State of Tennessee v. Raymond Benson

01/23/2026

IN THE COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS OF TENNESSEE

AT JACKSON

Assigned on Briefs January 7, 2026

STATE OF TENNESSEE v. RAYMOND BENSON

Appeal from the Criminal Court for Shelby County

No. 21-03172 Jennifer Fitzgerald, Judge

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No. W2025-00309-CCA-R3-CD

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The defendant, Raymond Benson, was convicted by a Shelby County Criminal Court jury

of reckless homicide and convicted felon in possession of a handgun for which he received

an effective sentence of four years suspended to supervised probation. On appeal, the

defendant argues that the evidence is insufficient to sustain his conviction for reckless

homicide and asserts that the trial court erred in denying his motion to impeach a State’s

witness with prior convictions. Following our review of the record, the parties’ briefs, and

the applicable law, we affirm the judgments of the trial court.

Tenn. R. App. 3 Appeal as of Right; Judgments of the Criminal Court Affirmed

J. ROSS DYER, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which CAMILLE R. MCMULLEN and

MATTHEW J. WILSON, JJ., joined.

Phyllis Aluko, District Public Defender; Barry W. Kuhn (on appeal), and Constance Barnes

and Devarius Minor (at trial), Assistant Public Defenders, for the appellant, Raymond

Benson.

Jonathan Skrmetti, Attorney General and Reporter; Benjamin A. Ball, Senior Assistant

Attorney General; Steven J. Mulroy, District Attorney General; and Kevin McAlpin and

Lauren Hutton, Assistant District Attorneys General, for the appellee, State of Tennessee.

OPINION

Facts and Procedural History

The defendant was indicted for second-degree murder, convicted felon in possession

of a handgun,1 and theft of property valued over $2,500, arising out of the murder of the

victim, Ivan Payton, during the early morning hours of May 16, 2021. The State dismissed

the theft charge and proceeded to trial on the remaining two counts.

The State’s proof at trial showed that on the date of the murder, Adam Ash and

Crystal Baggett were living in a house on Burr Road in Memphis. Sometime after 2:30

a.m., Mr. Ash and Ms. Baggett arrived home and a handful of people, including the

defendant, were at the house. The defendant was asleep on the couch, which was not

unusual because the defendant was a friend of Mr. Ash’s and sometimes stayed with him.

Not long after they got home, the victim arrived and began trying to wake up the defendant.

According to both Mr. Ash and Ms. Baggett, the defendant and the victim were friends,

“call[ing] each other brothers basically,” and the victim was concerned about the

defendant’s use of drugs. The victim “wanted [the defendant] to do better.” The victim

eventually roused the defendant, and the two engaged in a verbal altercation that turned

physical.

The victim hit the defendant, the defendant hit the victim back, and the two men

“ended up scuffing down the front porch” and into the middle of the yard. From their

vantage point on the front porch, Mr. Ash and Ms. Baggett could both easily observe the

fight taking place in the yard. The two men continued to wrestle and “do[] a little bit of

fighting,” and then the fight appeared to come to an end. The victim helped the defendant

up, gave him a kiss on the cheek, and said, “I love you. Just get off this sh*t. I’m doing

what your brother would be doing.” Thinking that the fight was over and there were no

significant injuries, Mr. Ash started to walk back into the house. Ms. Baggett saw the

victim start to walk away and then heard the victim say, “What? You gonna shoot me,

b*tch.” The defendant fired a gun that was now in his hand, and the victim “instantly went

down.” Neither Mr. Ash nor Ms. Baggett had seen either man with a gun until that point

in time. Upon hearing gunshots, Mr. Ash went back out onto the porch and yelled to the

defendant, “What you do that for, motherf***er?” Ms. Baggett heard the defendant

respond, “What did you want me to do, let him beat me up?” At that, the defendant got

into the victim’s car, which the victim had left running, and drove away.

An autopsy revealed that the victim sustained four gunshot wounds with the wound

to the chest being immediately fatal. The trajectory of the fatal bullet was front to back

and downward, which could be consistent with the victim moving forward when shot. The

medical examiner determined that the victim’s cause of death was multiple gunshot

wounds and manner of death was homicide.

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The defendant stipulated that he was previously convicted of a felony offense on January 27, 2009.

