State of Tennessee v. Shawn Nelson Smoot

Syllabus

A Roane County grand jury indicted the defendant, Shawn Nelson Smoot, with the first degree murder of the victim, Brooke Morris, and later convicted him of the same, for which he received an enhanced sentence of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. The defendant raises the following issues on appeal: (1) the trial court erred when allowing the introduction of evidence seized during the warrantless search of his home under the theory of inevitable discovery (2) the trial court erred when allowing expert ballistics and firearms identification testimony (3) the trial court erred when allowing the introduction of evidence related to the victim's order of protection against the defendant (4) the trial court erred when denying the defendant's motion to rehear all pretrial motions (5) the trial court erred when allowing the victim's landlord to render hearsay testimony regarding an incident between the victim and the defendant (6) the trial court erred when allowing several witnesses to offer improper character evidence under Tennessee Rule of Evidence 404(b) (7) the trial court erred when denying the defendant's request for a trial continuance so he could obtain a mitigation expert (8) the trial court erred when allowing the State to amend the indictment to include an additional witness twelve days before trial (9) the trial court erred when denying two motions for mistrial (10) the trial court erred when admitting the autopsy report as evidence (11) the trial court erred when admitting the prior consistent statement of the defendant's roommate into evidence (12) the trial court erred when excluding the victim's text messages to her friends from evidence (13) the trial court erred when instructing the jury on flight (14) the State committed prosecutorial misconduct when making improper comments to the jury regarding evidence (15) the State committed prosecutorial misconduct when commenting during closing arguments on the defendant's failure to testify (16)