SAVANNAH, Tenn. (Court TV) — Zach Adams testified Thursday in his post-conviction hearing, denying under oath that he kidnapped, raped, or killed nursing student Holly Bobo and tying his alibi to a bank ATM stop he says investigators never fully documented.
Adams, serving life without parole plus 50 years, told Hardin County Circuit Judge J. Brent Bradberry he had no relationship with Bobo beyond having her mother, Karen Bobo, as his fourth-grade teacher. Under direct examination by post-conviction attorney Crystal Etue, he gave flat denials when asked if he kidnapped, raped, or murdered Bobo.
Zachary Adams, who was convicted of kidnapping, raping and killing Holly Bobo takes the stand and says ‘I never admitted to killing Holly Bobo.’ Adams seeks a new trial after Jason Autry, who testified in Adams’ trial recanted his testimony. (Court TV)
The evidentiary hearing, which began in May 2025, centers on Adams’ claims that his trial lawyers were ineffective and that the State failed to secure or further explore potentially exculpatory evidence.
Adams placed himself at a Parsons, Tenn., bank ATM at about 11 a.m. on April 13, 2011. He testified that he was driving his brother Dylan Adams’ white Chevrolet Silverado with friend Shayne Austin in the passenger seat and Dylan in the back. He described backing the truck into the drive-through lane so Austin could reach the machine from the passenger side without having to lean across the cab.
Adams told the court that investigators obtained only exterior surveillance images that showed a pickup consistent with Dylan’s truck but did not clearly show who was inside. He said the bank’s customer-facing ATM camera — which he believes would have captured Austin at the keypad and perhaps himself and his brother Dylan inside the truck — was never collected or properly preserved by TBI investigators. Adams argued that if that footage had been obtained and played for the jury at his 2017 trial, it would have supported his timeline and location that morning. The State has maintained in the post-conviction proceedings that agents turned over all available video and that no recording exists that clearly identifies the occupants of the truck.
Under cross-examination, Special Counsel Amy Weirich walked Adams through his history of heavy drug use in 2011. Adams acknowledged daily use of marijuana, morphine, methamphetamine and benzodiazepines such as Xanax and Valium, and agreed he was both using and selling drugs during that period. He said his drug use was so extensive that days often “ran together,” and testified that his memory of the bank stop was triggered later when he was shown still images from the ATM lane.
Weirich contrasted that with phone records showing repeated calls between Adams and co-defendant Jason Autry on the morning Bobo disappeared, pressing him on why he now remembers backing into the ATM lane in detail but cannot recall the substance of those calls. Adams maintained that frequent phone contact with Autry was normal in their drug-using circle and denied any discussion about disposing of a body.
Confronted with statements jurors heard at his 2017 trial, Adams acknowledged telling acquaintance Jamie Darnell something to the effect of, “If you knew what that knife had done,” but testified he said it to discourage Darnell from trying to buy the knife, not as a confession. When asked about testimony that he said “let’s rape this bitch,” Adams denied using those exact words. Adams also told the court he responded sarcastically when fellow drug user Anthony Phoenix pushed a plan to rob someone, saying he made a flippant remark about rape to discourage a robbery that would have likely led to his prompt arrest, not to describe an actual plan involving Bobo.
Adams also addressed his 2017 decision not to testify. In a colloquy with then-Judge C. Creed McGinley, Adams said under oath it was his own choice to stay off the stand after consulting with his lawyers. On Thursday, Adams testified that he actually wanted to testify at trial but felt pressured not to after a jailhouse meeting in which his mother and lead trial lawyer, Jennifer Thompson, urged him to remain silent. “My mom made me promise I wouldn’t testify,” Adams said, adding, “I wanted to. I wanted to, bad.” Weirich suggested that meant he was either untruthful then or now; Adams said his mind was already made up by the time of that colloquy because of the promise he had made.
Judge Jennifer Nichols, who was the lead prosecutor in Zachary Adams’ murder trial, takes the stand. Adams, who was convicted of raping and killing Holly Bobo, seeks a new trial after Jason Autry claims he lied at Adams’ trial. (Court TV)
Throughout his testimony, Adams portrayed himself as a heavy drug user with a bad local reputation who cooperated with law enforcement by allowing searches and speaking with agents, even calling the TBI after hearing there were law enforcement officers at his house in February 2014, then meeting agents at a McDonald’s; Adams was arrested shortly thereafter and has been in custody ever since. He repeated his view that a more thorough effort to obtain and preserve the Parsons ATM footage would have changed the course of the case.
Former special prosecutor Jennifer Nichols, who led the 2017 trial team and now serves as a Tennessee circuit court judge, followed Adams to the stand as a defense-called witness. Nichols testified that when she joined the case in 2014, she reviewed earlier TBI work that had focused heavily on convicted sex offender Terry Britt, but concluded there was no proof that could be taken to a grand jury on Britt. She said the case that went to trial ultimately centered on Adams, his brother Dylan and co-defendant Jason Autry.
Nichols described the proof against Adams at trial as a mix of physical and circumstantial evidence, phone records and multiple witnesses who said he made incriminating remarks. She acknowledged in the post-conviction hearing that she did not believe every detail of every witness account. That included portions of Dylan Adams’ 2014 video statement, which she said she viewed as minimizing his own role even as he admitted that Bobo was raped. Nichols testified that prosecutors decided not to call Dylan at Zach’s trial because his version “did not comport with the proof that we had,” and said they were prepared to try Zach without Autry until Autry’s lawyer later approached about a proffer. She agreed that before Autry began cooperating, his case was “probably the weakest of the three” men charged because he had not talked.
On witness-handling, Nichols admitted that some witnesses were interviewed multiple times and confronted with inconsistencies, but rejected the defense suggestion that investigators coached them into a pre-set story. She said the goal was to test their accounts against other evidence and leave credibility disputes for the jury, and noted that TBI agents were responsible for collecting surveillance video and other physical evidence while she worked from what they turned over.
Nichols said she was aware of the Parsons bank ATM device and related footage through a sanctions fight in the post-conviction case and believed it was preserved via a TBI subpoena. She testified that any video she recalled seeing from that bank did not show faces clearly enough to identify who was in the truck and did not change her view of the case. Nichols disagreed when Bates suggested the ATM material was “potentially exculpatory” evidence. Earlier, Nichols told Bates she would not want any conviction to stand if she learned a State’s witness had lied about a material fact or if law enforcement had coerced false statements.
The hearing is scheduled to continue on Friday in Savannah. Judge Bradberry will later issue a written ruling on the petition.
This story was reported by John Cowley IV and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
