Bryant to get new sentencing hearing
A woman convicted of murdering her ex-husband and then hiding his body behind their Baker Mountain Road home in the summer of 2005 has been granted a new sentencing hearing by the Tennessee Court of Appeals, the amount of her jail time tied to the exact time she committed the crime.
The defendant, Jeri Bryant, 51, is serving a 22-year sentence at the Tennessee Prison for Women in Nashville, scheduled for release under her present sentence on July 6, 2027.
She is serving the sentence for the murder of her ex-husband, Furlon Bryant, with whom she had been married over 20 years prior to their divorce, which occurred shortly before his murder.
She was convicted in March 2006 after jurors decided it was Bryant who shot her husband to death and then burned and partially dismembered his body before dumping him in a brush pile 99 feet behind their home. His body was found a week after he went missing and three days after Mrs. Bryant took a near-fatal overdose of pills.
Mrs. Bryant maintained someone else had shot her husband and that men had broken into her home the same week and forced her to take the near-fatal overdose of pills.
In its review of the case, the Court of Appeals found there is enough evidence to justify Mrs. Bryant’s conviction. However, at question before the appellate court is the exact time the murder took place.
The court pointed out Furlon Bryant went missing June 6, but his body was not found until a week later. While the week in question does not affect his ex-wife’s guilt or innocence, it does impact which law Mrs. Bryant should have been convicted under.
According to the appellate court report, a new sentencing statute was coincidentally enacted by the state on June 7, 2005. The statute requires any defendant whose sentencing took place after June 7, 2005, but committed his or her offense before June 7, 2005, may elect to be sentenced under the new law.
The new law could affect Bryant’s overall sentence by several years, the amount of which would be determined by the trial court. Bryant was sentenced under what is considered the old law, so proof the crime occurred on or after June 7, 2005 could benefit Bryant.
The Appeals Court determined there is no proof to pinpoint exactly when the murder occurred, prompting them to vacate Bryant’s sentence and turn it back to Circuit Court Judge Bart Stanley for re-sentencing.
‘The trial court should determine which law applies,’ the appellate court directed.
The new sentencing hearing, which is yet to have its date set, will likely see prosecutors trying to pinpoint the murder to the day Mr. Bryant disappeared, that being June 6, 2005, which would place his killer under the same law for which she is sentenced. However, should the state not meet the burden of proof, Mrs. Bryant will likely opt for sentencing under the new law.