Lone survivor testifies at Ohio Craigslist trial

THOMAS J. SHEERAN

Asso­ci­ated Press

AKRON — Hop­ing to land a farm job and move close to his fam­ily, Scott Davis met his new boss and walked with him through the autumn-color wood­lands of south­east Ohio last year.

Then he heard the click of a gun at the back of his head.

“I spun around,” the soft-spoken Scott Davis told a hushed court­room Fri­day at the mur­der trial of Bro­gan Raf­ferty, a 17-year-old charged in a plot to lure vic­tims through phony Craigslist job offers. Three men were shot to death. Davis was the only vic­tim to sur­vive and tell his story.

Gen­tly prod­ded by the pros­e­cu­tor, Davis tes­ti­fied that he pushed the gunman’s arm away and got shot in the arm. Then he began a race for his life through the brush, the sound of gun­fire ring­ing through the trees.

Davis told a har­row­ing story to jurors, say­ing he ran through the woods and hid for seven hours. “I was wor­ried about bleed­ing to death,” Davis testified.

Pros­e­cu­tors say the plot involv­ing Raf­ferty and Richard Beasley, a self-styled chap­lain and the alleged trig­ger­man, tar­geted men des­per­ate for work who responded to Craigslist job ads.

Davis, 49, described how he responded to one such ad, sold his South Car­olina busi­ness and moved last year to be closer to his fam­ily in the Can­ton area.

Davis said he, a man who called him­self “Jack” and Raf­ferty shared a restau­rant break­fast before Raf­ferty drove the trio to an iso­lated Noble County farm, osten­si­bly to show Davis where he would be work­ing as a farm­hand and live in a trailer with hunt­ing rights.

Pros­e­cu­tors say “Jack” was Beasley, Rafferty’s men­tor. Beasley, 53, of Akron, has pleaded not guilty and will be tried separately.

Accord­ing to Davis, “Jack” urged him into a wooded area to look for farm equip­ment and even­tu­ally sug­gested that the two turn back.

“I heard a curse word and then a gun cock,” Davis testified.

Davis said he turned around and found him­self face-to-face with a hand­gun. He said he pushed the weapon aside, was wounded in the arm and fled as “Jack” fired at him.

Davis said he ran as fast as he could “but I kept falling down.” He said he even­tu­ally hid in a creek bed and tried to stop the bleed­ing amid ris­ing pain. Fear­ing loss of blood would kill him, Davis said he climbed to a hill­top in the moon­lit night to look for a house. He found one and man­aged to get there and ask for a phone to dial 911.

“I was get­ting weak at that point,” Davis testified.

Under ques­tion­ing by pros­e­cu­tor Emily Pelphrey, Davis iden­ti­fied the younger accom­plice by describ­ing the defendant’s court­room outfit.

Under cross-examination by defense attor­ney John Alexan­der, Davis tes­ti­fied that “Jack” had orches­trated the farm visit and fired at him.

Alexan­der posed repeated ques­tions fin­ger­ing Beasley as the mas­ter­mind, each time begin­ning, “‘Jack’ was the one … “

In her open­ing state­ment, Pelphrey said Raf­ferty chose to par­tic­i­pate in the three killings and Davis’ wound­ing, even if he wasn’t the trig­ger­man. Raf­ferty, of nearby Stow, kept his head down and took notes as the alleged plot was detailed for the jury.

Pelphrey showed the jury time­lines for each vic­tim and said they had been des­per­ate to improve their lives or find “the light at the end of the tun­nel.” A photo of each victim’s grave was shown on a big TV screen as she spoke.

The defen­dant was a quick stu­dent of the alleged plot and “a stu­dent of vio­lent crime,” Pelphrey told jurors.

“He made the choices he wanted to make,” she said.

Alexan­der told jurors Raf­ferty never par­tic­i­pated vol­un­tar­ily and was afraid that Beasley would kill him and his rel­a­tives if he didn’t coop­er­ate. As for the alleged plot to lure job-seekers, Alexan­der said, Raf­ferty “had no idea any of this was going on.”

The first killing came with­out warn­ing for Raf­ferty, accord­ing to Alexan­der. After­ward, Beasley warned Raf­ferty to keep quiet by remind­ing him that he knew where Rafferty’s mother and sis­ter lived, the defense lawyer said.

That was an implied threat, Alexan­der said. “He would kill them if Bro­gan says any­thing,” Alexan­der told jurors.

The body of David Pauley, 51, of Nor­folk, Va., was found on Noble County prop­erty owned by a coal com­pany and often leased to hunters.

Tim­o­thy Kern, 47, of Mas­sil­lon, was found in a shal­low grave near an Akron-area shop­ping mall. He had been shot in the head.

The body of Ralph Geiger, 55, of Akron, was found in Noble County, dead of a gun­shot wound to the head.

Beasley was a Texas parolee who returned to Ohio in 2004 after serv­ing time on a bur­glary con­vic­tion. He was await­ing trial on pros­ti­tu­tion and drug charges when author­i­ties took him into custody.

Police have said a halfway house he ran in Akron was a front for pros­ti­tu­tion. Author­i­ties said he was a men­tor for Raf­ferty and had befriended him.

Posted by AP News on Oct 12 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.