BOBBY CUTTS / JESSIE DAVIS TRIAL
BOBBY CUTTS / JESSIE DAVIS TRIAL
Posted by James F. McCarty February 15, 2008 21:26PM
Members of Jessie Davis’ family leave the Stark County Courthouse after the jury’s verdicts.• Previous trial coverage.• Verdict photo gallery. • All The Plain Dealer’s reporting on the case.Time played a key element in Bobby Cutts’ guilty verdicts Friday, legal experts said.The Stark County jury reasoned that while Cutts didn’t plan to kill his pregnant lover, Jessie Davis, after they fought last summer, he could have saved Chloe, the daughter she was weeks away from delivering.
That was enough to lead jurors to convict Cutts of aggravated murder for the death of the unborn child, they said. But it allowed them to reject the same charge in Davis’ death and to convict Cutts of murder — a lesser charge.
Analysts said the jury must have found that Davis’ slaying was unplanned — the result of a fight. But the baby’s death could have been prevented. For failing to act in a timely manner to save the child, Cutts, 30, faces a possible death sentence.
Ohio law allows for the killing of a viable fetus to be prosecuted as a capital crime.
Defense lawyer Fernando Mack asked Common Pleas Judge Charles E. Brown Jr. to declare a mistrial immediately after the verdicts were delivered. Mack cited an apparent inconsistency in the murder conviction for the 26-year-old woman’s death and aggravated murder verdict for the death of Chloe.
Cutts guilty of aggravated murder, could get death penalty
Posted by James Ewinger, Laura Johnston and April McClellan-Copeland February 15, 2008 11:34AM
CANTON — A Stark County jury Friday morning found Bobby Cutts Jr. guilty of killing his pregnant lover and their unborn baby, with the possibility of a death sentence.As Judge Charles E. Brown Jr. read the verdicts, Cutts sat quietly. This was in sharp contrast to the sobs, and emotional strain that punctuated his four hours of testimony Monday.
Cutts admitted on the witness stand that he killed Jessie Davis and hid the body in the tall grass of a Summit County park. He characterized the death as an accident in an argument that escalated to a physical confrontation.
The decisions were read before a capacity crowd of about 75 in the courtroom, a blend of family members, news media and curious spectators. About two dozen journalists were in the media room, which was an adjacent courtroom retooled for this trial.
The jury gave him only one break, convicting him of murder instead of the more serious charge of aggravated under for the slaying of Jessie Davis.
Cutts guilty of aggravated murder, could get death penalty
Posted by James Ewinger February 15, 2008 11:09AM
Brown imposed an all-encompassing gag order on witnesses, attorneys and family members at the beginning of the case last year. Because the case is not over, the response was muted as Brown read the verdicts.
To the community, it means the end of months of waiting — first in June to find Davis’ body and now, these last three days, to know the verdict. To reach a resolution. “I just makes me really mad,” said Alyssa Violand, 22, who was among the thousands of residents who searched for Davis last summer. “Why do you have to do something like that?”
Violand grew up in Lake Township, where Davis lived. Violand’s sister, who also searched, was eight months pregnant. So she feels tied to the case.
“It’s a small little community, and stuff like that doesn’t happen,” said Violand, serving coffee at Muggswicz Coffee Shop, two blocks from the Stark County Courthouse. “So for it to happen right here in River City is really shocking.”
BBC Radio played in quiet Muggswicz. But in other downtown eateries this week, TVs blared coverage of the trial, and folks discussed it over lunch.
When the smiling 26-year-old went missing in June, the saga transfixed Northeast Ohio — and for a moment, the entire country.
That photo of her, in the bright maternity smock, plastered newspapers and TV news. Billboards flashed messages about Davis and her unborn daughter, Chloe. Hundreds of strangers attended their wake and funeral. And still, this week, more shared their sympathies in an online guestbook.
“My heart goes out to the family and friends of Jessie Marie Davis,” wrote a woman from Broadview Heights. “Though I did not know her personally, this has affected me personally. What a horrible thing for anyone to have to go through.”
PD Photos: Bobby Cutts Jr. found guilty
Cutts verdict is in, to be announced about 10:30 a.m.
Posted by James Ewinger February 15, 2008 10:01AM
Cutts jury takes a break, will return tonight
Posted by James Ewinger February 14, 2008 16:47PM
Disclosure of the public proceedings takes on added importance because the general public’s access to the trial has been limited by space and the judge’s orders that have resulted in tight control over events inside and outside of his courtroom.
