My Me Time Often Involves Murder
And Once, So Did My Childhood
Yes, I am one of those weirdos who watches real life murder shows to “relax.”
What’s odd about this (other than the obvious) is that I absolutely cannot do scary movies or TV shows. They are not fun, enjoyable or enticing to me. I’d rather watch that pimple popper show. (Not really, but it’s a close toss up.)
But put me right into the middle of an actual homicide investigation? This is my version of Netflix and chill. My husband and I particularly love The First 48 which focuses on the crucial first two days of solving an actual murder case. We discuss the play by play and fan over the featured detectives like we’re watching our favorite NFL team.
“Nathan never misses. He sees right through that fake-ass alibi.”
“Love that Jerome. The way he solves murders in the neighborhood he grew up in and mentors kids to keep them from making the same mistakes of his brother…he’s my MVP.”
(I’m not actually a football fan, but you get the idea.)
I don’t know why real life murder shows intrigue me so much. Especially because my real life brush with murder kind of scarred me for life.
I was 10 years old when murder first hit close to home. Before this time, I think I thought of murder as more of an abstract concept - a terrifying prospect but nothing that had burst the innocent bubble of my life.
It was a typical Texas summer day, and I was stepping into my red gingham bikini getting ready to go for a swim when I heard my mom gasp and say “Oh my God” repeatedly. I don’t remember if she was on the phone, watching TV or reading the newspaper, but in that moment I do remember a trickle of fear mixed with dread oozing through my body.
I ran into her room to find out what had happened.
A 12-year old girl and a man had been murdered, shot execution style, just up the road from where we lived. The girl’s mom and another man had also been shot but survived.
The Cullen Davis Mansion Murders
The shootings took place at the Davis mansion, a contemporary white stone estate located a little over a mile from my house. We drove by it often.
Oil tycoon Cullen Davis was one of the wealthiest men in America at the time. He had built his dream home on 250 acres of land in the center of Fort Worth in the same neighborhood as Colonial Country Club and TCU. It was like a country estate in the heart of the city.
Cullen and his wife Priscilla were in the middle of a nasty divorce, and the judge had awarded the house to her. On August 2, 1976, the couple had returned to court where a judge also significantly bumped up the alimony amount Cullen would be required to pay.
That night, Priscilla and her boyfriend returned home from an evening out and were ambushed by a man in black who shot them both. Priscilla’s daughter Andrea had already been shot and killed inside. Another couple arrived at the home shortly after Priscilla and her boyfriend, and the intruder shot at them too. The male was hit. He survived, but was paralyzed for life. The woman escaped.
Priscilla, although wounded, also managed to make a run for it. She ran across the vast property in the dark to the bordering residential neighborhood and knocked frantically on a random door for help.
Both Priscilla and the other woman who fled after arriving on the scene identified Cullen as the shooter. In separate police interviews, they both said he had made no effort to disguise his identity other than wearing a black wig.
At the time, Cullen was thought to be the wealthiest man ever to stand trial for murder in the United States. He hired legendary Texas defense attorney Richard “Racehorse” Haynes in what was one of the highest profile cases to exist at that time.
Cullen was acquitted in a vicious textbook case of putting the victim on trial with only a flimsy alibi provided by his girlfriend (who ended up being his next wife). It was stunningly surprising. Shortly after, Cullen was secretly recorded paying a hitman to kill Priscilla and the judge presiding over their divorce. He was acquitted again.
He was the OJ of his day.
My Fear Factor
Although I didn’t know Priscilla’s daughter, my family did know the Davis family peripherally. This, coupled with the fact that the murder scene was in the area, completely freaked out 10-year-old me.
The night of the crime, a neighborhood friend and I had slept in a tent in my backyard just for fun.1 It particularly horrified me that I had been outside, unprotected and unaware while a murderer was loose just up the road.
