Once, during his seven years in the West Tennessee State Prison, Jereme Little was stabbed three times by a man who wanted his shoes.
He told the prison guards, with what he thought were his last words, that he was innocent. He told the paramedics, too.
"The thought of dying without being decriminalized and exonerated had me in a panic," Little said.
Now the panic that has tinged the first third of his 18-year sentence is gone. In a rare reversal, Hamilton County Criminal Court Judge Rebecca Stern on Tuesday granted Little's petition for post-conviction relief. She ruled that in a 2008 trial over which she originally presided, Little's attorney provided ineffective assistance that affected the outcome of his case.
"In my 18 years on the bench, this was probably the messiest trial I ever sat through," Stern said.
The move effectively overturns his conviction, and Little will be freed.
Little's conviction came in 2008, but the case stretched back to 1998, when prosecutors said he and Demetrius Grayson planned to rob Chris Rogers at the man's home. Grayson would testify that when Little wanted to kill Rogers, Grayson left, prompting Little to tie him up, hold him hostage and force him to eat crack cocaine and dog feces.
Grayson said he escaped, and he didn't report the crime until seven years later. At a Tuesday hearing for his post-conviction petition, Little said Grayson was lying.
Little has a long criminal history. He's been acquitted in a separate murder trial in which the mother of his unborn child accused him of beating her and causing the child's death. He was tried twice on a 2001 murder charge in the death of Tony McAfee, but both trials ended in hung juries.
Jereme LittleLittle already has appealed the kidnapping case to the Court of Criminal Appeals and the Tennessee Supreme Court. Those were appeals for a new trial, based on attorney Jeffrey Schaarschmidt's assertion that Stern's original jury instructions created prejudice. Little was originally charged with two counts of aggravated robbery as well as especially aggravated kidnapping, but his first trial ended in a mistrial and Little was acquitted of the robbery charges.
Stern didn't instruct a jury of that acquittal, which Schaarschmidt argued back then gave them grounds for a new trial. Appellate courts disagreed, upholding her decision.
Little's petition for relief through his new attorney, Lloyd Levitt, consisted of 14 points, but in the end Stern granted his petition based on just two.
First, she said Schaarschmidt should not have assumed that she would have provided that instruction about the acquittal. In fact, she said that Schaarschmidt should have asked for the counts to be severed, which would have excluded information about the kidnapping charges from ever having been introduced at trial at all.
She also agreed with Little's assertion that Schaarschmidt was ineffective because he called a witness to take the stand whose testimony was disastrous for the defense. The man, a known drug user, implicated Little in the crime. Schaarschmidt testified that he didn't know of the man's existence before the trial, and had just a few minutes to talk to him in a holding cell before putting him on the stand.
Stern said that he should have had more time to interview the witness.
During his testimony, Little periodically looked at his former lawyer, who sometimes smiled and sometimes shook his head. After Stern said she'd grant the petition, Little put his head in his hands.
His family rose from their bench and embraced Schaarschmidt one by one.
Contact staff writer Claire Wiseman at cwiseman@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6347. Follow her on Twitter @clairelwiseman.