William McKinley once used Cutts’ trial courtroom
Posted by James Ewinger February 14, 2008 12:02PM
The military uniforms of the multi-branch honor guard evoke an earlier era. For example, mounted Hussar cavalry with bearskin hats and stand guard across the street in some photos, across the street from the courthouse entrance that has been updated but not obscured from its original form.
Aging admirals in bicorn hats and swallow-tail tunics attend the horse-drawn hearse, as well as Army officers in high collars.
Drama on hold in Bobby Cutts Jr. murder trial
Posted by James Ewinger February 14, 2008 12:01PM
With that, even more media descended, a week after prosecutors began presenting evidence, and a day before the jury began deliberations.
As of this moment, the panel has been going for 13 hours and counting.
Lawyers and other court observers like to attach a value to the length of deliberations, with some suggesting that a long deliberation is a good sign for one side or the other.
But the fact is that quick verdicts have ended in acquittals and convictions, and so have lengthy ones.
First clue of the jury’s inclinations came Wednesday night as they were preparing to stop for the night.
They asked Judge Charles E. Brown Jr. if they would need to start their deliberations from scratch this morning if a juror had to be replaced.
The question was couched in terms of already having reached a decision on the first of three aggravated murder counts.
Brown told them that according to the rules of criminal procedure, a juror cannot be replaced once deliberations have begun.
At 6 p.m. Wednesday, Brown placed that question on the record in open court, along with a series of other questions that jurors had since they began deliberations.
One question was for an example of when they could convict on the lesser charge of murder instead of aggravated murder. The judge told them they had to follow the written and oral jury instructions he already had given them Tuesday.
They asked if there was a lesser charge they could consider instead of aggravated burglary. Brown said no.
Continue reading the entry…
Cutts jury resume deliberations; questions indicate verdict may be close
Posted by James Ewinger February 14, 2008 09:23AM
Cutts jury done for the day
Posted by February 13, 2008 17:16PM
reached a verdict.The jurors will begin their third day of deliberations Thursday morning. Because a death sentence is possible, the panel of six men and six women is sequestered
under the supervision of court bailiffs and sheriff’s deputies. They are spending their evenings
in a Canton-area hotel.Cutts, a former Canton policeman, is accused of strangling Jessie Davis, his pregnant lover, also causing the death of the unborn daughter she was expected to deliver weeks later. She died June 14, and Cutts lied about the slaying before leading authorities to her body June 23.He testified Monday and admitted to the slaying and deception. He said he panicked after
Davis died during an argument that escalated into a physical confrontation. The jury got the
case Tuesday around 3 p.m. and deliberated for three hours. They deliberated Wednesday from 8:30 a.m. until 5:15 p.m., taking an hourlong break for lunch.
Cutts jurors resume deliberations after lunch
Posted by James Ewinger February 13, 2008 13:13PM
Cutts jurors begin second day of deliberations
Posted by James Ewinger February 13, 2008 09:27AM
Jurors in Bobby Cutts case retire for the night
Posted by James Ewinger February 12, 2008 14:31PM
Cutts’ lawyers begin their closing argument
Posted by James Ewinger February 12, 2008 10:45AM
Prosecutors make closing arguments, say Cutts is guilty
Posted by James Ewinger February 12, 2008 09:54AM
Assistant county prosecutor Dennis Barr urged jurors in his closing argument to find Bobby Cutts Jr. guilty of three counts of aggravated murder.
The state does not have to prove that Cutts planned to kill Jessie Davis, Barr said. He reminded jurors that “for nine days, Bobby Cutts deceived everybody.”
Cutts strangled Davis, Barr said, calling that a very personal kind of violence requiring him to hold Davis’ throat for minutes. After nine days, Cutts led authorities to the body. As a trained police officer, he would have known that the body would decompose, Barr said.
What would Cutts have to gain? Barr asked rhetorically. He was $2,800 in debt, had multiple child support payments, further support for the baby Davis was about to have, and an imminent divorce requiring even more payments.
The three aggravated murder charges have some things in common: that Cutts purposely killed Davis and her unborn child, Barr said.
Judge won’t allow lesser crimes in Bobby Cutts Jr. trial
Posted by James Ewinger February 12, 2008 09:32AM
Jessie Davis• Follow the case today with regular updates. • Read more about the case in The Plain Dealer’s special report.Canton — When the jury begins to consider the fate of Bobby Cutts Jr., it will not be able to consider the crimes of voluntary or involuntary manslaughter.
