State v. Sparks

• Decision Date: 23 November 2022
• Docket Number: W2021-01213-CCA-R3-CD
• Parties: STATE OF TENNESSEE v. BETTY SPARKS
• Court: Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals

STATE OF TENNESSEE
v.
BETTY SPARKS

No. W2021-01213-CCA-R3-CD

Court of Criminal Appeals of Tennessee, Jackson

November 23, 2022

Assigned on Briefs November 1, 2022.

Appeal from the Circuit Court for Hardeman County No. 35CC1-2020-CR-28 J. Weber McCraw, Judge.

A Hardeman County jury convicted the defendant, Betty Sparks, of first-degree premeditated murder, first-degree felony murder, attempted first-degree murder, aggravated assault with serious bodily injury, and attempted especially aggravated robbery, for which she received an effective sentence of life imprisonment. On appeal, the defendant argues the trial court erred in denying her motion to suppress. She also contends the evidence presented at trial was insufficient to support her convictions. After reviewing the record and considering the applicable law, we affirm the judgments of the trial court. However, we remand the case for corrected judgment forms in counts one and two.

Tenn. R. App. P. 3 Appeal as of Right; Judgments of the Circuit Court Affirmed and Remanded for Entry of Corrected Judgments

William J. Milam, Jackson, Tennessee, for the appellant, Betty Sparks.

Herbert H. Slatery III, Attorney General and Reporter; Hannah-Catherine Lackey, Assistant Attorney General; Mark E. Davidson, District Attorney General; and Joe Van Dyke, Assistant District Attorney General, for the appellee, State of Tennessee.

J. Ross Dyer, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which Robert L. Holloway, Jr. and Kyle A. Hixson, JJ., joined.

OPINION

J. ROSS DYER, JUDGE.

Facts and Procedural History

This case arises from the shooting and attempted robbery of the victims, Deon Turner and Desiree White^[1], on March 22, 2019. For her participation in the crimes, the defendant was indicted for first-degree premeditated murder (count 1), first-degree felony

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murder (count 2), attempted first-degree murder (count 3), attempted first-degree felony murder (count 4), aggravated assault with serious bodily injury (count 5), and attempted especially aggravated robbery (count 6).^[2] Prior to her arrest, the defendant spoke to Tennessee Bureau of Investigation ("TBI") Special Agent Celinda Davidson twice regarding her involvement in the crimes. The defendant subsequently filed a motion to suppress her second statement, and the trial court conducted a pre-trial hearing on March 17, 2021.

I. Motion to Suppress

In her motion to suppress, the defendant argued she did not waive her Miranda rights prior to speaking with Special Agent Davidson the second time, thus rendering her statement involuntary.^[3] Additionally, the defendant argued that her interaction with Special Agent Davidson constituted custodial interrogation because it occurred at the Hardeman County Sheriff's Office ("HCSO"), it included both questions from her initial interview as well as new questions, and because Special Agent Davidson's report was "devoid of any reference that the defendant [was] free to refrain from answering questions." The State disagreed and presented the following evidence supporting its position at the suppression hearing.

Special Agent Davidson testified she was assigned to assist in the investigation of the murder of Mr. Turner and was at the Sheriff's Office on March 25, 2019, in that capacity. As she was walking through the lobby, Special Agent Davidson observed the defendant and stopped to speak with her. At the time, the defendant was not a suspect but had given a Mirandized statement several days prior regarding Mr. Turner's murder. Special Agent Davidson agreed that she did not Mirandize the defendant before speaking with her a second time but testified that the defendant was not in custody during their conversation. Special Agent Davidson and the defendant spoke in the crowded lobby for "less than five minutes," and according to Special Agent Davidson, at no point during their conversation did the defendant attempt to leave the lobby or state that she did not want to speak with Special Agent Davidson. Following their conversation, Special Agent Davidson prepared an investigative report which she attached to the case file.

After its review, the trial court issued an order denying the defendant's motion to suppress the statement, finding the defendant's conversation with Special Agent Davidson was not a custodial interrogation. The defendant then proceeded to trial.

II. Trial

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The evidence produced at trial showed that on March 21, 2019, Desiree White was spending the night at the home of her boyfriend, Deon Turner. At some point during the night, Ms. White was awakened by Mr. Turner, who stated that he had been shot. Ms. White immediately realized that she had also been shot, so Mr. Turner helped her into the car and drove them to his step-brother, Tyler Sims', house.

Mr. Sims woke up to a car horn honking outside of his house at 5:45 a.m. When he went outside, he saw Mr. Turner, who was "pouring blood." Mr. Turner told Mr. Sims that "[t]hey got me two or three good times," but refused to say who had shot him. Mr. Sims then helped Mr. Turner into the house and told his girlfriend to call 911. While tending to Mr. Turner, Mr. Sims again heard a car honking outside and discovered Ms. White, who had lost consciousness on the way to Mr. Sims' house, inside the passenger seat of Mr. Turner's vehicle. Mr. Sims placed Ms. White in a recliner in the living room and tried to keep her awake, but she "was passing in and out on [him] the whole time." When medical personnel arrived, they placed Mr. Turner and Ms. White in an ambulance and drove them to a nearby church parking lot where they were taken by helicopter to the hospital.

Kaci Burcham and Michael Mayfield, Jr., pleaded guilty for their roles in the crimes and testified as State's witnesses at trial. Ms. Burcham, who was in a relationship with the defendant's son, Steven Sparks, at the time of the incident, testified that Mr. Sparks was pulled over by police on March 15, 2019, and arrested after officers discovered ecstasy pills in his vehicle. Ms. Burcham and the defendant began raising money to pay Mr. Sparks' bail, and Mr. Turner told them he would contribute one thousand dollars. However, when Mr. Turner did not give the money to the defendant, she was forced to get a loan in Mr. Sparks' name to bail him out of jail on March 20, 2019. The defendant was "upset" that Mr. Turner did not give them the money he had promised and told Ms. Burcham not to post anything on Facebook about Mr. Sparks getting out of jail because "she was still going to try getting the money [from Mr. Turner] because [they] needed it." That evening, Ms. Burcham overheard a conversation between the defendant and Mr. Sparks during which the defendant stated that she messaged Mr. Turner, but he had not brought her the money, so "she wanted it took care of." Ms. Burcham assumed that this meant the defendant wanted Mr. Turner "taken care of." Mr. Sparks responded that he did not want to talk about it, and the defendant replied, "I'm just saying it needs to be took care of." According to Ms. Burcham, prior to this conversation, Mr. Sparks had not made any plans regarding Mr. Turner.

The next day, when Mr. Sparks came home from work, he told Ms. Burcham that Mr. Turner, who worked at the same company as Mr. Sparks, quit his job and that some of their coworkers told Mr. Sparks that his arrest "was a setup." Mr. Sparks told Ms. Burcham that "he had business to take care of" and that there was "no other way to handle it." Ms.

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Burcham knew Mr. Sparks was referring to Mr. Turner. Mr. Sparks then texted someone about purchasing a gun, and he and Ms. Burcham met a man on a side road and bought a black .9-millimeter handgun. Mr. Sparks called his friend, Mr. Mayfield, and told him that he needed his help with something. They picked Mr. Mayfield up at his girlfriend's house and drove to a Walmart in Corinth, Mississippi at approximately 1:30 a.m. where they purchased .9-millimeter ammunition, shotgun shells, Remington gun oil, a backpack, a black pullover, and a hatchet. After leaving Walmart, they stopped at a gas station where Mr. Sparks purchased a black toboggan. After picking up another friend, Terry Martindale, they drove back to Mr. Sparks' apartment, where they used meth and smoked marijuana, and Mr. Sparks dispersed the weapons and clothing. Mr. Martindale was given a shotgun and ghillie suit;^[4] Mr. Mayfield was given the backpack, hatchet, and a pistol belonging to the defendant; and Mr. Sparks kept the .9-millimeter purchased earlier that evening. Ms. Burcham's role was to drive them to and from Mr. Turner's house.

Before leaving the apartment, Mr. Sparks informed the group that they were going to Mr. Turner's house to kill him and steal his ecstasy pills along with anything else they could grab. According to Ms. Burcham, while Mr. Sparks was in jail, she and the defendant went to Mr. Turner's house several times to wait for Mr. Turner to give them the bail money, and the defendant intimated to Ms. Burcham that she knew Mr. Turner kept his ecstasy pills in the top drawer of his dresser.

Approximately twenty-five minutes after dropping Mr. Sparks, Mr. Mayfield, and Mr. Martindale off at Mr. Turner's house, Ms. Burcham drove back to the area but did not see anyone. Eventually, Mr. Sparks and Mr. Mayfield made their way back to the car; however, they were unable to locate Mr. Martindale, who went to a nearby house. He was able to get a ride to a gas station, and Mr. Sparks asked the defendant to pick him up and bring him to Mr. Sparks' apartment. When they arrived at the apartment, Mr. Sparks yelled at Mr. Martindale for getting lost and for leaving the ghillie suit and shotgun in the woods. The defendant then asked Mr. Sparks if "it was took care of," and Mr. Sparks responded that "[i]t should be" because he "unloaded a whole clip." The defendant also asked if they had "gotten...