STATE OF TENNESSEE v. LAMAR DENSON - Articles

All Content

STATE OF TENNESSEE v. LAMAR DENSON

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Mar 13, 2026

Court: TN Court of Criminal Appeals

Attorneys 1: Dillon E. Zinser (at trial and on appeal) and Holly Nehl-Zinser (at trial), Knoxville, Tennessee, for the appellant, Lamar Lanair Denson.

Attorneys 2: Jonathan Skrmetti, Attorney General and Reporter; Katherine C. Redding, Senior Assistant Attorney General; Charme P. Allen, District Attorney General; and Greg Eshbaugh and Jodie Bush, Assistant District Attorneys General, for the appellee, State of Tennessee.

Judge(s): DYER

The defendant, Lamar Lanair Denson, was convicted by a Knox County Criminal Court jury of the sale of fentanyl, a Class C felony; possession of heroin with intent to sell or deliver, a Class B felony; possession of fentanyl with intent to sell or deliver, a Class C felony; possession of a firearm by one with a prior conviction for a felony drug offense, a Class C felony; maintaining a dwelling for the unlawful selling of controlled substances, a Class D felony; and possession of drug paraphernalia, a Class A misdemeanor. The trial court imposed an effective sentence of fourteen years’ incarceration followed by five years on supervised probation. On appeal, the defendant argues that the trial court abused its discretion in: (1) denying his motion to dismiss Count 5 of the indictment, a charge related to the sale of fentanyl, due to the loss of potentially exculpatory evidence; and (2) reopening the proof to allow the State to enter into evidence a stipulation regarding the defendant’s status as having a prior conviction that would disqualify him from possessing a firearm . Following a thorough review of the record, the briefs, and oral arguments of the parties, we affirm the judgments of the trial court.

Attachments: