State v. Copeland, No. E2002-01123-CCA-R3-DD (TN 8/22/2005)
| Decision Date | 22 August 2005 |
| Docket Number | No. E2002-01123-CCA-R3-DD.,E2002-01123-CCA-R3-DD. |
| Parties | STATE OF TENNESSEE v. ARTHUR T. COPELAND. |
| Court | Tennessee Supreme Court |
Appeal from the Circuit Court for Blount County; No. C-11100; D. Kelly Thomas, Jr.
Judgment of the Circuit Court is Affirmed in Part, Reversed in Part, and Remanded.
Randall E. Reagan, Knoxville, Tennessee; Gerald L. Gulley, Jr., Knoxville, Tennessee (on appeal); W. Phillip Reed, Maryville, Tennessee; and Robert W. White, Maryville, Tennessee (at trial), for the appellant, Arthur T. Copeland.
Paul G. Summers, Attorney General and Reporter; Michael E. Moore, Solicitor General; Alice B. Lustre, Assistant Attorney General; Michael L. Flynn, District Attorney General; Kirk Andrews, Assistant District Attorney General; and Edward P. Bailey, Jr., Assistant District Attorney General, for the appellee, State of Tennessee.
The defendant, Arthur T. Copeland, was convicted by a Blount County jury of one count of first degree premeditated murder. The jury found that the state proved one aggravating circumstance: The defendant was previously convicted of one or more felonies involving violence to the person. Upon its further finding that the aggravating circumstance outweighed the mitigating circumstances beyond a reasonable doubt, the jury sentenced the defendant to death. In this appeal as of right, the defendant raises issues regarding the sufficiency of the evidence; the exclusion of jurors; an invalid indictment; the admission of certain testimony; the exclusion of expert testimony; his right to testify in his own defense; the denial of due process; the denial of his motion for continuance; the denial of his motion to suppress; error by the trial court during voir dire; the denial of a change of venue; prosecutorial misconduct during closing argument in the guilt and sentencing phases; discovery violations by the prosecution; error in allowing the introduction of certain photographs; denial of a request for a special jury instruction; the failure to charge the jury on a self-defense theory; the refusal to disqualify the district attorney's office; the refusal to excuse trial counsel from post-trial representation of the defendant; the failure to grant a new trial based on newly discovered evidence; improper jury instructions; the denial of expert funding for development and use of mitigation evidence; the admission of photos of the victim; the cumulative effects of errors during the guilt and sentencing phases; and various constitutional challenges to the death penalty and to the statutory capital sentencing procedure in this state. After review, this court concludes that reversible error attended the trial court's response to defendant's decision not to testify and that the death penalty in this case is disproportionate to the particular offense. We therefore reverse the conviction and sentence.
The defendant was convicted in the April 1998 murder of Andre Jackson in Maryville, Tennessee. Briefly summarized, the proof established that the murder was triggered by a rape that occurred in the Alcoa community where the defendant, the victim, and their friends frequently associated. On the afternoon of April 6, 1998, Lynn Porter reported being raped in her Alcoa apartment by two men whom she could not identify. At the time, Porter dated Reginald Sudderth. Upon learning of his girlfriend's rape, a visibly shaken Sudderth appeared at the Howe Street Park area of Alcoa and publicized to the usual group gathered there that he was offering a $10,000 "bounty" on the head of the person who had committed the rape, adding that "someone is going to die tonight." The proof further established that the defendant learned of and expressed interest in the reward money. Later that same evening, the defendant accompanied Sudderth and others to Maryville in search of the victim's residence, after concluding that the victim and his friend, Chris Knighton, were responsible for Ms. Porter's rape. After identifying the home where the victim lived, the defendant obtained a gun in Alcoa, and he and others returned to Maryville. The defendant entered the victim's home about 2:00 a.m. that morning and soon exited with the victim. Shortly afterwards, the homeowner heard gunshots, and the victim reentered the house alone where he collapsed from gunshot wounds and died. No direct evidence indicated who actually shot the victim. In addition to the defendant, Reginald Sudderth and two other men were later indicted for the victim's murder.
