APPELLATE COURT OPINIONS

The defendant appeals from his maximum sentence of six (6) years for voluntary manslaughter and the trial court's imposition of consecutive sentences. After review, we hold that the trial court properly sentenced the defendant to six (6) years for the voluntary manslaughter conviction and correctly ordered the defendant's convictions for voluntary manslaughter and aggravated assault be served consecutive to one another. Therefore, we affirm the judgment of the trial court.

Petitioner appeals the denial of post-conviction relief by the Shelby County Criminal Court. He contends he received ineffective assistance of counsel at his jury trial where he was convicted of second degree murder. We affirm.

A Shelby County jury convicted the defendant of second degree murder, and the trial court sentenced him to 25 years as a Violent Offender. In this appeal, the defendant alleges (1) the evidence was insufficient to sustain his conviction, and (2) the trial court erroneously admitted the defendant's custodial confession. We conclude that the defendant's initial arrest was without probable cause, and that the defendant's confession was obtained approximately 53 hours from his arrest without a judicial determination of probable cause. The defendant's confession was, therefore, erroneously admitted, and the error was not harmless. We reverse the defendant's conviction and remand for a new trial.

Defendant challenges the denial of pretrial diversion by the District Attorney General and subsequent denial of relief by the trial court. We conclude that the defendant failed to file a petition for writ of certiorari and improperly sought to have the trial court consider matters not presented to the District Attorney General; thus, defendant has failed to establish that the District Attorney General abused his discretion in denying pretrial diversion. We affirm the judgment of the trial court.

The appellant, LaQuenton Monger, was convicted by a jury in the Shelby County Criminal Court of one count of first degree felony murder by aggravated child abuse and one count of aggravated child abuse. The trial court imposed concurrent sentences of life imprisonment in the Tennessee Department of Correction for the felony murder conviction and twenty years imprisonment in the Department for the aggravated child abuse conviction. On appeal, the appellant challenges the sufficiency of the evidence underlying his conviction of felony murder and further challenges the trial court's failure to instruct the jury on lesser-included offenses of felony murder. Following a thorough review of the record and the parties' briefs, we reverse the appellant's convictions of felony murder and aggravated child abuse and remand the cases to the trial court for a new trial.

The defendant was charged in a two-count indictment with one count of the unlawful possession of more than .5 grams of cocaine with the intent to sell, and one count of the unlawful possession of more than 26 grams of cocaine with the intent to deliver. A separate indictment returned the same day charged one count of the unlawful possession of marijuana. Pursuant to a negotiated plea agreement, he subsequently pled guilty to two misdemeanor drug possession offenses in connection with the charges, and was sentenced to concurrent sentences of 11 months, 29 days. The trial court refused his request for judicial diversion, but granted him probation, with the condition that he spend 90 days in a halfway house. In a timely filed appeal to this court, the defendant raises two issues: (1) whether the trial court erred in denying his request for judicial diversion; and (2) whether the trial court abused its discretion in sentencing him to three months in the halfway house as a condition of probation. Based upon a careful review, we affirm the judgment of the trial court. However, we remand to the trial court for entry of a corrected judgment form to reflect the disposition of all charges against the defendant.

The defendant, George E. Ratliff, was convicted by a jury of rape of a child. In this consolidated appeal, Defendant alleges various errors by the trial court, challenges his sentence, and appeals the dismissal of his petition for writ of error coram nobis on the ground of untimely filing. After a review of the record and applicable law, we reverse the trial court's summary dismissal of the petition for writ of error coram nobis based on the recent decision of our supreme court in Workman v. State, 41 S.W.3d 100 (Tenn. 2001). We remand this matter to the trial court for a hearing on the merits of the petition for writ of error coram nobis. Pursuant to State v. Mixon, 983 S.W.2d 661 (Tenn. 1999), appellate proceedings on Defendant's appeal as of right from his conviction are stayed, pending the trial court's ruling on the error coram nobis petition.

The defendant, Charles R. Blackstock, pled guilty to especially aggravated kidnapping and two counts of rape of a child. See Tenn. Code Ann. §§ 39-13-305, 39-13-522. The trial court imposed 25-year sentences on each offense. The sentences were ordered to be served consecutively, for an effective sentence of 75 years. The sentence for especially aggravated kidnapping and the consecutive sentencing order are affirmed. Because the trial court erroneously applied certain enhancement factors to each of the sentences for rape of a child, the terms are modified to 23 years.