CLARKSVILLE, TN (CLARKSVILLE NOW) – The trial for two of the three teens charged with murder and especially aggravated robbery in the 2018 beating death of a 71-year-old laundromat attendant began Monday.
Both the state and defense attorneys made opening statements for the jury at the Montgomery County Courts Center.
The case
Three teenagers – Jevon Brodie, then 14; Harrison Smith, then 14; and Tavares Harbison, then 13 – were each charged with two counts of first-degree murder, one count of especially aggravated robbery and two counts of theft for their involvement in the attack on May 30, 2018.
The victim, 71-year-old Ted Cook, was an attendant at the Super Suds Laundromat at 714 Peachers Mill Road. He died June 9, 2018, from injuries he sustained in the attack.
According to court documents originally obtained by Clarksville Now, the teens entered the laundromat on the night of May 30 and pointed a rifle at Cook. After struggling with the suspects, Cook fell to the ground, where he was kicked and struck with the butt of the rifle multiple times, the documents said.
While one of the teens pointed the rifle at Cook, the others tipped over a coin-operated game machine and took the change inside. The teens stole the victim’s truck and drove off, the records said.
The documents also said the teens stole $34 in coins from the machine, and the victim’s truck was worth $2,500.
In October 2018, the courts decided the three would be tried as adults, and their names were released. However, now-18-year-old Smith took a plea in April to the lesser-included charge of second-degree murder, according to court records. He will serve 15 years at 100% at a Tennessee Department of Corrections facility.
Opening statements
During his opening statement, District Attorney General Robert Nash discussed some of the evidence, including video footage of the incident, the defendant’s own statements, and DNA evidence from a BB gun used during the attack.
He also detailed the events of that night and alleged that the three teens planned the robbery together. Nash said they entered the laundromat and noticed the game machine with quarters visible, leading them to devise a plan to rob the laundromat for those coins.
“Smith, Harbison and Brodie leave the laundromat to go retrieve Harbison’s BB rifle. Smith and Harbison go to vending machines at the back of the laundromat. Smith and Harbison ask for Mr. Cook’s help with the vending. Mr. Cook approaches them. Brodie, armed with a BB rifle, enters the laundromat walks up behind Mr. Cook,” Nash said.
This is when the struggle began.
Nash added that Smith later confessed and led officers to a shed that contained the BB rifle, quarters, jackets worn during the robbery, and two backpacks.
Brodie’s defense attorney, Vicki Carriker, made opening statements, as did Harbison’s, Shelby Silvey.
Silvey said her client was too young to have the forethought to know what he was involved in.
“We see him today, it’s 2021 and it’s been several years, but I want to take you back to 2018 and Mr. Harbison was 13 years old,” Silvey said. “He’s grown a foot since I had him, he’s not the person you see.”
Witness testimony is set to begin Tuesday morning.