Cutts is on trial in Stark County Common Pleas Court, charged with killing Jessie Davis and her unborn child. On Monday he admitted on the witness stand that he killed Davis, but said it was an accident that happened as they struggled during an argument.
During initial discussions with lawyers last week, Judge Charles E. Brown Jr. said he might give jurors the option of considering lesser offenses. But this morning Brown eliminated voluntary manslaughter and involuntary manslaughter as those options.
He also eliminated any lesser included crimes for killing Davis’ unborn child.
Allowing lesser included crimes would let the jury convict, but for a crime with less penalty than what Cutts was originally charged.
A death sentence is possible only if the jurors convicts on all of the original charges.
Lawyers were to present final arguments this morning. The jury of six men and six women will be getting the case this afternoon. The panel is now sequestered because the death penalty is possible.
A TIMELINE OF THE JESSIE DAVIS MURDER TRIAL OF BOBBY CUTTS, JR.
The story so far:
PROSECUTORS USE BOBBY CUTTS’ FRIENDS AGAINST HIM ON DAY 2 OF AGGRAVATED MURDER TRIAL
Posted by James Ewinger February 05, 2008 18:37PM
Canton — Bobby Cutts Jr. strangled his pregnant lover, wrapped her in her bed comforter, put the corpse in the bed of his pickup and drove her to a desolate park, his former high school friend told jurors Tuesday.
Cutts, 30, is accused of killing Davis, then dumping her and their unborn daughter in a Summit County park, 20 miles north of her Plain Township home.
Cutts co-defendant, Myisha Ferrell, testified for about 50 minutes in Stark County Common Pleas Court about the slaying, the removal of the body and some of Cutts’ efforts to cover up the crime.
She said Cutts showed up outside her house about 6 a.m. on June 14. They started driving, but as they drove she could tell something was terribly wrong.
Cutts told her he had choked Davis, she said.
“He said he used his arm,” she said. She raised her arm and bent it at the elbow, as she said Cutts did.
He drove north into Cuyahoga Falls as they talked. At the park, Cutts dragged the body into tall grass.
She could see Davis’ feet protruding from the comforter.
Assistant County Prosecutor Dennis Barr asked if she could see anything else.
“I didn’t want to see anything else,” Ferrell replied.
Davis’ body lay in the park for nine days before Cutts led authorities there.
Ferrell, 30, made no mention of helping dispose of the body. She pleaded guilty in November to complicity in the gross abuse of a corpse and obstructing justice for lying to police. She also she had been drinking and smoking marijuana before Cutts picked her up that morning.
Much has been made out of the large volume of bleach that investigators took from her home, and the presence of the substance in Davis’ home after her disappearance. But the topic was not raised Tuesday.
She said that as they drove, Cutts gave her a pink cell phone to toss out the window, presumably Davis’ phone, though that was not established in testimony.
She said Cutts gave her $100 on the trip.
Ferrell also said Cutts instructed her to tell investigators that he brought her to his house so she could watch Blake, but she never baby-sat the little boy. Blake, the then-2-year-old son of Davis and Cutts, was found alone in Davis’ house a day after the woman was killed.
She said Cutts showed her the incision on his finger where he said Davis, 26, bit him. She also said Cutts called Davis’ cell phone after her death — confirming prosecutors’ claim that he was constructing his alibi even as he disposed of the body.
Prosecutors used several witnesses to continue the theme from Monday that Cutts was under intense pressure last summer that led him to kill Davis.
Two women told jurors they had affairs with Cutts — one becoming pregnant and having abortion — around the time of Davis’ death.
Stephanie Hawthorne testified that she found out she was pregnant in early June with Cutts’ child and had the abortion on June 15.
Denise Haidet also said she had an affair with Cutts around that time.
Cutts’ wife, Kelly, had begun divorce proceedings and he was under mounting financial pressure, prosecutors said. Cutts also has a daughter with a woman from Canton.
Fernando Mack, one of Cutts’ lawyers, told jurors on Monday that prosecutors would bring up aspects of his client’s troubled personal life to inflame the jurors’ emotions.
On cross examination, Mack tried to ask Hawthorne if she ever asked prosecutors “why it was necessary to drag your personal,” at which point he was cut off by an objection from prosecutors.
