Cops: Student acted erratically day before he killed his parents at Central Michigan University
March 4, 2018 by admin
Filed under Latest Lingerie News
A day before a Central Michigan University sophomore from southwest suburban Plainfield fatally shot his parents inside his dorm, he acted erratically, telling a campus police officer that someone was out to kill him, authorities said Saturday, hours before he was formally charged with murder.
James Eric Davis Jr., 19, was arrested without incident shortly after midnight Saturday following an intensive daylong manhunt that included more than 100 police officers scouring the campus area, authorities said. Officers found him after someone aboard a train spotted a person along railroad tracks in Mount Pleasant, and called police.
Davis was taken into custody and later charged with two counts of murder and a felony weapon charge, according to a statement from CMU officials. Davis remained under guard at a hospital Saturday and is expected to be moved to the Isabella County jail when he’s discharged. It was unclear when he might make his first court appearance.
The 2016 Plainfield Central High School graduate is accused of shooting his parents, James Eric Davis Sr. and Diva Jeneen Davis. Davis Sr. was a police officer in west suburban Bellwood and an Illinois National Guard veteran who served in Operation Iraqi Freedom. Diva Davis’ Facebook page identified her as a real estate broker; friends said she was also a breast cancer survivor and had worked as a flight attendant.
During a news conference Saturday morning in Michigan, university police Chief Bill Yeagley told reporters that Davis’ parents had just picked him up from the hospital and brought him to his dorm to pack up for spring break when Friday’s shooting occurred.
On Thursday, a day before the shooting, CMU police encountered Davis Jr. when he came running into a community police office in his dorm “very frightened” and “not making a lot of sense.”
“He said someone was out to hurt him, someone was going to harm him, and the officer calmed him down and tried to gain more information about what was going on. Mr. Davis was very vague and he kept talking about someone having a gun,” Yeagley said, adding that Davis Jr. said he had not actually seen the person with a gun.
Davis Jr. eventually talked about riding in a dorm elevator with the person, and police went to talk to the individual Davis Jr. had identified. Yeagley said that when officers determined that the person posed no threat — and reviewed video from the elevator that showed Davis Jr. and that person laughing — Davis Jr. said he was fine and was leaving campus Friday for spring break.
Hours later, officers spotted Davis Jr. in a dorm hallway with his suitcases, Yeagley said. When officers tried to talk to him, he again wasn’t making sense, Yeagley said, adding that the student was acting “in a fashion that isn’t reasonable or logical.” They asked Davis Jr. to call his parents, which he did. An officer then spoke to Davis’ mother, Diva Davis, told them about her son’s behavior, their concerns about possible drug use and asked her whether he had a history of drug use, Yeagley said.
“The mother said she too was concerned this could be drugs,” he said. He declined to say whether drugs were found in Davis Jr.’s system.
Video footage showed Davis Jr. in the dorm’s parking lot with the gun before he entered the residence hall where his parents were shot around 8:30 a.m., authorities said.
Authorities suggested that Davis’ parents may have been caught off guard, saying both were “simply packing up for spring break” inside his fourth-floor dorm at the campus’ Campbell Hall when they were killed.
Yeagley said the gun used in the shooting belonged to Davis’ father, but wouldn’t say whether the father had brought the gun to the university’s campus in Mount Pleasant, Mich., when picking up his son. It was also unclear whether the gun was the elder Davis’ police service weapon.
News of Friday’s slaying spread ripples of shock and grief through separate circle of friends who knew Davis Sr. and Diva Davis as examples of the American dream, hard-working people who wanted better for their children.
Davis Sr., who served in the Illinois National Guard for more than two decades before retiring in 2014, was well liked and had a lot of friends, said Lt. Col. Brad Leighton, an Illinois National Guard spokesman.
As a recruiter for the National Guard, Davis was “disarmingly personable,” able to easily connect with many of the young men and women he came in contact with, according to Jordan Murphy, who worked with Davis in the early 2000s.
Murphy, who now lives in Florida, said he was shocked to learn the Davis Jr. was allegedly responsible for his parents’ death.
“He wasn’t a good kid—he was a great kid. A kid from a traditional, respectful, value-filled family,” Murphy said.
Childhood classmates for Diva Davis, who spent her youth in Gary, Ind., were also stunned by her death. Pam Jones, an anchor for WGN radio who attended Wirt High School with Davis, said she was in disbelief when she heard another anchor mention the Davis family name.
“All I could say was, ‘No!’ Jones said. “Diva was just as friendly as her beautiful smile suggests. If you look at her yearbook photo and compare it to the one from her Facebook page, it looks like no time has passed at all. “
James Wilson, who said he first met Davis in 1974 when the two were in daycare, said he’d reconnected with her not long ago after recently losing his parents. “She was just very encouraging, and we had a great conversation. She was so proud of all her kids.”
Longtime friend and classmate James Powell recalled Davis as a “trendsetter” to whom everyone looked up. Another friend, Tyjuana Hedrick-Powell remembered Davis as a “go-getter” who succeeded in whatever path she took — from Mary Kay cosmetics to real estate agent — though she particularly loved being a flight attendant with American Airlines. “You could hear it in her voice. She loved to travel,” she said.
