Sims v. State

347 So.3d 222

Belton Wayne SIMS a/k/a Belton Sims, Appellant

v.STATE of Mississippi, Appellee

NO. 2021-KA-00682-COA

Court of Appeals of Mississippi.

September 13, 2022

ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT: OFFICE OF STATE PUBLIC DEFENDER, BY: GEORGE T. HOLMES, Jackson

ATTORNEY FOR APPELLEE: OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL, BY: ASHLEY LAUREN SULSER

BEFORE WILSON, P.J., GREENLEE AND EMFINGER, JJ.

GREENLEE, J., FOR THE COURT:

¶1. Belton Sims was convicted of capital murder in the Jefferson Davis County Circuit Court. The underlying felony charge was felonious abuse and/or battery of a child—his four-year-old son. The circuit court sentenced Sims to life imprisonment without eligibility for parole in the custody of the Mississippi Department of Corrections and ordered him to pay a $25,000 fine and court costs. On appeal, Sims challenges the sufficiency and weight of the evidence. Additionally, he claims that the circuit court erred by admitting Exhibit 11v—an autopsy photo—into evidence. Finding no reversible error, we affirm Sims’ conviction and sentence.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

¶2. Around 3:35 a.m. on August 5, 2016, Belton Sims arrived at the emergency room with his four-year-old son Messiah Griffith. According to Nurse Katrina Lockhart, Sims stated that Messiah was not breathing and that he had drowned in the bathtub. However, Messiah had multiple abrasions and contusions to the head, neck, trunk, and extremities as well as a severe head injury. Dr. Herbert Floyd, the emergency room physician who treated Messiah, noted that he had the worst widespread trauma that he had ever seen. When Nurse Lockhart noticed the bruises all over Messiah's body, she told Sims, "No, [he] did not drown." Likewise, Dr. Floyd did not find any signs of drowning. Although it appeared that Messiah was already dead upon his arrival at the hospital, attempts were made to resuscitate him. When Sims was eventually told that Messiah was in fact deceased, he did not display any emotion.¹

¶3. The deputy coroner, Katherine Stevens, arrived at the hospital around 4:30 a.m. Sims told her that he had gotten home around 11:00 p.m. and that Messiah had been at his grandmother's house. He said that he gave Messiah a bath, went to retrieve a towel from the other end of his trailer, and when he returned to the bathroom, he realized that Messiah had drowned. According to Stevens, she asked Sims what happened between 11:00 p.m. (when he got home) and 3:35 a.m. (the time that he and Messiah arrived at the hospital), but Sims did not have a "real explanation." According to Stevens, she saw Sims outside the emergency room later and noted that he looked as if he was "fixing to run." Stevens told law enforcement that she thought they should "handcuff [Sims] and put him in the car."

¶4. Around 9:00 a.m., Dr. Mark LeVaughn performed an autopsy on Messiah's body.² He noted that Messiah had various injuries—abrasions, contusions, bruising, and blunt impact injuries—to his head, neck, back, chest, abdomen, and extremities.³ Dr. LeVaughn described Messiah's injuries as "significant" and "severe." And he noted that Messiah had internal abdominal bleeding and "multiple areas of bleeding under the scalp."

¶5. Dr. LeVaughn took photographs during the autopsy. At trial, Exhibit 11v was admitted into evidence over defense counsel's objection. Dr. LeVaughn explained that Exhibit 11v was a photograph of Messiah's head after Dr. LeVaughn made an incision and peeled back the scalp tissue to expose the skull during the autopsy.⁴ He further explained that he found widespread hemorrhaging underneath Messiah's scalp. Although no hemorrhaging existed on the surface of the brain, Dr. LeVaughn found excess swelling, which he described as extremely serious. According to Dr. LeVaughn, Messiah would have been immediately symptomatic.

¶6. Dr. LeVaughn testified that there was no evidence that Messiah had drowned. Rather, the cause of death was "multiple blunt trauma due to a beating." According to Dr. LeVaughn, at least some of Messiah's injuries were consistent with being struck with a curtain rod that he noticed in photographs presumably from the crime scene. Although Dr. LeVaughn could not establish an exact time of death, he believed that Messiah died "fairly quickly" after incurring his injuries. Specifically, he testified that Messiah likely received the fatal injuries less than six hours before his death. Additionally, Dr. LeVaughn testified that if Messiah's body temperature was below 94 degrees when he was brought to the hospital, as Dr. Floyd indicated, then he would have been dead for several hours.