The trial resumes today, and Cutts’ ex-wife is expected to testify. Stark County prosecutors are a third of the way through their witness list, but their witnesses have already testified to many of the key points that they promised jurors would hear.
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Myisha Ferrell testifies in Bobby Cutts trial
Posted by James Ewinger February 05, 2008 12:58PM
Myisha Ferrell took the stand at 12:20 p.m.
She acknowledged knowing Cutts since grade school and admitted to her earlier guilty pleas.
She said she saw Cutts about 6 a.m. on June 14, the day Davis died. He came to her house and was standing outside.
After looking at Cutts, she said she could tell something was wrong. She went in to get cigarettes and then went to Cutts’ truck.
“We drove off and he said something was wrong,” she said. “He said, “‘Something bad.'”
“He said something was wrong with his baby’s mother,” she said. Ferrell assumed he meant Davis.
As they drove, he was “talking in spurts,” and said, “She’s in the back.”
“He said he used his arm” to choke Davis, she said, raising her arm as she said Cutts did.
As they spoke, he drove north, into Cuyahoga Falls, but she did not continue to ask him questions.
Ferrell could see Davis’ feet in the bed of the truck.
Assistant County Prosecutor Dennis Barr asked if Ferrell saw anything else.
“I didn’t want to see anything else,” Ferrell replied.
A blanket or something covered the body, Ferrell added.
After Cutts removed the body, he came back to the truck. They drove to a gas station where he hosed out the truck bed.
Ferrell said he made two phone calls, one to Davis’ cell phone and another to someone with whom he coached football.
As they drove, He handed her a pink cell phone which she knew not to be his, and she threw it out the window.
Later, at Cutts’ house, he asked her if she could see the marks on his chest, which she could, and he showed her a cut finger, where he said Davis had bit him.
The next day, June 15, he called Ferrell and told her his “baby’s mom is missing.”
A day after that, Ferrell got a call from a sheriff’s deputy. She told him to call back in 30 minutes.
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Bobby Cutts’ other girlfriends testify
Posted by James Ewinger February 05, 2008 15:14PM
Two women testified this afternoon that they had romantic relationships with Bobby Cutts Jr. last year while he was married and involved with Jessie Davis.
Stephanie Hawthorne said she had a physical relationship with Cutts — beginning in April or May — and she found out she was pregnant in June with Cutts’ child.
She had an abortion June 15, the day after Davis died. But she said she began that process June 13, and Cutts knew about it then.
She said she talked to Cutts by phone June 14 about 2 a.m. She did not know where he was then. She thought he might have been in or near his truck. She also said she had frequent phone contacts with Cutts throughout the day of June 14.
She spoke to Cutts after the news broke about Davis’ disappearance.
“He said he couldn’t talk because something happened to Blake’s mom,” she testified
She only learned of Davis’ pregnancy from TV reports about her disappearance.
On Saturday, June 16, she and Cutts exchanged text messages. In one, she said, “Aren’t you glad your don’t have to find out about me and another kid?”
On cross-examination, Mack tried to ask Hawthorne if she ever asked prosecutors why it was necessary “to drag your personal…” at which point he was cut off by an objection from prosecutors.
Mack told jurors in his opening statement Monday that prosecutors will claim they are bringing in some of the other women in Cutts’ life only to establish a timeline, but he said they were actually doing it to dirty up his client, to inflame the jurors’ emotions.
Denise Haidet also testified that she was involved romantically with Cutts at the time — while he was married and also involved with Davis.
She said knew of Blake, the child of Cutts and Davis, but became upset when she found out that Davis had become pregnant with a second Cutts’ child last year.
The women’s testimony came after a string of witnesses who provided a timeline for Cutts’ movements on June 13 and 14.
Canton Patrolman Mike Lombardi testified he had seen Cutts and Ferrell together about 6 a.m. on the day of the Davis slaying.
Adreina Snell testified after Lombardi. She has known Ferrell for 20 years, and has known Cutts since junior high school.
On the morning of June 14, she said, she had been at Ferrell’s since the previous night. As she left, she saw Cutts arriving in his truck.
Lombardi and Snell were on the stand for mere minutes, apparently only to establish a timeline and to corroborate some of Ferrell’s testimony.
William Moses, who has played on softball teams with Cutts, testified that he and Cutts had a game June 13, the day before the slaying.
He went to a bar after the game, to meet another player. Cutts came, too, and they stayed until about 11 p.m.