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The defendant testified that at the time of the offense, he was using drugs because

his brother had recently died but was preparing to move to Iowa in an effort to change his

behavior. On the night of the murder, the defendant went to visit his friend, Mr. Ash, to

socialize and buy methadone “wafers.” When the defendant arrived, Mr. Ash did not have

the drugs but was attempting to secure them. The defendant played dominos, drank, and

consumed Xanax while he waited. He eventually went inside and passed out on the couch.

According to the defendant, he was awakened by a “sharp . . . [e]xcruciating pain”

down his back. The pain was being caused by the victim putting his thumb on the

defendant’s “pressure points” to “try to wake [him] up.” The defendant claimed the victim

was “no one to [him],” not “like a brother” or a “close associate.” In fact, the victim and

two other men had “jumped” the defendant a week earlier. When the victim finally released

his grip, the defendant stood up and discovered that his phone was missing, his pockets

were turned inside out, and his money was gone.

The defendant went outside and walked down the ramp off the porch. Moments

later, the victim came up behind him, grabbed him around the neck, and slammed him

against a car that was parked in the yard. As the defendant struggled to get the victim off

of him, the victim pulled a gun out and placed it against the defendant’s stomach. The

defendant put his hands in the air, but the victim “slung [the defendant] on the ground” and

stood over him. The victim attempted to strike the defendant with the gun, but the

defendant dodged the blow. The victim connected on his second strike but somehow lost

the gun before his third attempt. The victim released the defendant to look for the gun, but

the defendant saw the gun first and grabbed it. The victim taunted the defendant and then

charged at him. As the defendant “back peddl[ed] trying to scoot back,” he fired the gun

at the victim. He did not know how many times he shot. According to the defendant, the

victim was calling him names and walking toward him in “a fast aggressive manner” when

he fired the gun. He did not mean to hurt the victim and only shot “[o]ut of fear.” The

defendant dropped the gun and left the scene in the victim’s car. Two days later, the

defendant turned himself into the police with the assistance of his cousin who was a

Memphis police officer.

Following the conclusion of the proof, the jury convicted the defendant of the lesser-

included offense of reckless homicide and, as charged, of convicted felon in possession of

a handgun. The trial court imposed a sentence of four years’ supervised probation.2 The

defendant appealed.

2

The defendant’s probation was revoked in April 2025 after a violation.

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Analysis

On appeal, the defendant argues that the evidence is insufficient to sustain his

conviction for reckless homicide and asserts that the trial court erred in denying his motion

to impeach State’s witness Adam Ash with prior convictions. The State responds that the

evidence is sufficient and that the defendant waived his impeachment claim. We agree

with the State.

I. Sufficiency

The defendant argues the evidence is insufficient to sustain his conviction for

reckless homicide because the proof did not show that he acted recklessly, but instead, that

he shot the victim in self-defense.

When the sufficiency of the evidence is challenged, the relevant question of the

reviewing court is “whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the

prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime

beyond a reasonable doubt.” Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979); see also Tenn.

R. App. P. 13(e) (“Findings of guilt in criminal actions whether by the trial court or jury

shall be set aside if the evidence is insufficient to support the findings by the trier of fact

of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.”); State v. Evans, 838 S.W.2d 185, 190-92 (Tenn.

1992); State v. Anderson, 835 S.W.2d 600, 604 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1992). All questions

involving the credibility of witnesses, the weight and value to be given the evidence, and

all factual issues are resolved by the trier of fact. See State v. Pappas, 754 S.W.2d 620,

623 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1987). “A guilty verdict by the jury, approved by the trial judge,

accredits the testimony of the witnesses for the State and resolves all conflicts in favor of

the theory of the State.” State v. Grace, 493 S.W.2d 474, 476 (Tenn. 1973). Our Supreme

Court has stated the rationale for this rule:

This well-settled rule rests on a sound foundation. The trial judge and the

jury see the witnesses face to face, hear their testimony and observe their

demeanor on the stand. Thus the trial judge and jury are the primary

instrumentality of justice to determine the weight and credibility to be given

to the testimony of witnesses. In the trial forum alone is there human

atmosphere and the totality of the evidence cannot be reproduced with a

written record in this Court.

