(Photo: Twitter/Turney Montana)Shania Gray, 16, was murdered by Franklin Davis.
Shania Gray, 16, was murdered to prevent her from testifying at the trial of Franklin Davis, the man whom she accused of sexual assault. Davis has confessed to police but maintains that he "didn't plan on hurting her. Those weren't my intentions."
Davis would soon be facing trial for the sexual assault of Gray, who used to babysit his daughter before quitting. Her parents told police what had happened with Davis, and he was charged with four counts of assault. Gray was going to testify against Davis, which is why he formulated an elaborate scheme to contact her.
Davis established a fake Facebook account and told Gray he was a teenage boy who had a crush on her. Gray agreed to meet this "teenage beau" but was apparently surprised when Davis showed up instead.
"I needed to [do] some kind of footwork myself," he told WFAA from jail. "I needed to get some kind of evidence, some kind of proof myself to show I did not have sex with her and that she's lying. But I told her I wasn't going to hurt her because I didn't plan on hurting her. Those weren't my intentions."
Yet those plans quickly went awry. After driving near the Trinity River in Texas, Gray stopped the car, told Gray to get out, and then shot her twice with a pistol he kept in his car. She reportedly fell into the river, but Davis pulled her from the river and stood on her neck until she stopped breathing.
"I was fighting demons," he explained. "It was like a different person was in me. It wasn't me."
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Now Gray will face charges of capital murder and possibly life in prison. Right now he is being held on $2 million bond and will likely not make bail.
Family and friends, and even strangers, however, are left mourning the life of Gray.
"R.I.P. Shania Gray… You didn't deserve what was done to you..." tweeted Most Famous Que.
A vigil held at Mesquite's Horn High School showed just how much the community cared about Gray and the support they had for her family.
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