State of Tennessee v. Hubert Glenn Sexton

Summary

The Tennessee Supreme Court affirmed the defendant's two first-degree murder convictions but set aside both death sentences and remanded for new sentencing hearings. It held that the trial court improperly admitted inflammatory hearsay concerning alleged child sexual abuse, references to the defendant's refusal to take a polygraph, and allowed several instances of prosecutorial misconduct, but those errors did not undermine the overwhelming proof of guilt. The court also provided guidance requiring capital-case jury questionnaires to be evaluated in context rather than by isolated answers.