Bolin v. State, 405 S.W.2d 768, 771 (Tenn. 1966) (citing Carroll v. State, 212 Tenn. 464,

370 S.W.2d 523 (1963)). “A jury conviction removes the presumption of innocence with

which a defendant is initially cloaked and replaces it with one of guilt, so that on appeal a

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convicted defendant has the burden of demonstrating that the evidence is insufficient.”

State v. Tuggle, 639 S.W.2d 913, 914 (Tenn. 1982).

Guilt may be found beyond a reasonable doubt where there is direct evidence,

circumstantial evidence, or a combination of the two. State v. Matthews, 805 S.W.2d 776,

779 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1990) (citing State v. Brown, 551 S.W.2d 329, 331 (Tenn. 1977);

Farmer v. State, 343 S.W.2d 895, 897 (Tenn. 1961)). The standard of review for

sufficiency of the evidence “‘is the same whether the conviction is based upon direct or

circumstantial evidence.’” State v. Dorantes, 331 S.W.3d 370, 379 (Tenn. 2011) (quoting

State v. Hanson, 279 S.W.3d 265, 275 (Tenn. 2009)). The jury as the trier of fact must

evaluate the credibility of the witnesses, determine the weight given to witnesses’

testimony, and reconcile all conflicts in the evidence. State v. Campbell, 245 S.W.3d 331,

335 (Tenn. 2008) (citing Byrge v. State, 575 S.W.2d 292, 295 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1978)).

Moreover, the jury determines the weight to be given to circumstantial evidence and the

inferences to be drawn from this evidence, and the extent to which the circumstances are

consistent with guilt and inconsistent with innocence are questions primarily for the jury.

Dorantes, 331 S.W.3d at 379 (citing State v. Rice, 184 S.W.3d 646, 662 (Tenn. 2006)).

This Court, when considering the sufficiency of the evidence, shall not reweigh the

evidence or substitute its inferences for those drawn by the trier of fact. Id.

Reckless homicide is the reckless killing of another and is considered a result-of-

conduct offense. Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-13-215(a); State v. Davis, 466 S.W.3d 49, 70

(Tenn. 2015) (citing State v. Parker, 350 S.W.3d 883, 910 n.16 (Tenn. 2011)). A reckless

act occurs regarding “the result of the conduct when the person is aware of but consciously

disregards a substantial and unjustifiable risk that the circumstances exist or the result will

occur.” Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-11-302(c). In this context, “[t]he risk must be of such a

nature and degree that its disregard constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of care

that an ordinary person would exercise under all the circumstances as viewed from the

accused person’s standpoint.” Id.

Again, the defendant contends that the evidence is insufficient to sustain his

conviction for reckless homicide because the proof did not show that he acted recklessly,

but instead, that he shot the victim in self-defense. However, in the light most favorable to

the State, a rational jury could conclude that the defendant “consciously disregarded a

substantial risk” by firing a gun four times at an unarmed victim and was, therefore, not

acting in self-defense.

It is well-established “that whether an individual acted in self-defense is a factual

determination to be made by the jury as the sole trier of fact.” State v. Goode, 956 S.W.2d

521, 527 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1997) (citing State v. Ivy, 868 S.W.2d 724, 727 (Tenn. Crim.

App. 1993)). At the time of the offense, the applicable statute provided:

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(2) [A] person who is not engaged in conduct that would constitute a felony

or Class A misdemeanor and is in a place where the person has a right to be

has no duty to retreat before threatening or using force intended or likely to

cause death or serious bodily injury, if:

(A) The person has a reasonable belief that there is an

imminent danger of death, serious bodily injury, or grave

sexual abuse;

(B) The danger creating the belief of imminent death or serious

bodily injury is real, or honestly believed to be real at the time;

and

(C) The belief of danger is founded upon reasonable grounds.

Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-11-611(b)(2). When self-defense is fairly raised by the proof, the

State is required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant did not act in self-

defense. State v. Benson, 600 S.W.3d 896, 903 (Tenn. 2020).

Here, the jury was presented with proof from two eyewitnesses that after a minor

skirmish, the victim helped the defendant up off the ground, kissed him on the cheek, and

urged him to get off drugs. The defendant then produced a gun and shot the victim four

times. Although the defendant testified conversely, claiming the victim brutally attacked

him and was the one who pulled out a gun, the jury heard all the evidence and by its verdict

accredited the testimony of the State’s witnesses over that of the defendant. It is well

“within the prerogative of the jury to reject the claim of self-defense.” Goode, 956 S.W.2d

at 527. Moreover, we deem it worthy of note that contrary to the defendant’s assertion, the

physical evidence casts doubt on the defendant’s testimony because the trajectory of the

bullet fired into the victim’s chest was in a downward direction, which would not be

possible if the defendant fired up at the victim from the ground as the victim charged at

him. It was within the province of the jury to find the defendant’s testimony not credible.

