The jury’s sentence of death for a Memphis man convicted of killing an unarmed teenager was unanimously upheld Monday by the Tennessee Supreme Court.
Kevin Burns received a death sentence for the 1992 murder of 17-year-old Damond Dawson and was sentenced to life in prison for killing 20-year-old Tracey Johnson. The victims were murdered as they sat in a car in Dawson’s driveway.
The two victims and a third man who was wounded, but survived, were robbed and then shot. A fourth friend who also was in the car fled unharmed as shots were fired in his direction. The shots also missed a group of teenagers playing basketball in the driveway.
Burns, 23 at the time of the crime, told authorities after his arrest by the FBI in Chicago that he and four other men went to Dawson’s home for a confrontation with the victims and their friends. Instead, witnesses said, the victims were robbed of money and jewelry before being shot. Dawson, who was shot five times, died after being transported to a hospital. Johnson died at the scene.
Chief Justice Riley Anderson and Justices Frank Drowota, Adolpho A. Birch, Jr. and Janice Holder agreed with a Court of Criminal Appeals decision and rejected Burns’ claims that errors in his trial and sentencing hearing affected the outcome. Justice William Barker was not a member of the court when the case was heard in Jackson.
Writing for the court, Anderson said Burns showed no remorse for his crimes and fled to Chicago after committing the robbery and murders.
“We have determined that none of the alleged errors claimed by the defendant affected the convictions for felony murder or the sentences imposed by the jury,” Anderson wrote for the court. “We have further concluded that the evidence supports the jury’s findings as to the aggravating and mitigating circumstances, and the sentence of death is not arbitrary or disproportionate to the sentence imposed in similar cases, considering the nature of the crime and the defendant.”