He was followed by James Ladson, another softball player who also testified about the tavern rendezvous that included Cutts.
Haidet also testified about the bar meeting, noting that she saw Cutts there between 12:30 and 1 a.m., when she left.
Myisha Ferrell expected to testify when trial resumes
Posted by James Ewinger February 05, 2008 11:23AM
The Bobby Cutts Jr. aggravated murder trial broke for lunch shortly after 11 a.m.
When it resumes, prosecutors are expected to call co-defendant Myisha Ferrell to testify. She pleaded guilty in November for her supporting role in the June disappearance of Jessie Davis, 26.
Ferrell, 30, agreed to testify against Cutts and has since given prosecutors a statement in which she said he admitted killing Davis June 14, weeks before Davis was to deliver a daughter fathered by Cutts.
After he killed Davis on June 14, Cutts duped Ferrell into to helping him move Davis’ body to a Summit County park 20 miles north of her Plain Township home, prosecutors said. When he picked up Ferrell from her home, he told her he needed her to babysit his son, prosecutors said.
Assistant Stark County Prosecutor Chryssa Hartnett described in her opening statement to jurors Monday how Cutts wrapped Davis, 26, in a comforter and placed the body in the bed of his pickup truck, before going to Ferrell for help.
Ferrell acted “never dreaming that her police officer friend, the person she looked up to, had a dead body in the back of his truck,” the prosecutor said.
At the park, Ferrell “is horrified when she sees feet sticking out of the comforter,” as Cutts dragged the body into high grass — a place where it would stay until he led authorities there June 23.
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Bobby Cutts’ lawyer counterattacks
Posted by James Ewinger February 05, 2008 10:44AM
Fernando Mack, one of Bobby Cutts Jr.’s lawyers, attempted to establish whether Cutts had been a suspect from the beginning June 15, asking about his multiple interviews that first day, the search of his home and whether others had been questioned more than once.
Stark County Sheriff’s Sgt. Eric Weisburn said that other people close to Davis also were questioned more than once.
Mack also began chipping away at the burglary allegation, one of the bases of the capital-murder specifications against Cutts.
Weisburn said that initially, despite some of the disarray at Davis’ home, he viewed the case only as a missing-persons investigation.
This may seem a fine legal distinction, but it is one upon which Cutts’ life depends.
Defense attorneys told jurors there is no evidence that Cutts committed a burglary, and tried without success before trial began to get the burglary charge dismissed.
Prosecutors argued in pretrial briefs that one does not have to force his way into a home to commit burglary. They said that even if permission to enter is granted, that permission can disappear if violence occurs.
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Bobby Cutts Jr. murder trial resumes; dramatic testimony expected
Posted by James Ewinger February 05, 2008 08:59AM
Canton — At 9:19 a.m, jurors saw the first public photo of Jessie Davis’ body.
Her body was dark and in the advanced stages of decomposition. The comforter that prosecutors say former Canton police officer Bobby Cutts Jr. used to wrap her body was also visible.
The comforter is believed to be what then 2-year-old Blake Davis referred to June 15 when he told his grandmother: “Mommy’s crying. Mommy broke the table. Mommy’s in the rug.”
Sheriff’s deputy Sgt. Eric Weisburn first questioned Cutts the day his pregnant lover was reported missing. Weisburn said that on June 17, six days before Cutts disclosed the body’s placement, Cutts joined with numerous volunteers searching for Davis.
On cross examination by defense attorney Fernando Mack, Weisburn said that on June 23, there was no indication about how the body got to the park where it was found.
Prosecutors are expected to call co-defendant Myisha Ferrell, who pleaded guilty in November for her supporting role in the June disappearance of Jessie Davis, 26.
Ferrell agreed to testify against Cutts and has since given prosecutors a statement in which she said he admitted killing Davis June 14, weeks before Davis was to deliver a daughter fathered by Cutts.
Ferrell, a friend of Cutts’ since high school, was tricked into helping him, prosecutors said Monday, because he told her he was picking her up June 14 to baby-sit for the 2-year-old son he had with Davis.
Weisburn’s testimony, continued from Monday, picked up this morning with discussion of Cutts’ phone records.
Prosecutors have said the records helped them to close in on Cutts as a suspect, and some of them corresponded to the whereabouts of Davis’ body.
Before his arrest, Cutts led investigators to the body of Davis and her unborn child, in a Summit County park 20 miles north of her Plain Township home in Stark County.
Cutts’ lawyers have not denied his knowledge of the body’s location but have said the state cannot prove the charges of aggravated murder and aggravated burglary.
Those charges are the foundation of a potential death sentence, and presume a level of criminal intent above and beyond a mere crime of passion.
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Co-defendant to testify Tuesday in Bobby Cutts Jr. trial
Posted by James Ewinger February 04, 2008 18:41PM
Canton — Bobby Cutts Jr. raised his arm and bent it as he told his high school friend how he choked the life out of his pregnant girlfriend, prosecutors told jurors Monday.
Cutts, 30, is on trial in Stark County Common Pleas Court on aggravated murder charges accusing him of killing Jessie Davis and her unborn child.
Cutts’ former classmate, Myisha Ferrell, is expected to take the witness stand Tuesday morning. She pleaded guilty to related charges and agreed to testify against him.
After he killed Davis on June 14, Cutts duped Ferrell into to helping him move Davis’ body to a Summit County park 20 miles north of her Plain Township home, prosecutors said. When he picked up Ferrell from her home, he told her he needed her to babysit his son, prosecutors said.
Assistant County Prosecutor Chryssa Hartnett described in her opening statement how Cutts wrapped Davis, 26, in a comforter and placed the body in the bed of his pickup truck, before going to Ferrell for help.
Ferrell acted “never dreaming that her police officer friend, the person she looked up to, had a dead body in the back of his truck,” the prosecutor said.
At the park, Ferrell “is horrified when she sees feet sticking out of the comforter,” as Cutts dragged the body into high grass — a place where it would stay until he led authorities there June 23.
Prosecutors said Cutts assembled a body of lies to distance himself from the crime.
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Sheriff’s Sgt. continues testimony in Cutts case
Posted by James Ewinger February 04, 2008 15:44PM
Sgt. Eric Weisburn continued his testimony this afternoon. He described his conversation with then-2-year-old Blake Davis the day the boy’s mother, Jessie Davis, was reported missing.
Weisburn used a coloring book and crayons to relax Blake at a neighbor’s house so he could interview him.
Weisburn said that after he interviewed the child and other deputies completed taking the statements of other witnesses, he asked Cutts to come to the sheriff’s office for further questioning.
After a break, prosecutors played a tape of Cutts’ interview at the sheriff’s office. Cutts speaks in calm, measured tones. He describes how Ferrell was supposed to babysit Blake.
As the tape of the interview at the sheriff’s office continues, a deputy is heard asking Cutts about his wife Kelly serving him with dissolution papers, and about whether they “fight a lot.”
Hartnett said in her opening statement to jurors that this case is about pressure, including the pressure that Cutts used when he strangled Davis, the pressure he felt from a crumbling relationship and the combined pressures of multiple relationships, mounting debt and child support.
That’s as close as prosecutors have come to offering a motive.
On the interview tape, Weisburn asks Cutts again about calling Davis, and asks him if he has any idea where she might be.
After a long pause, Cutts says, “No,” without emphasis or any discernible emotion.
Deputies testify in Cutts trial
Posted by James Ewinger February 04, 2008 14:36PM
The first witness after lunch was Stark County Sheriff’s Deputy Darin Baad. He testified about the scene at Jessie Davis’ home, the actions of her family and presence of Bobby Cutts Jr.
Baad said authorities were treating the home as a crime scene and they thought it could have been burglarized because of the disarray. He also said they found Davis’ cell phone.
Had they been unable to find the phone, investigators had hoped to try to call her.
Sgt. Eric Weisburn, the Stark County deputy who interviewed Blake at the Davis home, testified next.
He said the toddler son of Davis and Cutts said to him, “Daddy’s mad.”
During his testimony, prosecutors played a tape of Cutts saying that he was not sure whether the child Davis was pregnant with was his during a conversation with Weisburn
Cutts also said on the tape that Davis was seeing another man.
The defendant also said on the tape that he tried to reach Davis by phone that day — which prosecutors said was a day after he killed her and dumped the body.
As the taped interview progresses, Weisburn can be heard asking increasingly specific questions about exactly what Cutts did the day before and where he had been.
It is in these moments, prosecutors have said, when Cutts’ web of practiced lies starts to become apparent.
Cutts’ voice is steady on the tape, even calm, and he does not seem to stumble.
