Jereme Little

In Chattanooga’s legal circles, a man named Jereme Little has gained notoriety over the years for facing trial six times without ever being convicted.

Three of those trials were on murder charges, making his record exceptional to those who mingle in Hamilton County’s courtrooms every day.

“It’s unusual to get a pass that often,” said former Hamilton County Assistant District Attorney Yolanda Mitchell, who unsuccessfully prosecuted Mr. Little in 2001 when he was accused of stomping his girlfriend’s fetus out of her womb. “He had that Bill Clinton thing going on. He was like Teflon. Everything was bouncing off him.”

Mr. Little’s run ended in April, when a seventh jury convicted him of aggravated kidnapping. It took prosecutors 10 years and a prior mistrial on the same charge to prove he had pistol whipped his friend and forced him to eat dog feces in 1998.

The victim testified Mr. Little attacked him in retribution for a botched robbery the pair committed the same day. During that trial, two counts of aggravated robbery against Mr. Little were dropped by Judge Rebecca Stern.

On Monday, Mr. Little avoided the maximum punishment of 25 years, receiving 18 years in prison instead. Assistant District Attorney Boyd Patterson argued that a long criminal history, exceptional cruelty shown to his victim and crimes committed as a juvenile proved Mr. Little didn’t deserve leniency.

“If there was ever anyone in Hamilton County that deserves the maximum, it’s Jereme Little,” Mr. Patterson told Judge Stern.

In 2003, Hamilton County law enforcement officials declared Mr. Little one of the area’s top five criminals because of his numerous arrests for crimes throughout his youth and adulthood.

Mr. Little has a record in Hamilton County Criminal Court with more than 70 charges on it, including both misdemeanors and felonies. Many were traffic violations, but he also pleaded guilty to charges such as assault, theft of property over $1,000 and vandalism, records show.

While acknowledging all seven trials that he has endured, Mr. Little continued to proclaim his innocence Monday in a statement to Judge Stern.

“I’m not an angel,” he said, “But if I could show my past life in reverse, it would show that each time I stood trial in this courtroom for whatever situation, I was innocent of it.”

Mr. Little received an acquittal in 2004 when prosecutors failed to prove his possession of cocaine with intent to sell. Yet two years earlier, Judge Stern declared during someone else’s trial that Mr. Little was an expert witness in the buying and selling of cocaine, according to trial testimony.

Amid objections that Mr. Little had neither the character nor the credentials to be an expert witness in anything, Judge Stern said she had “known him a long time. I believe he does,” according to testimony.

Ms. Mitchell, now the chief magistrate for Hamilton County, said she believed it’s always been the people around Mr. Little who have helped him succeed in his defense, whether it was out of love or fear of the imposing 32-year-old.

By the end of the trial in which the state accused Mr. Little of killing his girlfriend’s fetus, when the jury acquitted Mr. Little of all charges, Ms. Mitchell said she believed the girlfriend simply never wanted him to be punished.

The girlfriend stopped short on the witness stand of implicating Mr. Little in the crime, Ms. Mitchell said.

“That’s the only time I’ve wanted to go up and snatch my witness off the stand,” Ms. Mitchell said. “She made me so mad.”

Witness problems plagued the case surrounding the 2001 torture and shooting death of Atlanta drug dealer Anthony McAfee as well, a crime for which Mr. Little’s co-defendants Muhammed Nuriddin and Edgar Bailey are serving prison terms.

And, though the prosecution said it was Mr. Little who actually shot Mr. McAfee in the head — but not before “carving him up like a Thanksgiving turkey,” according to trial testimony — two juries during two separate trials in 2007 could not decide on his guilt or innocence, causing mistrials to be declared.

In both instances, Mr. Patterson said, the main proof came from witnesses who said they heard Mr. Little talk about the killing. Mr. Patterson was able to gather more substantial forensic evidence for the second trial involving a shoe print at the scene of the crime, but Judge Stern did not allow the evidence to be presented to the jury.

Mr. Patterson declined comment on Mr. Little’s 18-year sentence handed down Monday.

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