¶7. After the autopsy was performed, Investigator Frank Riley with the Mississippi Bureau of Investigations interviewed Sims at the police department. During the interview, Sims maintained that he had picked up Messiah from his grandmother's house and given him a bath around 11:00 p.m. After he returned from getting some towels, he found Messiah lying on his side in the bathtub and then performed CPR. Sims stated that Messiah had been in a bike wreck earlier that evening and that Messiah had complained of his stomach hurting. However, Dr. LeVaughn later testified at trial that Messiah's injuries were not consistent with a bike wreck. Sims also mentioned that he had drunk some vodka earlier that evening.⁵

¶8. According to Investigator Zack Jackson with the Jefferson Davis County Sheriff's Department, law enforcement did not find any water in the bathtub while searching Sims’ trailer. Additionally, he indicated that with the exception of one or two small water droplets on the outside of the bathtub, law enforcement did not find any water on the floor around the tub either. He also noted that law enforcement did not find any bath towels. According to Investigator Jackson, Sims’ trailer looked as if it had been cleaned.

¶9. At trial, the mothers of Sims’ children—Shantania Applewhite and Brittany Griffith—testified about events that had occurred on the night of Messiah's murder. Applewhite testified that she thought she saw Sims with LeDesmond Johnson—an alleged drug user—at a Family Dollar store around 9:50 p.m. After she returned to her mother's house, Sims drove up and seemingly wanted to take their son Connor with him. Although Connor previously had stayed with Sims without incident, he did not want to go with Sims that night. Applewhite testified that Sims became angry and said that she and her mother would pay for not letting him get his son and that she would not make it to work the next morning. According to Applewhite, someone woke her up around 2:00 a.m. or 3:00 a.m. and told her that the tires on her and her mother's vehicles were flat.⁶ When Deputy Terrance Cooley with the Jefferson Davis County Sheriff's Department arrived at 3:34 a.m., Applewhite called Sims to see if he would admit to essentially slashing the tires. However, one of Sims’ relatives answered the phone and said that Messiah was deceased.

¶10. Messiah's mother Brittany testified that she had stayed with Sims for several days leading up to the night of Messiah's murder. That evening, she got off work and called Sims, who said that Messiah was with his grandmother. Around 10:00 p.m., Brittany met Sims to give him some clothes for Messiah seemingly because she was not sure if she would stay with Sims that night. At that time, Sims indicated that he was headed back to his trailer to give Messiah a bath. Brittany testified that she and Sims continued to text each other and then eventually agreed that she would go to Sims’ trailer. But when she arrived around midnight, Sims did not appear to be there. Brittany testified that she waited for ten to twenty minutes and noticed another vehicle as she was leaving. When she got near the end of the road, Sims called her and asked why she left. According to Brittany, Sims sounded mad, so she turned around. But then Sims drove past her. Brittany testified that she ultimately went back to her mother's house, and her brother called her and told her to check on Messiah around 2:00 a.m. or 3:00 a.m. When she called Sims, he asked her, "Who told you?" Then Brittany learned that Messiah allegedly had drowned. However, on the way to the hospital, she received a text from Sims’ phone that said Messiah was "good." Finally, Griffith testified that Sims and Messiah initially had a good relationship, but Messiah seemed to be afraid to be around Sims in the month leading up to his death. She recalled that Messiah had marks on his chest as if someone had pinched him, and his ear looked as though someone had twisted it after previously visiting Sims.

¶11. After the State rested its case, the defense moved for a directed verdict. The court denied the motion, and then the defense requested a mistrial or, in the alternative, a continuance because three defense witnesses had not appeared to testify. The court allowed the defense to make a proffer of the witnesses’ testimony but ultimately denied the motion for a mistrial or continuance.

¶12. Although LeDesmond Johnson failed to appear to testify, his prior statement was read to the jury at trial. In his statement, Johnson indicated that he was with Sims when he went to pick up clothes for Messiah from Griffith, and afterward, they went to Sims’ grandmother's house to get Messiah. Johnson stated that he spoke to Messiah while he was walking in the house and then "heard all type of noise." But he stated that he "did not know what he was really doing." Then Johnson heard three hard knocks. Finally, he stated that he and Sims left around 11:30 p.m. or 11:40 p.m., and Sims dropped him off at 1:25 a.m.

¶13. Finally, the defense called Sims’ cousin Stephanie Turner to testify.⁷ Turner testified that she lived with her grandmother and that she essentially had babysat Messiah on the day of his murder. She indicated that she went to get cigarettes after Sims picked up Messiah. She also indicated that at the time, she did not hear anything out of the ordinary inside...