The State presented sufficient evidence from which the jury could have concluded that the

defendant did not act in self-defense, and we affirm the defendant’s conviction for reckless

homicide.

II. Impeachment

The defendant also asserts that the trial court erred in denying his motion to impeach

State’s witness Adam Ash with his prior convictions. The State submits the defendant has

waived this issue as he did not seek admission of Mr. Ash’s prior conviction pursuant to

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Tennessee Rule of Evidence 609 at trial. Upon our review of the record, we agree with the

State.

The defendant filed a pre-trial notice of intent to use the prior bad conduct and

convictions of State’s witness Adam Ash at trial.3 More specifically, the defendant

intended to question Mr. Ash about his drug use should Mr. Ash deny the same. At a

hearing on the motion, defense counsel stated to the court:

But we also did file an additional motion for notice of intent to use

prior bad conduct against the State of Tennessee witnesses because several

of them have felony convictions. Some of those do not qualify. And I will

be very candid[] with the Court. They do not qualify as it relates to

credibility. It’s not about untruthfulness or showing that they have

committed a crime of moral turpitude.

The only manner in which this would arise is if during their cross-

examination the State’s witnesses deny using drugs or the presence of drugs.

Then we were requesting permission to use their prior convictions and their

pending cases showing a continuation of drug use or possession of drugs to

impeach their testimony.

Despite the limitation expressed by the defendant, the trial court went on to review

Mr. Ash’s prior record and determined that a drug conviction from July 2020 was within

the ten-year time period discussed in Tennessee Rule of Evidence 609, but because it did

not involve fraud or deceit, the trial court determined Mr. Ash could only be asked about

it if he denied using drugs on the stand.

The defendant contends on appeal that the trial court erred in disallowing

impeachment of Mr. Ash with past drug convictions pursuant to Tennessee Rule of

Evidence 609. However, as detailed above, the defendant failed to present an argument

related to Rule 609. Furthermore, the defendant specifically told the court that Mr. Ash’s

conviction was not admissible to attack his credibility and only wanted permission to cross-

examine Mr. Ash about the conviction if he “den[ied] using drugs or the presence of drugs.”

The court ultimately ruled as the defendant requested, “that if the[] witness[] get[s] up there

and say[s], well, no, I don’t use drugs, I think [he] open[s] the door and the question can

be asked about these convictions.” “It has long been settled in Tennessee that a party

cannot take advantage of errors which he himself committed or invited, or induced the trial

court to commit, or which were the natural consequence of his own neglect or misconduct.”

3

The motion also referred to the victim, Crystal Baggett, and another witness, Jamie Macarthur, who did

not testify at trial. However, the defendant’s argument on appeal focuses solely on witness Adam Ash.

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State v. Garland, 617 S.W.2d 176, 186 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1981) (collecting cases); see

Tenn. R. Crim. P. 36(a) (“Nothing in this rule shall be construed as requiring relief be

granted to a party responsible for an error or who failed to take whatever action was

reasonably available to prevent or nullify the harmful effect of an error.”). As such, the

defendant has waived this issue.

Regardless, even if the trial court erred in disallowing the requested impeachment

evidence, such error was harmless. An error by the trial court does not require relief unless,

“considering the whole record, error involving a substantial right more probably than not

affected the judgment or would result in prejudice to the judicial process.” Tenn. R. App.

P. 36(b). Ms. Baggett was an eyewitness to the offense along with Mr. Ash, and unlike

Mr. Ash, Ms. Baggett actually witnessed the moment of the shooting and provided more

details on the events of the evening than Mr. Ash. We conclude that even if the trial court

erred in not allowing the defendant to impeach Mr. Ash with his prior drug conviction, we

cannot say that such error “more probably than not affected the judgment.” The defendant

is not entitled to relief.

Conclusion

Based on the foregoing authorities and reasoning, we affirm the judgments of the

trial court.

S/ J. ROSS DYER _

J. ROSS DYER, JUDGE

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