CLARKSVILLE, TN (CLARKSVILLE NOW) – The jury trial for a man charged with the 2020 murder of an employee at a Chinese restaurant began Monday afternoon.
On Dec. 2, 2020, at approximately 12:45 p.m., officers responded to the King Mao Chinese restaurant on Needmore Road where an armed robbery resulted in the death of an employee, 28-year-old Seth Stephens. The suspect fled and remained at large for almost two years.
An investigation by the Clarksville Police Special Operations Homicide Unit, with the assistance of the Joliet (Illinois) Police Department, led to the identification of Jaelyn Deon Gant as the suspect. Gant, who had been in custody in Illinois on unrelated charges, was extradited from Western Illinois Correctional Center, to the Montgomery County Jail on Nov. 9, 2022.
Prosecution: ‘Cold-blooded robbery and murder’
On Monday, Gant, 31, sat at the defense table as the state presented its argument.
“This case is about cold-blooded robbery and murder,” said Chief Deputy District Attorney General Marianne Bell. “It’s about greed, ego, violence, and it’s about Seth Stephens.”
Bell explained to the jury that Stephens, a member of the Clarksville community, was a father, son, brother and uncle who was shot at work. Gant, she argued, went into the restaurant with the intent to rob it at gunpoint.
“Seth Stephens didn’t give him (Gant) what he wanted, so Jaelyn Gant used that silver revolver and shot him three times,” Bell said, “then grabbed the money out of his dying hands and ran all the way back to Chicago.”
The case remained open, but all leads seemed to dry up until February 2021, when Bell said there was a break in the case from the Joliet Police Department.
Evidence was found in an overturned vehicle in a field: a loaded silver revolver, a black hoodie with white writing, a greeting card, and a cell phone. Bell said that on the phone, a picture of the overturned car, a selfie of Gant with a silver revolver, and a search history in the phone for “Clarksville, Tennessee shooting on Dec. 2, 2020.”
A second cell phone later obtained from Gant after his arrest revealed even more incriminating searches: “Clarksville, Tennessee shooting on Dec. 2, 2020” and “Seth Stephens.”
Defense: No way to connect the dots
For months leading up to the trial, Gant intended to represent himself. Previously, Clarksville Now observed several warnings by the judge presiding over the case, Judge Robert Bateman, toward Gant for disruptive behavior in the courtroom.
Now, with the representation of attorney Gordon Rahn, Gant’s defense argument was presented.
“There is no doubt that on Dec. 2, 2020, a tragedy occurred,” Rahn told the jury. “What happened to Seth Stephens was something that nobody should ever have experienced and something his family shouldn’t have had to experience.”
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Rahn agreed with Bell that the jury would hear a lot of witness testimony and implored them to pay attention to the details.
“You’re going to have to connect a lot of dots,” Rahn said. “Some facts are just indisputable, you can’t get around those. But I would submit that by the end of this trial, the state will not be able to connect all of those dots.
“The lack of those dots and the lack of connection of those dots will be sufficient to create reasonable doubt in this case.”
The trial is set to resume Tuesday at 8:30 a.m. at the Montgomery County Courts Center.
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