MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) – A judge reset a hearing on Tuesday to address a request by the ex-wife of slain NBA player Lorenzen Wright to throw out her guilty plea in his 2010 killing in Memphis, Tennessee.
Sherra Wright filed a petition for relief of conviction or sentence after her surprise guilty plea to facilitation of murder in July 2019. She has asked Shelby County Criminal Court Judge Lee Coffee – who approved her guilty plea in Lorenzen Wright’s slaying and sentenced her to 30 years in prison – to hold an evidentiary hearing on her petition.
A hearing had been scheduled for Tuesday but it was rescheduled by her attorney and Coffee for July 6.
Sherra Wright alleged that her conviction was “unlawfully induced” and involuntarily entered without her understanding the nature and consequences of the plea, her court filing showed. Wright claimed her coerced confession was the result of ineffective counsel and her constitutional rights to due process and protection from self-incrimination were violated.
Under Tennessee law, a petition for post-conviction relief seeks to have the conviction or sentence set aside or an appeal granted on claims that the conviction violated the state or U.S. constitution.