.”

In his lengthy dissent Thomas said that Boatner’s earlier statement confessing doubt about the killer’s identity did not undermine Boatner’s ultimate confidence in his identification of Smith at trial. “Much of the record evidence confirms that, from the night of the murders through trial, Boatner consistently described - with one understandable exception - the first perpetrator through the door, that Boatner's description matched Smith.” Smith would likely take issue with the idea that the “one understandable exception” was not, according to Justice Thomas, a very big deal.

For the full opinion, please click here.

Read: “Supreme Court Tosses Murder Conviction for Brady Violation by New Orleans DA,” by Debra Cassens Weiss, published at ABAJournal.com.

Earlier:

Is Chief Justice Roberts A First Amendment Defender? One New Study Says Maybe Not

Chief Justice Roberts Steps into Recusal Fight

Post Conviction denied in Juvenile life without parole murder conviction

Daniel Decker, appeals the Hamilton County Criminal Court’s denial of his petition for post-conviction relief. Decker was convicted by a jury of one count of first-degree premeditated murder and is currently serving a sentence of life without the possibility of parole. On appeal, he contends that the post-conviction court erred in denying his petition because the proof presented established that he was denied his right to the effective assistance of counsel. More specifically, the petitioner alleges that the postconviction court erred in   multiple aspects, specifically: (1) that the courtheld that an expert witness had the duty and burden to present her opinions more completely at trial; (2) that the court erred by admitting a letter written by the petitioner to trial counsel after the conviction; (3) that the court should haverecused itself in the matter; (4) denying  relief because the petitioner met his burden of proof under the Strickland standard to establish ineffective assistance of counsel; (5) that the court erred by not reviewing trial counsel’s performance under the Cronic standard; and (6) that the court erred by failing to address all issues raised by the petitioner in its order denying relief.Court of Criminal Appeals finds no error and affirms the denial of the petition.

Full case State v. Decker