Texas v. David Graham
"The Cadet Murder Trial"
Graham Guilty of Capital Murder
NEW BRAUNFELS, TEXAS, July 24 (Court TV) -- David Graham was found guilty of capital murder in the 1995 slaying of 16-year-old Adrianne Jones. Like his former fiancee, Diane Zamora, who was also convicted of capital murder last February, Graham will serve a mandatory life sentence with the possibility of parole after 40 years.
The jury reached its verdict after eight hours of deliberations over two days. During
deliberations, jurors asked for crime scene photos of Adrianne Jones, blown-up replicas of
Graham's confession and the Texas statute regarding confessions, post-arrest letters that
Graham wrote to his Zamora and his friend John Green, a map of the area where Jones' body
was found, and a copy of Green's testimony.
Watch the family of Adrianne Jones address David Graham during their victim impact statements.
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Graham's confession was the key evidence at his trial. His defense lawyer, Dan Cogdell,
had hoped to convince jurors that his client's statement to police was coerced, made-up
by Graham to protect Zamora (whom the defense believed killed Jones on her own). He said that a staged fight between Grand Prairie Detective Dennis Meyer and Air Force investigator
Keith Kyle, combined Meyer's alleged threat to give Graham the death penalty if he did not
give a written statement, forced the former Air Force cadet into the confession. Cogdell
also stressed that the confession did not support the state's physical evidence of the
murder. Under Texas law, had the jury believed that investigators did not follow proper
procedure, they could have dismissed the coonfession entirely.
The prosecution, however, said that Graham's confession was not coerced, noting that he had
volunteered information about the weapon that was used to strike Jones during her attack.
Prosecutor Mike Parrish also noted that Graham took 1 hour and 45 minutes to type his
confession himself, carefully choosing his words, and giving details about the murder that
were otherwise unknown. The written confessions of Graham and Zamora, Parrish stressed
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during trial, agreed on these two points: Graham and Zamora engaged in a plan to kill Jones,
the victim was deceptively lured out of her house, attacked, and then shot to death by Graham.
During her trial, Zamora had blamed Graham solely for Jones' death, saying that he decided alone to kill her. At his trial, however, Graham's defense said that Zamora carried out Jones' murder alone and claimed that Graham was
not even there at the time of the murder. Jurors felt that Graham's confession proved that he was at least present at Jones' murder
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Bill Jones
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Linda Jones
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Justin Jones
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Scott Jones
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After the verdict was reached, the family of Adrianne Jones gave victim impact statements. Bill Jones, Adrianne's father, said that his family was grateful and justice was served; Linda Jones, the victim's mother, said that she felt sorry for Graham's family and also thanked the jurors; Adrianne's two brothers, Justin and Scott Jones, expressed a mutual love of late their sister but had differing views of Graham. Justin referred to Graham as an animal but said he could not hate the defendant because "animals are stupid." Scott, however, said that unlike his brother, he can hate an animal.
Parrish was gratified about the verdict and felt that justice had finally been served. He praised the jury for being conscientious in doing its job. Although disappointed in the verdict, Cogdell said he respected the kind of job the jury did and said that the verdict was not a surprise. He said he had told Graham that they had only a 10 percent chance of winning and did not regret not calling any witnesses at trial.
Cogdell indicated that he plans to appeal the verdict and question whether the confessions of Graham and Zamora were properly admitted at trial. He also said that he would base the appeal partly on the fact that Parrish mentioned Graham's polygraph test during opening statements.
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