KELLUM WILLIAMS v. STATE OF TENNESSEE - Articles

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KELLUM WILLIAMS v. STATE OF TENNESSEE

Posted by: Karen Belcher on Sep 7, 2023

Court: TN Court of Criminal Appeals

Attorneys 1: Gregory D. Smith, Clarksville, Tennessee, for the appellant, Kellum Jordan Williams.

Attorneys 2: Jonathan Skrmetti, Attorney General and Reporter; Caroline Weldon, Assistant Attorney General; Robert J. Nash, District Attorney General; and Art Bieber, Assistant District Attorney General, for the appellee, State of Tennessee.

Judge(s): HOLLOWAY

Petitioner, Kellum Williams, appeals as of right from the Montgomery County Circuit Court’s denial of his petition for post-conviction relief, wherein he challenged his convictions for first degree premeditated murder, first degree felony murder, and especially aggravated kidnapping and resulting sentence of life without the possibility of parole plus twenty-five years. Petitioner contends that he was denied the effective assistance of counsel based upon trial counsel’s failure to: (1) sufficiently emphasize at trial the theory that the victim died in Montgomery County rather than in Robertson County, as testified to by the State’s experts; (2) seek an independent expert “to test samples from the crime scene”; (3) raise as a defense that venue of the trial should have been in Robertson County instead of Montgomery County; and (4) more extensively question witnesses to demonstrate Petitioner’s “non-participation in the events leading to [the victim’s] death.” Petitioner further asserts that he is entitled to relief based upon cumulative error. Following a thorough review, we affirm the judgment of the post-conviction court.

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