Davenport v. State

281 S.W.3d 268, 373 Ark. 71, 2008 Ark. LEXIS 184
CourtSupreme Court of Arkansas
DecidedMarch 20, 2008
DocketCR 07-1086
StatusPublished
Cited by22 cases

This text of 281 S.W.3d 268 (Davenport v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Arkansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Davenport v. State, 281 S.W.3d 268, 373 Ark. 71, 2008 Ark. LEXIS 184 (Ark. 2008).

Opinion

PAUL E. DANIELSON, Justice.

Appellant Talideen Tramal Davenport appeals from his convictions for capital murder and three counts of unlawful discharge of a firearm from a vehicle and his sentence to life imprisonment without parole plus fifteen years. His sole point on appeal is that the circuit court erred in denying his motions for directed verdict. We affirm Davenport’s convictions and sentence.

A review of the record reveals that on October 2, 2005, four teenagers, T.N., L.R.J.R., andJ.S., stopped for gas at a gas station in Little Rock. While the driver, T.N., was pumping gas, a blue Jeep Cherokee pulled next to the teens’ car. Comments were exchanged between the occupants of the two vehicles, and a gun was fired, killing L.R. Davenport was arrested and, ultimately, was convicted of capital murder and three counts of unlawful discharge of a firearm from a vehicle and was sentenced as already set forth.

Davenport argues that the circuit court erred in denying his motions for directed verdict because the State did not provide substantial evidence that Davenport himself discharged a firearm from a vehicle and committed murder. He asserts that the only evidence presented at trial that he was the shooter was the testimony ofT.N., J.R., andJ.S. He contends that their in-court identifications of him were so unreliable and clearly unbelievable that this court should ignore them and overturn his conviction.

The State responds that substantial evidence supported Davenport’s identity as the shooter. It contends that viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to it, the facts were of sufficient force and character to compel a conclusion beyond suspicion or conjecture that Davenport was the shooter. It further submits that to the extent that Davenport challenges the reliability of the identifications, that was for the jury to decide, as Davenport did not argue to the circuit court that the in-court identifications were constitutionally infirm, nor did he object or move to suppress the identifications, waiving any issue relating to any alleged defects.

We treat a motion for directed verdict as a challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence. See Tryon v. State, 371 Ark. 25, 263 S.W.3d 475 (2007). When reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence, we determine whether there is substantial evidence to support the verdict, viewing the evidence in a light most favorable to the State. See id. Substantial evidence is that which is of sufficient force and character that it will, with reasonable certainty, compel a conclusion one way or the other, without resorting to speculation or conjecture. See id.

Here, Davenport does not challenge the State’s proof on any of the elements of the offenses charged against him, but instead urges that his motions for directed verdict should have been granted due to the fact that the witnesses’ in-court identifications of him were so unreliable and unbelievable. We have held that the credibility of witnesses is a matter for the jury’s consideration. See Boyd v. State, 369 Ark. 259, 253 S.W.3d 456 (2007). Where the testimony is conflicting, we do not pass upon the credibility of the witnesses and have no right to disregard the testimony of any witness after the jury has given it full credence, where it cannot be said with assurance that it was inherently improbable, physically impossible, or so clearly unbelievable that reasonable minds could not differ thereon. See Barnes v. State, 258 Ark. 565, 528 S.W.2d 370 (1975).

Here, T.N. identified Davenport, at trial, as being the one that he saw with the gun on the evening in question. He stated that he was positive that Davenport was the one and that, at the time, Davenport was partially in the Jeep Cherokee:

Prosecutor: How certain are you of that?
T.N.: Positive, because I seen him, he opened the door, he stepped on — he was inside the door [of the Jeep Cherokee], he stepped on a little ledge right there. He was pointing the gun over on the Jeep.
Prosecutor: Let me ask you this, was he — was his body all still in the car?
T.N.: Like half. His legs — his leg was in the car.
Prosecutor: His legs were in the car?
T.N.: Upper body was above.
Prosecutor: How did he get out and shoot?
T.N.: He got up, stepped up over there, leaned over the car like this and shot.

T.N. testified that as he drove off, J.S. jumped out of the car and ran the other way. T.N. testified that the other vehicle chased after J.S., shooting at him. He testified that L.R. had fallen into his lap and that he thought she had been shot.

T.N. testified that while he made an identification from a photo spread shown to him by police, he “wasn’t sure it was the person.” He then confirmed that, when he saw Davenport in the courtroom that day, he knew Davenport was “the guy” “because I felt and I seen his face and I remember his face because I had — when she told me it was a gun, he had a gun, I had looked up and looked him dead in his eyes and I seen him.” T.N. further stated that Davenport looked as if he had lost a “little weight” since the night in question, that his face was “still the same,” and that he had a “lot more hair on his head.” On cross-examination, T.N. testified that he recognized Davenport “when I walked in the door [of the courtroom]” and that he was “positive” that it was him. On redirect, he testified that it was not possible that he could be mistaken as to Davenport being the shooter because he remembered his face and was never going to forget it.

J.R. also testified that the shooter stood on a “little rail or something” of the Jeep Cherokee “up in the truck” and pointed his gun. She testified that when he started shooting, they “all held our head down.” She admitted that two weeks after going to the police station, she could not pick anyone out of a photo spread presented to her by the police. She then stated that she recognized the shooter when she came to court on that day:

Prosecutor: You thought you were just — let me back up. You thought you were going to introduce yourself to the ladies and gentlemen of the jury. You didn’t think anyone was going to be in here at that time?
J.R.: No, ma’am, I didn’t think so.
Prosecutor: Okay. All right.
J.R.: And so when I came in, and then I — and then I looked that way and I saw when he bit his lip and that made me think about when he was shooting the gun, he was biting his Up.
Prosecutor: Okay.
J.R.: And so that made me think about it and it flashed back.
Prosecutor: Who are you talking about?

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Bluebook (online)
281 S.W.3d 268, 373 Ark. 71, 2008 Ark. LEXIS 184, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/davenport-v-state-ark-2008.