The state's first witness was Edna Delapp, who lived on Scenic Drive in Maryville, Tennessee, along with her daughter, Stephanie, and Stephanie's boyfriend, Andre Jackson. According to Delapp, her daughter had convinced her to allow Jackson to live with them over the previous 10 months because he was having problems at home and was trying to get in school and "back on track." Delapp recalled that on April 6, she was off from work. Jackson was also home and slept most of the morning. At about 1:00 p.m. that afternoon, Jackson briefly introduced her to Chris Knighton, a friend. Jackson left with Knighton, and Delapp did not see Jackson again until her daughter returned home with him at about 11:30 p.m. that night. About 2:00 a.m., Delapp was awakened by a "very insistent pounding" at the front door. She looked out the window and saw no cars in her driveway. The loud knocking continued. She looked through the glass panes and thought she recognized the person standing at the door as Knighton. She opened the door and angrily confronted the man about waking everyone. He entered and replied that he needed to talk to Jackson.
As they walked through the hallway and she was better able to see, Delapp stated that she realized the man was not Knighton. With the man following her, she opened the door leading down to Jackson's room and called his name, but Jackson did not respond. The man said, "I'll go get him" and walked down the stairs into Jackson's room. Delapp returned to her bedroom, looked out the window again, and saw no one. As she made her way back to the hall, she encountered Jackson following the man up the stairs. Delapp recalled that the man was wearing dark clothing and had "really weird hair" with "little twisted ponytails." She further noted his eyes, stating that they stared at each other for a few seconds and that she would "never forget him." She did not recall noticing his hands. She stated that the man and Jackson went out the front door. She again returned to her bedroom window but saw nothing. At the window, Delapp testified, she heard shots and glass shattering. She ran from her bedroom and collided with Jackson in the doorway to the hall. She described Jackson as being "hunkered down and running, just as fast as he could." Delapp stated that during the collision, she was knocked down and cut her forehead, which bled quite a bit. She ran to the living room, slammed the front door closed and tended to her forehead in the hall bath. Her daughter appeared, and the two went to Edna Delapp's master bathroom and found Jackson lying on the floor. He was wearing black and red tennis shoes at the time.
Edna Delapp identified photographs indicating bullet marks to her sofa, hardwood floors and the walls of the entrance to her home. She identified the defendant as the man that came to her home and called Jackson outside that night. Delapp observed that "his eyes were so intense, I'll never forget him." Delapp stated that later that night, she and her daughter went to the Maryville Police Department and gave statements. Delapp then went to the hospital and received approximately twenty stitches for the cut to her forehead. She stated that the next afternoon, she returned to the police department for a photographic lineup of suspects. She viewed six photographs and identified the man she saw at her home based on his eyes. Delapp noted that in July 2000, two detectives came to her house and observed the foyer area that led to the basement. She stated the area was lit with night lights, the same as it was the night of the murder.
On cross-examination, Delapp testified that following the advice of her boss and a friend, she had refused to talk with anyone from the defense team about the case. She stated that on the day of the murder, she briefly looked at Knighton as he stood in the foyer when he picked up Jackson. Regarding the man who came to her home at 2:00 that morning, she stated that she would not forget him because "we stared at each other for two full seconds" and had "eye-to-eye contact." Delapp described the lighting when she first saw him at the door, as "very bright outside," because the moon was nearly full and there was a lamppost in the carport area. She stated there was no conversation between the man and Jackson when they exited the house. Delapp agreed that at the preliminary hearing, she had testified that when she injured her head in the collision with Jackson, "I had so much blood on my face, I couldn't see." She stated that although there was a lot of blood over her left eye, she could still see out of her right eye. She noted that in her description to police that night, she recalled the man's dark clothing and his hairstyle and estimated that he was a little taller than her height of five-foot-six inches. She stated she also recalled the man's eyes but probably did not mention them. Delapp stated that she told the emergency room doctor that she had fallen at home because she was upset and embarrassed and did not want to explain that someone had just been murdered in her home. She stated that the day after she identified the defendant in the photo lineup, she saw the same picture of him in...
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