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Tanner v. State5/4/2000
:20 and 4:35 p.m. Tanner, however, contends that he has an alibi and presented witnesses who testified he was in a jewelry store in Pearl, Mississippi, from approximately 3:55 to 4:40 p.m. Police later discovered that Tanner had taken and sold Wood's rings to a pawn shop. Tanner subsequently confessed to taking the rings "two or three weeks" earlier but maintained he did not kill Wood. Testimony by Wood's housekeeper, however, indicates that she helped Wood recover one of the rings Tanner pawned from a recliner on the morning of Wood's death.
. Taking all factors into consideration, a reasonable juror could have concluded that Tanner was indeed guilty. "It is enough to say that the jury, and not the reviewing court, judges the credibility of the witnesses as well as the weight and worth of their conflicting testimony." Gathright v. State, 380 So. 2d 1276, 1278 (Miss. 1980). Accordingly, sufficient credible evidence was presented to the jury, and Tanner's argument is without merit.
XIII.
WHETHER THE AGGREGATE ERROR REQUIRES REVERSAL
. Tanner argues that the cumulative effect of the errors in trial denied him his constitutional right to a fair trial. "This Court has often ruled that errors in the lower court that do not require reversal standing alone may nonetheless taken cumulatively require reversal." Jenkins v. State, 607 So. 2d 1171, 1183 (Miss. 1992). We find this issue to be without merit.
CONCLUSION
. With the exception of its handling of the Batson challenge to the State's peremptory strikes of prospective jurors Kasenda Lampkin and Kimberly Cain, we affirm the judgment of the Hinds County Circuit Court. However, we remand this case to that court with directions that it conduct a Batson hearing on the State's peremptory strikes of those two prospective jurors and that it rule on whether the State struck either of those prospective jurors for racially discriminatory reasons. If the trial court finds that the State struck either or both of those prospective jurors for racially discriminatory reasons, then the trial court shall vacate its judgment and order a new trial for Boman L. Tanner. In remanding for this Batson hearing, we do not express or imply any view as to how the trial court should rule on remand.
. AFFIRMED IN PART AND REMANDED.
PITTMAN, P.J., SMITH, COBB AND DIAZ, JJ., CONCUR. PRATHER, C.J., DISSENTS WITH SEPARATE WRITTEN OPINION JOINED BY BANKS, P.J., AND WALLER, J. McRAE, J., NOT PARTICIPATING.
PRATHER, CHIEF JUSTICE, DISSENTING:
. Because I feel the trial court erred in admitting testimony of an allegedly stolen gun, I respectfully dissent. "Relevancy and admissibility of evidence are largely within the discretion of the trial court and this Court will reverse only where that discretion has been abused." Underwood v. State, 708 So. 2d 18, 31 (Miss. 1998). Tanner asserts that the trial court erred by overruling his motion in limine to exclude testimony regarding Tom Harper's firearm, which had been stolen in December or January, 1997. The basis of Tanner's objection was there was that no proof the stolen gun was the murder weapon or that Tanner was even the person who stole it. Furthermore, Tanner asserts this was evidence of a crime totally unrelated to the murder, and that the "stolen gun theory" was more prejudicial than probative. After hearing Tanner's objections, the trial court admitted Harper's testimony.
. According to Harper's testimony, Harper saw Tanner at East Side Auto Sales in December or January of 1997. Harper, Tanner, and Sam Ray ("Sam") engaged in a conversation. During that conversation, Harper testified that Tanner asked
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