MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Jessie Dotson, who sits on Tennessee’s death row after being convicted in the brutal 2008 murders of six people - including his brother and two young nephews, is now asking the court to declare the convictions and sentences unconstitutional.
One of the the city's worst mass murders, the so-called Lester Street Massacre rocked Memphis and was featured on A&E’s The First 48.
According to the filing on Jan. 26, 2024, Dotson claims his convictions and sentences were the result of “improper police tactics, prosecutorial misconduct, suppressed exculpatory evidence, false testimony, a false confession, and constitutionally ineffective assistance of counsel.”
The court filing claims Dotson, who the defense said “lives with neurocognitive deficits,” could not have committed the murders by himself without leaving evidence or DNA behind. It claims the pressure to solve the case was enormous, particularly because of the A&E cameras embedded with the Memphis Police Department at the time.
The filing goes on to claim the murders were actually a result of gang violence and retaliation. It calls Dotson’s confession to the attacks unreliable based on the crime scene and that the “false confession was obtained in violation of Miranda.”
The filing asks the court for an evidentiary hearing and to set aside the convictions and sentences.
The murders
Prosecutors said on March 2, 2008, Dotson shot his brother, Cecil Dotson, in the head during an argument after a day of drinking, then went after everyone else in the house with two guns, boards and kitchen knives, trying to eliminate all witnesses.
He then stabbed two boys and a 2-month old girl, who stayed alive for about 40 hours until paramedics arrived, prosecutors said.
Also killed were his nephews 4-year-old Cemario Dotson and 2-year-old Cecil Dotson Jr. II; Cecil Dotson’s girlfriend, Marissa Williams; and friends Hollis Seals and Shindri Roberson.
The trial and convictions
During the trial, two of the young survivors testified that “Uncle Junior,” a nickname the family had for Dotson, committed the gruesome attacks.
Despite a confession to police and to his mother, Dotson blamed the attack on gang members. He testified he was at the house on Lester Street in Binghampton and hid under a bed during the slayings. He said he didn’t report them to police because he feared for his life.
Dotson was found guilty in 2010 of six counts of first-degree murder and three counts of attempted first-degree murder. He was sentenced to die by injection for the six murders, then in a separate hearing, he was sentenced to 40 years for each of the three counts of attempted murder, to be served consecutively.
Dotson had been released from prison about seven months before the killings, having served 14 years in prison for another murder.
Jessie Dotson currently sits on death row at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.