The Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals has upheld the conviction of a man found guilty in a 2021 Lebanon murder.
Appeals Judge Timothy Easter delivered the opinion of the appellate court that the conviction of Jonathan Duncan, 40, of Nashville was affirmed.
Duncan was found guilty of first-degree murder, felony murder and aggravated robbery of Ellis Sanders, 27, of Mt. Juliet. Judge Michael Collins sentenced Duncan to life in prison.
The defense argued that long hours for the jury, sleeping jurors and admission of prior bad acts as evidence should result in a retrial. The defense also argued that evidence presented wasn鈥檛 sufficient to support the guilty verdict.
The trial court disagreed. As the trial began, prosecutors introduced evidence that linked the prior bad acts, which happened hours before, to the murder as 鈥渁 continuation of events.鈥 Findings after the trial concluded determined that only one juror fell asleep during a video presented. That juror was dismissed before deliberations.
The appellate court considered those factors and found that the evidence was sufficient, that while the jury worked for many hours, the trial court offered times for the jury to stretch and rest and that the juror dismissed for f无毛视频ing asleep did not affect the verdict.
The appeals court ruled that some of the charges be remanded back to the trial court to merge the sentences for first-degree murder and felony murder into one to avoid any possible double jeopardy issues.
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