Tyrone Chalmers v. State of Tennessee

Capital Petitioner Tyrone Chalmers appeals as of right the judgment of the Shelby County Criminal Court denying his petition for post-conviction relief. In 1997, the petitioner was convicted of one count of first degree felony murder and one count of especially aggravated robbery. The jury sentenced him to death after finding that the evidence of an aggravating circumstance, that the defendant was previously convicted of one or more felonies other than the present charge, whose statutory elements involve the use of violence to the person, see Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-13-204(i)(2), outweighed evidence of mitigating circumstances beyond a reasonable doubt. The trial judge imposed a sentence of twenty years for the especially aggravated robbery conviction, to run concurrently with the death sentence but consecutively to sentences previously imposed in another case. See State v. Chalmers, 28 S.W.3d 913, 915 (Tenn. 2000). On April 19, 2001, the petitioner filed a pro se petition for post-conviction relief. An amended petition was filed on September 22, 2003. An evidentiary hearing was conducted in August 2005. On January 24, 2006, the trial court entered an order denying post-conviction relief. On appeal to this court, the petitioner presents a number of claims that can be characterized in the following broad categories: (1) the ineffective assistance of counsel and (2) the constitutionality of the imposition of a sentence of death. Following a thorough and exhaustive review of the record and the applicable law, we affirm the judgment of the postconviction court.