As kids, Pervis Payne and Darrien McGraw thought about sealing their close bond by becoming blood brothers.

McGraw remembered Payne suggesting it, but noted Payne was uneasy about the cutting part and the blood.

“We became water brothers,” McGraw said with a chuckle Monday, Dec. 13, adding they decided to wash their hands together.

Pervis Payne resentencing centers on consecutive or concurrent life sentences

His testimony in Criminal Court about a childhood dominated by their membership and connections to the Church of God In Christ contrasted sharply with a five-minute Millington police video showing the bloody kitchen where Charisse Christopher and her 2-year-old daughter, Lacie, were stabbed to death in 1987.

Charisse Christopher’s body lay face up while the child’s body was face down with a knife by the child’s body. All of that detail was not recognizable from the edge of the kitchen because of blood, until closeups made clear the human forms.

Payne is the common element in the stories of close and loyal childhood friends whose young lives centered on churches and the brutal 1987 murders in Millington that also left Christopher’s son wounded.

Pervis Payne’s death sentence is vacated

Testimony resumes Tuesday in Division 1 of Criminal Court before Judge Paula Skahan in the resentencing hearing for Payne, who was sentenced to death following his 1988 conviction.

Payne’s attorney will call several Tennessee Department of Corrections guards to testify Tuesday about an incident in which Payne came to the aid of a guard who had been stabbed in an attack by another prisoner and seriously wounded.

Payne’s death sentence was set aside by the Shelby County District Attorney General’s office after attorneys for Payne argued a recent state law barring the state from executing those with mental challenges applied to Payne’s case.

Pervis Payne to get two life sentences instead of death penalty

A psychologist hired by the state to evaluate Payne’s mental competency “could not say if Payne’s intellectual functioning is outside the range for intellectual disability,” according to Shelby County District Attorney General Amy Weirich.

Rev. Carl Payne testified Monday that his son was slow to develop after being born premature.

“He would do what I told him to do,” the elder Payne said as a picture of him and his son and two daughters from decades ago showed on a screen in the courtroom. “He was always helping somebody.”

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Skahan will rule whether Payne should be resentenced to serve two life terms in prison consecutively or concurrently. A concurrent sentence — serving both sentences at the same time — would make him eligible for parole in several years after more than 30 years on death row.

Sylvester Robinson, Payne’s cousin, also grew up with Payne and McGraw, with the three forming a band at one point built around the church they attended.

“He was always a giver. Anyone who knew him would say that,” Robinson said. “That’s my brother.”

Pervis Payne appears in court for first time in 14 years

He recalled Payne trying to cheat on a test in school but getting caught because he signed Robinson’s name to the test after copying Robinson’s answers.

Robinson was questioned by detectives investigating the 1987 murders. He said he was threatened with perjury charges if he didn’t tell the truth and told he could get “as much time as him,” meaning Payne.

“If he did it, I would have known,” Robinson said.

At one point in Monday’s hearing, Skahan made it clear she was not deciding whether Payne committed the murders or not. His conviction stands.

Kelley Henry, Payne’s attorney who presented the proof Tuesday for the lesser sentence, has said the move for two concurrent life sentences doesn’t mean Payne has given up contesting his conviction in separate proceedings.

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Along the way Monday, Payne’s legal team raised questions that could come into play in that separate legal battle with prosecutors.

Henry questioned the Millington police official who transferred the VHS video of the crime scene to a compact disc to be shown at the hearing about the position of the child’s body, citing other evidence that the child may have been in a different position by police accounts.

Millington police interim inspector Christopher Stokes said his only testimony was about the transfer of the crime scene video from 1987 and not about the actual events of 1987.

Henry also questioned Stokes about five rolls of undeveloped film with the same results.

Pervis Payne attorneys file petition to present intellectual disability claim

Members of prison ministry groups based in Nashville and Franklin testified Monday about their visits with Payne on death row and how he is regarded by other death row inmates.

Dan Mann, who has visited numerous times with Payne over the past 11 years, said the visits are usually in a congregant setting with others on death row.

“They believe in his innocence,” Mann said. “You will hear things like, ‘He shouldn’t be in here.’ ” Skahan questioned Mann further about what Mann described as a strangely silent death row when Payne’s execution date was set for December 2020 — a date that would later be set aside by Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Pervis Payne gains new supporters as reprieve set to expire

The delay was followed by the new state law barring executions of those with diminished mental capacity that led to setting aside the death sentence.

When Payne got his execution date, Mann said the others on death row were “all really upset.”

“The entire meeting was quiet,” he said. “They were very protective of him.”

By contrast, when Don Johnson, another death row inmate from Shelby County, was close to his execution in 2019, Mann said the mood was “entirely different.”

“Everybody had come to terms with it,” he said. “It was uneasy. But it wasn’t quiet.”

New DNA evidence not enough to exonerate Payne, judge says

Phyllis Hildreth of American Baptist College of Nashville described Payne as “one of my favorites” among death row inmates she has talked with as part of a conflict resolution program.

“He has a sense of calm,” she said.

Assistant District Attorney General Steve Jones asked one of the witnesses from ministry programs if the program did any work with families grieving the loss of victims of violent crime.

Family and friends of Christopher attended Monday’s hearing as well as those supporting Payne.

Skahan cautioned Jones about the question, saying the direct examinations outlined the specific work of the ministries and that Jones could call whatever witnesses he wanted to make that particular point later.

Jones also asked Carl Payne about allegations of drug use and a peeping tom incident by his son.

Henry objected, saying there is no record or proof of either accusation.

“I wouldn’t approve of no sin,” Payne said of his son’s conduct. “I really don’t know what you are talking about.”