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Bobby Cutts Jr. capital murder trial update
Posted by James Ewinger February 04, 2008 12:27PM
Canton – The second witness at the aggravated murder trial of former Canton cop Bobby Cutts Jr. was Audrey Davis, 20, of Akron. She is the sister of Jessie Davis, who was killed last summer.
Audrey Davis last spoke to her sister June 13, two days before their mother called authorities from Jessie Davis’ Plain Township home about Jessie’s disappearance.
Margaret Midkiff, North Canton, Jessie Davis’ neighbor, testified third. She heard a scream from Davis’ home June 15 — the day Jessie Davis disappeared.
She went to Davis’ home to investigate the noise and was asked to tend to Blake. She said she saw a bottle of bleach. Sheriff’s deputies had asked her to watch Blake while they questioned Davis’ family.
As she finished her testimony, the city tested its emergency siren, just as the judge had warned they would. It provided the only significant sound as Brown met with attorneys for both sides about one juror’s question.
The judge read the juror’s question about how Cutts was dressed at Davis’s house that day. He was in police uniform, Midkiff said.
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Jessie Davis was strangled, prosecutor reveals
Posted by James Ewinger February 04, 2008 10:48AM
Canton — As Bobby Cutts Jr.’s trial began Monday morning, prosecutors began to sketch what they characterized as the body of lies he assembled in June to distance himself from the lives he took.
Those lives belonged to his girlfriend, Jessie Davis, and the little girl she was to give birth to in early July — the second child she would have had with Cutts.
Cutts’ attorneys warned jurors, however, that the state’s case is calculated to inflame their emotions because the evidence is not there to convict him of aggravated murder and aggravated burglary.
Those charges are the pillars of the state’s drive to secure a death sentence for the 30-year-old former Canton police officer.
Assistant Stark County Prosecutor Chryssa Hartnett said — confirming a long-standing speculation — that Cutts strangled Davis, 26.
Continue reading the entry…
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Bobby Cutts Jr. trial begins today
Posted by Plain Dealer staff February 04, 2008 09:54AM
Boy’s statements to be allowed in Bobby Cutts Jr.’s capital murder trial
Posted by James Ewinger February 01, 2008 11:43AM
Statements made by the young son of Jessie Davis after her disappearance will be allowed in the trial of his father, the former police officer accused of killing Davis.
Stark County Judge Charles Brown ruled today that statements 3-year-old Blake Davis made to his grandmother and a sheriff’s sergeant will be allowed as evidence under the hearsay exception. The boy will not have to take the stand.
Blake was quoted at the time of his mother’s disappearance as telling his grandmother, Patti Porter, “Mommy’s in the rug,” after Porter went to the home, finding it in disarray and the child alone.
The sheriff’s sergeant said Blake also told him, “Daddy’s mad.”
Ohio courts have allowed small children to testify, usually no younger than 5 or 6, and there is no indication that he will participate in this trial.
Davis disappeared in mid-June. Blake’s father, Bobby Cutts Jr., claimed to have no knowledge of her disappearance and joined the legions of volunteers searching for her.
Prosecutors said that nine days after Davis’ disappearance, Cutts led police to her body in a Summit County park. He was charged with capital murder.
Cutts’ high school friend, Myisha Ferrell, was charged with obstructing justice for lying to police and complicity in the gross abuse of a corpse for helping dispose of Davis’ body. She pleaded guilty in November on the eve of her trial and agreed to testify against Cutts.
Cutts is a former Canton police officer.
A jury was selected in Cutts’ trial this week and testimony is to begin Monday.
Cutts’ lawyers asked the judge to move the trial out of Northeast Ohio because of the amount of publicity the case has received. The judge denied the request Friday.
At trial, jurors are likely to hear about affairs that Cutts may have had with two other women, one of whom may have had a terminated pregnancy.
Cutts’ lawyers sought to limit the women’s testimony, because they said the information is inflammatory and could prejudice a jury.
Prosecutors did not state why they need the testimony.
Brown also will allow the state to use the tape of an interview that a Canton Repository reporter had with Cutts before he was charged with the slaying. In it, Cutts denied any knowledge of Davis’ disappearance.
But the judge said he will not allow prosecutors to question the writer about the identity of a source who arranged the interview.
