State v. Coman

• Decision Date: 24 June 2022
• Docket Number: W2020-01684-CCA-R3-CD
• Parties: STATE OF TENNESSEE v. BRANDON CARDELL COMAN, JR.
• Court: Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals

STATE OF TENNESSEE
v.
BRANDON CARDELL COMAN, JR.

No. W2020-01684-CCA-R3-CD

Court of Criminal Appeals of Tennessee, Jackson

June 24, 2022

Assigned on Briefs May 3, 2022

Appeal from the Circuit Court for Madison County No. 19-797-B Donald H. Allen, Judge

The pro se defendant, Brandon Cardell Coman, Jr., appeals his Madison County Circuit Court jury conviction of aggravated robbery, arguing that the trial court erred by admitting certain evidence, excluding certain evidence, denying a motion to suppress certain evidence, denying the defendant's request for new counsel, denying a motion to dismiss the charges; that the evidence was insufficient to support his conviction; and that his trial was tainted by prosecutorial misconduct. Discerning no error, we affirm.

Tenn. R. App. P. 3; Judgment of the Circuit Court Affirmed

Harold Dorsey, Alamo, Tennessee (at trial), for the appellant Brandon Cardell Coman, Jr., and Brandon Cardell Coman, Jr., pro se (on appeal).

Herbert H. Slatery III, Attorney General and Reporter; Richard D. Douglas, Assistant Attorney General; Jody S. Pickens, District Attorney General; and Matt Floyd, Assistant District Attorney General, for the appellee, State of Tennessee.

JAMES CURWOOD WITT, JR., J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which CAMILLE R. MCMULLEN, and TIMOTHY L. EASTER, JJ., joined.

OPINION

JAMES CURWOOD WITT, JR., JUDGE

On September 30, 2019, the Madison County Grand Jury charged the defendant and co-defendant Christina En Clark-Smith with one count of the aggravated robbery of Fleming Ivory. Despite being represented by counsel, the defendant filed several pro se pretrial motions, including a motion to sever his trial from that of his codefendant, a motion to dismiss the case, a motion to dismiss the indictment, and two

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motions to suppress evidence.^[1]

At the August 27, 2020 trial,^[2] Jeff Cates, the general manager of the Quality Inn at 535 Wiley Parker Road in Jackson, testified that he provided the Jackson Police Department ("JPD") with copies of the hotel's video surveillance from June 11, 2019. He said that the timestamp on the video recordings were "always one hour ahead exactly."

Fleming Ivory, the victim, testified that in June 2019, he was living in Memphis but that he "was going back and forth from Memphis to Nashville for business." During one business trip, he travelled to Jackson where he met Ms. Clark-Smith at the Subway restaurant where Ms. Clark-Smith worked. The victim said that he and Ms. Clark-Smith began texting and calling each other "[p]robably every day." He said that they "were getting to know each other and then we communicated about going out on a date, you know, about dinner and then it became adult conversation." The victim said that he checked into room 216 at the Quality Inn on June 10 and that he and Ms. Clark-Smith had arranged to meet. The victim picked up Ms. Clark-Smith in the early morning hours of June 11 from "in front of her house near the . . . Lambuth College area," and the two went to the victim's hotel room, arriving at approximately 1:40 a.m.

Shortly after returning to the hotel, the victim left the room to get some ice, and "a minute or so" after he returned, at 1:52 a.m., "there was a knock on the door and Christina went to open the door and the gentleman pushed the door on open and came in and pulled out a gun." The victim identified the defendant as the man with the gun, which the victim described as "a black handgun." The victim identified a photograph of the defendant holding "a black gun," which appeared to be the same gun that the defendant used during the robbery.

The victim said that when the defendant entered the hotel room, the defendant asked "'Is this the n*****?,'" at which point, the victim "kind of freaked out," and the defendant "told me to empty my pockets" and "give him my cell phone." The victim gave the defendant his cellular telephone and wallet, which included his "[c]redit cards, debit card, driver's license, [and] social security card." The victim explained that he complied with the defendant's instructions because "I was very afraid that I was going to die." The victim recalled that the defendant stated "[s]everal times . . . that he would kill me. He stated that he would torture me." When the defendant first entered the room, Ms. Clark-Smith "was just standing there and then [the defendant] gave the gun to her."

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The victim said that he "never carr[ied] cash" but that he was "trying to do cash app" to transfer money. The defendant "had [Ms. Clark-Smith] do the cash app." After Ms. Clark-Smith transferred money via the "cash app," the defendant "told me to go and sit in the tub in the bathroom and he told me if I come out before a certain amount of time that he would kill me. So then I followed his instructions." At that point, the defendant and Ms. Clark-Smith left, taking the victim's cellular telephone and car keys. The victim waited in the bathtub "long enough for them to get out of there," then he called the hotel's front desk and asked them to call the police.

The victim provided the police with Ms. Clark-Smith's contact information. He also "went on [Ms. Clark-Smith's] Face[b]ook page" and discovered photographs of the defendant, which photographs he provided to the police. The photographs showed the defendant's distinctive "body tattoo," which the victim "noticed the night of the robbery." The victim said that he was unable to recover any of his stolen belongings or the money that was transferred via the cash app.

During cross-examination, the victim testified that he first met Ms. Clark-Smith on June 7 or 8, 2019. He said that they "both were flirting with each other" and that Ms. Clark-Smith gave him her cellular telephone number. Although the victim acknowledged that the two "began to communicate daily back and forth," he denied that they were in a relationship. The victim said that in their text exchanges, he and Ms. Clark-Smith talked "about her schooling" and job. The victim acknowledged that in one text exchange, he offered to send Ms. Clark-Smith a "naughty picture" of himself. Ms. Clark-Smith replied, "'Yea send one,'" and the victim said, "'If you like feel free to send one back.'" Ms. Clark-Smith responded, "'Mine's not for free tho.'" In another text exchange, Ms. Clark-Smith asked, "Monday when you come you go give me some money ? . . . I'm broke as a joke r[ight] n[ow] I thought I was getting paid Friday NOPEEE. Ion get my check till next Friday and I got shit that need to be done and yeah I do." The victim replied, "Yes." The victim acknowledged that he and Ms. Clark-Smith exchanged explicit, sexual messages but denied that...