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State v. Adams12/20/1999
ed open and her mother "hollering." Ms. Lewis' mother, Christine Lewis, ran from the kitchen into the front room where Ms. Lewis was resting, with the Defendant following her with a knife in his hand. Ms. Lewis testified that the knife was long and that she thought she had previously seen it at the Defendant's mother's house. She said the Defendant looked like a "maniac," but she had never seen him on drugs so she did not know if his appearance was drug-related. She said that she told the Defendant not to "stick" her mother. Two of Ms. Lewis' daughters were in the room, and the Defendant let them go past him and out the back door.
Ms. Lewis testified that the Defendant approached her and said, "I told you I was going to kill you, Bitch." He then started stabbing her. He stabbed her four or five times in the chest and cut her hand and finger. He continued stabbing her until she said, "I'm dying," at which point he stopped and went out the back door. Ms. Lewis went out the front door, where she saw the Defendant walking past her on the sidewalk. As he was walking down the sidewalk, he again said, "I told you I was going to kill you, Bitch."
Ms. Lewis was taken to Vanderbilt Hospital for a day and then moved to Centennial Medical Center for a second day. She did not think she was placed in intensive care, but she had to have three surgeries on her finger because of the damage caused by the knife wound. She testified that she still could not move her finger and she could not pick things up with her left hand.
After the Defendant was arrested, he started sending Ms. Lewis letters from jail. One letter, dated November 13, 1996, included a hand-drawn picture of a woman with a knife through an eye entitled, "Booded Tears." Blood was drawn in red dripping from the knife wound to the eye. The letter and picture were introduced into evidence. Ms. Lewis testified that she received about twenty letters from the Defendant. In some of the letters the Defendant said that he was sorry, that he loved her, and that he did not know what he was doing. He asked her to come visit him at the jail. The letters also contained cursing, "ugly" things, and other pictures. One contained a picture of a gun, and another contained a picture of a dead body in a casket.
Ms. Lewis' mother, Christine Lewis, testified that she was washing collard greens in the kitchen when the Defendant "snatched the screen door open" and entered the kitchen with a knife. He called her an "old bitch" and scared her. She ran into another room, and he said, "I should have killed that old bitch." Christine Lewis did not see what happened between the Defendant and Linda Lewis because she went outside, but she testified that she saw the Defendant come out the back door and stand on the back porch. He stood there with his arms folded and said, "I killed the bitch." Christine Lewis waited with her daughter on the front porch for an ambulance. She said Linda Lewis was awake and could talk, but she was bleeding. On cross-examination, Christine Lewis said that the Defendant looked like he was "messed up" that morning when he came in. He looked like "he had done had something."
Linda Lewis' daughter, Shanta Lewis, testified that she was sleeping in her bed when she heard somebody screaming. She got up and went downstairs, where she saw the Defendant standing over her mother. Shanta Lewis screamed, "Don't kill my momma," pushed the Defendant away from her mother, and then saw that he had a knife in his hand. When she pushed the Defendant, he went into the kitchen. Shanta Lewis tried to help her mother get up; then the Defendant came back in the room. Shanta Lewis sat on top of her mother to protect her, but the Defendant
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