State of Tennessee v. Phillip Francis Morales

A Blount County grand jury indicted the defendant on one count of simple possession or casual exchange of Lorazepam, a schedule IV controlled substance, and on one count of possession with intent to sell or deliver an E felony amount of marijuana, a schedule VI controlled substance. After unsuccessfully seeking suppression of the items seized in the search involved in this case, the defendant waived his right to a trial by jury. At the conclusion of a bench trial, the lower court found the defendant guilty as charged. The trial court later sentenced the defendant to concurrent terms of eleven months and twenty-nine days for the simple possession offense and eighteen months for the possession with intent to sell or deliver offense. Though otherwise placed on supervised probation, the trial court ordered the defendant to serve sixteen days of these sentences on eight consecutive weekends. The defendant subsequently filed a new trial motion alleging that the trial court erred in not suppressing the aforementioned evidence and that the proof is insufficient to support the E felony conviction. The trial court denied this motion, and the defendant appeals the denial to this Court raising the same issues. After a review of the record and relevant authorities, we find that the defendant's suppression claim has merit though the sufficiency allegation does not. Because of our finding regarding the suppression matter, we must reverse and remand the defendant's convictions.