For weeks, I slept on the floor at the foot of my parent’s bed. When I finally migrated back to my room, I created an elaborate alarm system where I stacked a pile of noisy objects (metal piggy bank, canister of marbles, wooden box of coins) in front of my bedroom door to alert me if anyone entered.
Unfortunately my parents set off my contraption several times while coming to check on me in the night, scaring the shit out of all of us. But my fear of being murdered overrode my need for uninterrupted sleep.
Eventually my visceral fear tapered off, and I went back to being the regular amount of scared of being murdered. The surreality of being in close proximity to a murderer2, however, did not go away.
We frequently saw Cullen around town. He ended up back in his nearby mansion with his new wife and her two sons who he subsequently adopted. My dad was their pediatrician. One of them went to the same school as my sister. Their mom and my mom ended up carpooling. My mom would pick up and drop them off at the murder mansion.
My parents also went there for a dinner party they were invited to once. And they attended a Dallas Cowboys game with Cullen in his box. It was completely unnerving to know they were mingling with a murderer3. I mean What the hell Mom and Dad?!
One time in high school, I remember going to church with a friend whose dad was the minister. Cullen had found religion and been “born again.” That Sunday, he sat a couple of rows in front of us.
All I could do was stare at the back of his head thinking I am a few feet away from a killer. There is an actual murderer4 in this room and we are all acting like it’s just a typical Sunday morning and which one of these things is not like the others and I wonder what he did with the wig and what the hell, what the hell, what the hell?!
I have no idea what my friend’s dad preached about that day, but I wonder if the sermon included Thou Shalt Not Kill?
The Davis family left the murder mansion for good sometime in the 80s. The acreage surrounding the house was sold for development and is now home to a Trader Joe’s, banks, a Walgreen’s, apartments, a Calloway’s Nursery, restaurants, a gated residential neighborhood and more. But the house itself remained until quite recently. Before its demolition, it was home to a Mexican restaurant and a private event venue. Now it’s been razed to make way for some new townhomes.
Multiple books and TV movies have recounted the grisly tale of the Cullen Davis mansion murders. Weirdly, as much as I’m fascinated by a good true crime show, I’ve never watched any of them. Maybe revisiting the fear I felt that summer in 1976 is just a bit too much for me. It may have been irrational, but that didn’t make it any less real at the time.
Even peripheral proximity to a killer is too close for my comfort.
On my couch, however, is the perfect place to immerse myself in murder. If it gets too intense, I can always change the channel to that pimple popping show and immerse myself in a different type of horror.
I am perpetually on a quest for the perfect sheets. I don’t know if they exist, but my new Quince Bamboo Sheets are pretty darn awesome. They’re silky smooth, cooling and beyond soft.
Just finished reading The Tell by Amy Griffin, and it lives up to the hype. It’s a true story about buried memories, healing from trauma and finding your voice.
Playlist Swap - Stole this idea from another Substacker: My son and I made playlists for each other. He’s in New York and I’m in Texas, and listening to our personally curated playlists from each other gives us a fun bonus way to stay connected. Sharing the one he made for me.
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Me and camping don’t actually get along. For more about that, read this:
*alleged - I don’t want to get murdered.
*alleged - gotta CYA
*still alleged
Joe Shannon was one of the prosecutors on the Cullen Davis case, and he teaches a four week course on the murders and trial at TCU Silver Frogs. He only teaches it once a year, in the fall, and there is always a waitlist to get it. It was absolutely fabulous! He has all the stories, photos, maps, and info that never made the papers. Way better than any movie or book when you get the inside scoop. Blood Will Tell, by Gary Cartwright, is a great book.
I started this before dinner and finished so I can watch the most recent 48 Hours on YouTube! Your church encounter reminds me of a time many years ago when my father-in-law, a sweet, serious devout ophthalmologist was offended when an associate pastor of his huge First Baptist Church had been revealed as an adulterer, and “there he was singing hymns loudly on Sunday as if nothing had happened.”