Murder in Texas

A lurid, old-fashioned trial

Even by Texas standards, the trial unfolding on the fifth floor of the Potter County courthouse in Amarillo was getting steamier by the minute. The state's prime witness was a platinum blonde who was known to wear a .32 strapped to her boot and a necklace that spells out RICH BITCH in diamonds; the defendant was her husband, one of the Lone Star State's richest men. The charge: murder.

Following fast on the heels of another lurid Texas trial--a Houston civil-court jury last month cleared Oilman Ash Robinson of charges that he had conspired to murder his son-in-law--the trial of Cullen Davis has all the trappings of a suburban western. One August night in 1976, a black-wigged intruder broke into the $6 million Fort Worth mansion where Davis' estranged wife Priscilla lived with a new lover, ex-Basketball Player Stan Farr. In the shooting rampage that followed, Farr and Andrea Wilborn, 12, Priscilla's daughter by a previous marriage, were left dead. Family Friend Gus ("Bubba") Gavrel, who showed up inopportunely at the height of the carnage, was wounded; Priscilla was shot in the chest but managed to escape. Four hours later, police arrested Cullen at the home of his girl friend, Karen Master.

At first glance, it appeared to be an open-and-shut case. Priscilla, Gavrel and a girl friend with him that evening identified Davis as the assailant. The couple had been quarreling bitterly over money; only days before, Davis had been ordered to increase support payments to Priscilla to $5,000 a month. A negligible amount, perhaps, for an heir of Kendavis Industries, a conglomerate valued between $300 million and $1 billion, but Davis was in debt at the time, and the presiding judge had ordered his assets frozen until the terms of the divorce were settled.

The D.A.'s office is seeking the death penalty, and Davis has hired a team of nine lawyers, supplemented by twelve investigators and secretaries, to represent him. Foremost among them is Richard ("Racehorse") Haynes, a flamboyant character fond of hand-tooled ostrich-hide boots and aggressive tactics of crossexamination. "My wealth has worked against me," Davis laments, ruefully noting his lawyers' failure to get him released on bail over the past 14 months, but he has managed to carry on his business from a phone in the judge's chambers and to dine with cronies in a vacant jury room.

Says Joe Shannon, the beleaguered prosecutor: "The defense has more assets than the state of Texas."

In court, unsavory details have emerged to the discredit of both sides.

With her hip-hugger jeans and Indian jewelry, Priscilla has never been a favorite of Forth Worth society--one executive described her as "a lady who looked like she had spent too much time in bowling alleys"--and Haynes has concentrated less on an alibi for Davis than on his wife's reputation. Last week he put on the stand William Rufner, a convicted felon and former lover of Priscilla's, hoping to depict him as a possible suspect. Priscilla stands to gain millions by her husband's conviction, Haynes argued, while Gavrel, the other key witness, has a $13 million damage suit pending against Davis.

As wildly divergent as the testimony was, with the money and life of a millionaire at stake, every story had some plausibility. "You have Cullen Davis and Priscilla," summed up ex-Prosecutor Judge George Dowlen. "Both know exactly what happened, and who is telling the truth and who is lying. No one else can say for a certainty."

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