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Defense team questions racial diversity of all-white jury in Bobby Cutts Jr. murder trial
Posted by James Ewinger February 01, 2008 01:00AM
Bobby Cutts Jr. is accused of murdering his pregnant girlfriend Jessie Davis back in June.When Bobby Cutts Jr. goes on trial Monday for the slaying of his son’s mother, an all-white jury will be sifting the facts about the black former cop.That’s in spite of his lawyers’ repeated efforts to expand the jury pool to assure racial diversity.
A panel of six white men and six white women constitute the jury. Three white men, two white women and one black woman make up the six alternates.
Ohio courts generally rely on voter registration rolls for jury pools, but state law allows courts to use a roster of licensed drivers, too.
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Jury seated in Bobby Cutts Jr. murder trial
Posted by James Ewinger January 30, 2008 18:01PM
A jury has been selected in Stark County Common Pleas Court for the aggravated murder trial of former Canton police officer Bobby Cutts Jr.
He is accused of killing his pregnant girlfriend, Jessie Davis, in June.
Six men and six women are on the panel that will begin hearing testimony Monday. Six alternates include three men and three women, one of them the lone African American on the entire panel.
Cutts’ attorneys have expressed concern since his arrest last summer, about the possible racial makeup of the panel. Cutts is black.
Testimony in the trial is set to begin Monday.
Judge sidesteps questions over alleged Cutts’ confession
Posted by James Ewinger December 21, 2007 15:45PM
Lawyers for Bobby Cutts Jr. on Friday refuted Stark County prosecutors’ earlier assertions that he admitted killing Jessie Davis last summer.Cutts, 30, is charged with aggravated murder in the deaths of Davis, 26, and her unborn daughter. Prosecutors are seeking a death sentence.
The controversy erupted out of a legal document prosecutors filed earlier this week, claiming that he told co-defendant Myisha Ferrell of his role in the death.
“Bobby Cutts has never admitted to killing Jessie Davis,” defense attorney Fernando Mack said after an emergency hearing that Cutts’ attorneys sought in front of Common Pleas Judge Charles Brown. Jr.
The lawyers had asked Brown to force prosecutors to hand over the statement. They filed a motion saying that prosecutors made inaccurate statements about Cutts to potential jurors and the community at large.
The defense team said in court and after the hearing that prosecutors turned over the statement Ferrell gave to investigators as part of her November plea agreements. But that statement did not include her statement that Cutts confessed to her.
Cutts’ lawyers said because of a gag order in the case they could not answer reporters’ questions about what was in the statement. But they reiterated what they said in court: Either the alleged admission does not exist or prosecutors have not met with their legal duty to hand it over to the defense.
Court motions clash on whether Bobby Cutts said he killed Jessie Davis
Posted by Associated Press December 21, 2007 11:39AM
Jessie DavisLawyers for a former police officer facing trial in the death of his pregnant girlfriend say prosecutors who said he admitted the crime to a friend are misleading the public.Bobby Cutts Jr., 30, never told anyone he killed Jessie Davis, 26, who was nearly full-term when she was killed in June, according to documents filed by his defense. The lawyers accuse prosecutors of trying to influence potential jurors and the community with wrong information.
Cutts, who resigned as a Canton patrolman after his arrest, is charged with three counts of aggravated murder, aggravated burglary, gross abuse of a corpse and endangering children. His trial is set to start in late January or early February. If convicted, Cutts faces a possible death sentence.
If prosecutors have evidence of the alleged admission, including grand jury testimony, they must turn it over, the defense writes in its latest motion. Prosecutors deny withholding evidence or misleading the public.
Stark County Common Pleas Judge Charles E. Brown Jr. set a hearing for Friday.
A gag order imposed by the judge prohibits lawyers from commenting on the case other than at court hearings or in motions.
In court papers, Stark County prosecutors have said Cutts admitted to an acquaintance, Myisha Ferrell, that he killed Davis and her unborn daughter. Ferrell, who pleaded guilty in November to obstructing justice and complicity to gross abuse of a corpse, has agreed to testify at Cutts’ trial.
Cutts’ attorneys also have renewed their request for Brown to dismiss parts of the indictment that could bring the death penalty, saying the prosecution has failed to provide supporting evidence. Brown denied a similar request Tuesday.
BOBBY CUTTS, JR., ORDERED HELD ON $5 M BOND FOR MURDER OF PREGNANT GIRLFRIEND JESSIE DAVIS, UNBORN BABY
Monday, June 25, 2007
ASSOCIATED PRESS
BEAUTIFUL, ALSO, ARE THE SOULS OF MY BLACK SISTERS 