STATE OF TENNESSEE v. JOHN DAVID CUNNINGHAM - Articles

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STATE OF TENNESSEE v. JOHN DAVID CUNNINGHAM

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Sep 24, 2025

Court: TN Court of Criminal Appeals

Attorneys 1: Patrick T. McNally, Nashville, Tennessee (on appeal); D. Brock East and Halle Mann, Murfreesboro, Tennessee (at trial), for the appellant, John David Cunningham.

Attorneys 2: Jonathan Skrmetti, Attorney General and Reporter; Lacy E. Wilbur, Senior Assistant Attorney General; Jennings H. Jones, District Attorney General; and Hugh T. Ammerman III and Allyson S. Abbott, Assistant District Attorneys General, for the appellee, State of Tennessee.

Judge(s): MCMULLEN

A Rutherford County jury convicted the Defendant, John David Cunningham, as charged of seven counts of rape of a child and six counts of aggravated sexual battery against his minor daughter, and the trial court imposed an effective 100-year sentence. See Tenn. Code Ann. §§ 39-13-522 (Supp. 2013), -504(a)(4). On appeal, the Defendant argues: (1) the trial court erred in admitting the child’s forensic interview; (2) the evidence is insufficient to sustain his convictions; (3) the trial court erred in admitting evidence of his alleged prior bad acts; (4) the trial court abused its discretion in imposing partially consecutive sentencing; (5) the trial court erred in ordering the Defendant to stop taking depositions in the divorce case and to turn over existing deposition transcripts to the State; and (6) the trial court abused its discretion in allowing the State to utilize an unauthenticated excerpt of a transcript lacking the court reporter’s certification. After review, we affirm the judgments of the trial court but remand the case for entry of corrected judgment forms in Counts 1 through 13 to reflect the Defendant’s effective 100-year sentence.

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