Brothers sought in double homicide : Letalvis Cobbins & Lemaricus Davidson

[Gary Dee]

Knoxville police this morning were searching for two brothers in connection with the double slaying of a couple this weekend.

http://www.crimeshots.com/forums/sho...5648#post25648

Authorities were searching for Lemaricus Davidson, 25, and Letalvis Cobbins, 24. Davidson has an outstanding warrant from court on a traffic violation, said Knoxville Police Department spokesman Darrell DeBusk.

Letalvis CobbinsLemaricus Davidson

DeBusk described each "as a person of interest in the homicides of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom."


The body of Newsom, 23, was found Sunday along Norfolk Southern railroad tracks between Ninth Avenue and Cherry Street. Police discovered the body of Christian, 21, about 2 p.m. Tuesday in a rental home at 2316 Chipman St.

DeBusk this morning declined to say if either of the brothers had been staying at the Chipman Street residence where Christian’s body was found.

"At this time, it would be inappropriate for us to discuss that," he said.
Newsom, of Halls, and Christian, of West Knox County, had been dating since November. Newsom is a woodworker and Christian was a senior at the University of Tennessee who worked at a shoe store in the West Town Mall.

Christian told her mother at 12:30 a.m. Sunday that the couple planned to join friends to watch movies. Twelve hours later, a Norfolk Southern employee reported seeing Newsom’s body along the railroad tracks.
Police have declined to disclose the manner of death for each victim.

http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/local_ne...269774,00.html

[Bailey]

By Jamie Satterfield
Published Friday, October 2, 2009

KNOXVILLE - A jury was seated this afternoon for the trial of the alleged ringleader in the torture-slaying of a Knox County couple.

The Knox County Criminal Court jury is composed of seven women and five men, one of whom is black. The six alternates are three men and three women, all white.

The trial for Lemaricus Davidson, 26, is scheduled to begin Oct. 19.

He is facing the death penalty in the January 2007 carjacking, kidnapping, torture, rape and slayings of University of Tennessee student Channon Christian, 21, and her boyfriend, Christopher Newsom, 23.

Davidson had demanded his right to a Knox County jury, a tall order in a community seething with outrage over what is one of this region's most heinous crimes.

Davidson and his three co-defendants are black; the victims white.

While investigators and prosecutors have contended that race was not an issue in the crime, it has been a heated controversy sparking protests and vitriolic comments on Web sites and elsewhere.

Prosecutors Leland Price and Takisha Fitzgerald, defense attorneys David Eldridge and Doug Trant, and Judge Richard Baumgartner spent eight days putting potential jurors under the microscope in a bid to screen out people unable to impose the death penalty or too biased against Davidson to fairly try him.

That process netted 74 potential jurors in the final pool.

The panel of 18 was chosen from the pool during more questioning today.

Baumgartner agreed to double the number of alternates from three to six. Those extra three alternates would be dismissed if the entire panel makes it to the Oct. 19 trial date with no issues.

Davidson's brother, Letalvis Cobbins, was convicted in August in the deaths of the couple and is serving a prison term of life without parole.

Jury selection for a third defendant George Thomas has been delayed to Nov. 18 with the trial to follow Dec. 1.

Trial for a fourth defendant, Vanessa Coleman, is awaiting scheduling while an appeal is being heard.

More details as they develop online and in Saturday's News Sentinel.

http://m.knoxnews.com/news/2009/oct/...slaying-trial/

[Bailey]

By Jamie Satterfield
Updated Wednesday, October 21, 2009

KNOXVILLE - A Tennessee Bureau of Investigation forensic scientist this afternoon said he found what he believes was bleach on torture slaying victim Channon Christian's camisole.

TBI Agent Randall Nelson testified today that a stain on the semen covered camisole was consistent with the chemical properties of bleach.

The testimony tends to back up a statement by suspect Vanessa Coleman that her fellow co-defendants, including alleged ringleader Lemaricus Davidson, poured cleaning solution down Christian's throat in a bid to wash away DNA evidence of oral rape.

Davidson is standing trial this week in the January 2007 slayings of Christian and boyfriend Christopher Newsom.

But jurors won't hear Coleman's statement because appellate courts have ruled that one suspect's statement cannot be used against another suspect.

That means prosecutors Leland Price and Takisha Fitzgerald will have to figure out another way to show jurors the significance of his bleach finding.

Defense attorney David Eldridge elicited testimony from Nelson that he cannot say how long the bleach stain had been the camisole.

Christian was naked from the waist down when found stuffed inside a trash can in Davidson's Chipman street home but was wearing the camisole and a sweater.

Also today, cell phone records show that Christian was in the area of Chipman Street when she phoned her dad at 12:33 am after the couple went missing.

Fitzgerald has indicated Christian was already in the hands of her captors when the call was made.

However, defense attorneys Eldridge and Doug Trant contend that call supports their theory the couple went to Chipman Street in search of drugs.

Earlier today, segue back Davidson's former girlfriend took the witness stand against him.

Davidson showed no reaction as Daphne Sutton helped prosecutors try to paint him as a killer who coolly gave away his victim's clothing.

Sutton, the niece of a Knoxville policeman, told jurors she moved out of the couple's Chipman Street house after Davidson's co-defendants moved in.

She left, she testified, on Jan. 5, 2007. Two days later, Davidson called her.

"He told me he had some clothes for me and to come over," she said.

At the house, Davidson refused to allow her into the kitchen.

"He said, 'What are you doing? This is my house.' " she said.

He told her suspect Vanessa Coleman was in the bathroom, where the door was closed.

Authorities allege Christian was still being held in the house at the time.

Sutton said she later complained in a phone call to Davidson that the clothes were used.

"He said he bought them at Planet Exchange," she said.

When he came to her friend's apartment to retrieve the rejected clothing, she said he was in a Toyota 4Runner with stickers on the back identical to the stickers on Christian's SUV.

The clothing also has been identified as belonging to Christian.

Sutton also introduced the first overt reference to race in what has been a racially-charged case outside the courtroom.

That came when she was asked why she didn't like Eric Boyd, suspected in the slayings but so far only convicted as an accessory to carjacking.

"Lemaricus told me (Boyd) was Muslim and hated white people," said Sutton, who is white.

Davidson's lawyers are trying to attack felony murder charges by suggesting that Christian and Newsom were neither kidnapped nor robbed but went willingly to the Chipman Street house to buy drugs.

To that end today, Sutton testifed under cross-examination by defense attorney Doug Trant that she had seen Davidson "talking to a white woman in a Toyota 4Runner" sometime in December 2006.

But prosecutor Takisha Fitzgerald elicited follow-up testimony in which she said that vehicle was an older model than Christian's SUV.


http://m.knoxnews.com/news/2009/oct/...istian-newsom/