## Facts

- Gary Dean Finchum, co-owner of an antiques store in Madison, Tennessee, was shot during a robbery on July 13, 2001, and later died.
- Sabrina Renee Lewis had visited the store weeks earlier, seeking an appraisal for “two vases,” and returned later under the pretext of shopping for a gift.
- On the morning of the shooting, Finchum told his wife by phone that he believed “the woman with the vases” was coming in.
- After the shooting, nearby employees heard loud crashes and saw a person enter the passenger side of an older gray vehicle with the engine running near the store’s back door.
- While mortally wounded, Finchum told police he had been shot near the heart, identified “the lady with the vases” as involved, directed officers to contact information on his desk, and stated he knew she was involved.
- Police found a paper with Lewis’s name and the notation “two vases.”
- The prosecution introduced (1) Lewis’s videotaped police statement, (2) Finchum’s statements as a dying declaration, and (3) DNA evidence through an expert who relied in part on laboratory data generated by other analysts.
- Lewis was not alleged to be the shooter; the prosecution theory was that she helped set up the robbery.

## Issues

1. Whether Lewis’s videotaped statement to police was admissible when offered against her at trial.
2. Whether Finchum’s identification statements were admissible as dying declarations and, if testimonial, whether their admission violated confrontation rights under the federal and Tennessee constitutions.
3. Whether confrontation rights required the State to present testimony from each analyst involved in generating DNA testing data, rather than permitting a testifying expert to interpret data produced by others.

## Decision

- Affirmed the convictions and effective 21-year sentence.
- Held Lewis’s videotaped statement was properly admitted as an admission by a party-opponent.
- Held Finchum’s statements were admissible as dying declarations and did not violate confrontation rights even if testimonial.
- Held confrontation rights did not bar expert testimony evaluating DNA data generated by other laboratory personnel.

## Legal Principles

- A defendant’s own out-of-court statement, offered against the defendant, is admissible as an admission by a party-opponent and is not excluded by the hearsay rule.
- A statement qualifies as a dying declaration when the declarant believed death was imminent and the statement concerned the cause or circumstances of the believed impending death.
- Testimonial dying declarations are admissible without prior cross-examination because the dying-declaration rule is a historically recognized exception that is consistent with confrontation guarantees under the federal and Tennessee constitutions.
- Confrontation rights are satisfied when the testifying forensic expert is subject to cross-examination regarding the expert’s evaluation and opinion, even if the expert relied on DNA data generated by other analysts; the defendant is not entitled to confront every person who performed each testing step.

## Conclusion

The Tennessee Supreme Court upheld evidentiary rulings admitting the defendant’s videotaped admissions, the victim’s identification statements as dying declarations notwithstanding confrontation objections, and expert DNA testimony based on laboratory data produced by others, and it affirmed the convictions for criminally negligent homicide and facilitation of attempted especially aggravated robbery.


State v. Lewis, 235 S.W.3d 136 (Tenn. 2007)