Anthony Graves

Case record: Anthony Graves

Background

Anthony Graves was convicted in 1994 of assisting Robert Carter in multiple murders in 1992.

Graves was released from a Texas prison on October 27, 2010, after Washington-Burleson County District Attorney Bill Parham filed a motion to dismiss all charges that had resulted in Graves being sent to death row 16 years earlier.

The offence

The murders took place in the small town of Somerville, Texas, in 1992.

The victims were:

• Bobbie Davis, 45
• Nicole Davis, 16
• D’Nitra, 9
• Brittany, 6
• Lea Erin, 5
• Jason, 4

Three weapons were used: a knife, a hammer and a .22 calibre gun.

To cover up the killings, the house was set on fire.

Soon afterwards, Robert Carter, father of one of the victims, was arrested. He confessed to having taken part in the killings. Carter was executed in 2000.

Anthony Graves’ trial also took place in 1994. The main witness for the prosecution was Carter, who named Graves as his accomplice. The jury gave Graves the death penalty.

Two weeks before Carter was scheduled to be executed in 2000, he provided a statement saying he lied about Graves’s involvement in the crime. He repeated that statement minutes before his execution: “Anthony Graves had nothing to do with it. ... I lied on him in court.”

Charles Sebesta, then district attorney, did not believe Carter.

Even after he no longer held the post, Sebesta held to his beliefs, calling Graves “cold-blooded” and taking out an ad in two Burleson County newspapers in 2009 to dispute media reports criticizing the conduct of prosecutors. Sebesta acknowledged it was not his strongest case: “I've had some slam-dunk cases,” and “It was not a slam-dunk case.”

Investigation

The evidence against Graves relied primarily on Carter’s testimony that Graves was his accomplice, and on jailhouse statements purportedly overheard by law enforcement officers.

Over the years, increasing evidence raised doubts about the validity of the conviction. Students in a University of St. Thomas journalism class worked with The Innocence Project at the University of Houston to review the Graves case in detail.

Nicole Casarez, the journalism professor who taught the class, and one of her students interviewed Carter’s brother. Their work included an affidavit and other evidence gathered to help persuade the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals to order a hearing, which eventually led to the new trial.

Casarez said: “I think the dismissal motion filed this morning says it best: There is no credible evidence to inculpate this defendant.”

Casarez said: “I’m just thrilled that it has finally come to this. I think it was a lot of people working very hard, perhaps even divine intervention, so that it all worked out today.”

Arrest

Soon afterwards Robert Carter was arrested following the killings and his confession to having taken part in the killings.

Trial

In a trial in 1994, Robert Carter was sentenced to death.

The trial of Anthony Graves also took place in 1994.

Arthur Curry, Graves’ youngest brother, testified at Graves’ 1994 trial, telling jurors that Graves had been at home sleeping at the time when the murders occurred. Jurors did not believe him.

Arthur Curry said: “The sun couldn't shine any brighter,” and “It's just like celebrating a resurrection, almost, because it was almost like a death in our family. But it was a slow death, continuously, just waiting for that demise.”

Graves’ appellate attorneys, Jay Burnett and Roy Greenwood, knew it was far less, and they were soon convinced their client had no knowledge of or participation in the crime, just as he had claimed since the moment of his arrest.

Sentencing

Anthony Graves was sentenced to death on November 7, 1994.

Appeals

In 2006, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit overturned Graves’ conviction and ordered a new trial after finding that prosecutors elicited false statements and withheld testimony that could have influenced the jurors.

A three-judge panel said he deserved a new trial after ruling that prosecutors elicited false statements from two witnesses and withheld two statements that could have changed the minds of jurors.

After D.A. Parham began to reassemble the case and review the evidence, he hired former Harris County assistant district attorney Kelly Siegler as a special prosecutor.

Siegler said: “After months of investigation and talking to every witness who's ever been involved in this case, and people who've never been talked to before, after looking under every rock we could find, we found not one piece of credible evidence that links Anthony Graves to the commission of this capital murder. This is not a case where the evidence went south with time or witnesses passed away or we just couldn't make the case anymore. He is an innocent man,”

Siegler said: “This is not a case where the evidence went south with time or witnesses passed away or we just couldn't make the case anymore,” and “He is an innocent man.”

Outcome

After Parham began reassembling the case and reviewing the evidence, Parham filed a motion to dismiss all charges that had resulted in Graves being sent to death row.

Graves was released from a Texas prison on October 27, 2010.

The prosecutor filed a motion to dismiss charges that had sent Graves to Texas’ death row for most of his adult life.

Aftermath

Graves returned to his mother’s home in Brenham and no longer characterized as “cold-blooded killer” in the prosecutor’s earlier description.

Graves’ attorney, Jimmy Phillips Jr., said: “The first place he wanted to go is to go hug his mama,” and “He is a free man, and he's home.”

Phillips said Graves called his mother to tell her he was coming home, and by the time Doris Curry returned home, Graves was already there, surrounded by family and friends.

Doris Curry said: “I hugged him and I hugged him and I cried and we both cried and we hugged and we cried,” and “He said: 'Mama, it's over. Mama, 18 years we've fought this fight a long time. It's over. Justice has been done for me.' ”

Doris Curry said: “A mother knows her child,” and “I know what kind of person he was. He wasn't that person they built him up to be.”

Doris Curry said: “He's lost a lot,” and “But he can build his life on what he has and move on,”

Doris Curry also said: “He's lost a lot. He was 26 years old when they took him. Now he's 45. He's got grandchildren he's never touched.”

Bill Parham said: “He's an innocent man,” and “There is nothing that connects Anthony Graves to this crime.”

Parham said: “I did what I did because that's the right thing to do.”

An attorney for Graves said Graves was released from Burleson County Jail, where he had been awaiting a retrial.

Timeline

• 1992 — The murders occurred in Somerville, Texas.
• 1994 — Anthony Graves was tried and sentenced to death; Robert Carter was sentenced to death.
• November 7, 1994 — Anthony Graves was sentenced to death.
• March 3, 2006 — The federal 5th Circuit Court decided to award Anthony Graves a new trial.
• 2006 — The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit overturned Graves’ conviction and ordered a new trial after finding prosecutors elicited false statements and withheld testimony.
• May 31, 2000 — Robert Carter was executed; minutes before his execution he said: “Anthony Graves had nothing to do with it. ... I lied on him in court.”
• 2009 — Charles Sebesta took out an ad in two Burleson County newspapers to dispute media reports criticizing the conduct of prosecutors.
• October 27, 2010 — Anthony Graves was released from a Texas prison after a motion to dismiss all charges.
• Wednesday (release date in report) — Bill Parham gave Graves his release and said, “There is nothing that connects Anthony Graves to this crime. I did what I did because that's the right thing to do.”

Other details

Graves was described as 45 years old at release; the report described Doris Curry as a 62-year-old woman and Arthur Curry as 37.

The evidence described the murders as “butchery of a family in Somerville.”

The case involved the prosecutor dispute described as an ad in two Burleson County newspapers in 2009.

The trial of Graves after appellate proceedings was described as set to begin in February 2011 in Brenham, in Washington County, Texas.