 MJP
During a search, officers found suspected methamphetamine in the man’s front pocket, and placed him in the back of a squad car. The man’s wallet contained identification cards for William Rayon Davis with a birth date of January 1, 1983, and for Curtis Ray Davis with a birth date of July 5, 1980. The rest of the wallet’s contents contained the name of William Davis.
The man told police he was Curtis Davis, and explained that he was holding the wallet for his brother William. The officers used the Dallas County Adult Information system (AIS) from the squad car and compared photographs from the cards to photographs of Curtis and William Davis. Both had similar appearances. The officers then arrested the man. He was taken to Garland Detention Center and booked as Curtis Davis.
He was charged with possession of methamphetamine, and was issued a citation for possession of marijuana and drug paraphernalia.
In fact, the man was William Davis. He was fingerprinted, posted bond, and was released before he could be taken to the Dallas County Jail. Had he been taken to the jail, officials there would have examined his fingerprints and realized that he was not Curtis Davis.
The police submitted the suspected methamphetamine to the Texas Department of Public Safety Crime Laboratory for analysis. Seven months later, on February 20, 2021, the laboratory issued a report concluding that the substance was in fact methamphetamine. On May 2, 2022, an indictment was returned against Curtis Davis.
On July 9, 2022, Curtis Davis was arrested for unauthorized use of a vehicle. He was taken to the Dallas County Jail.
On July 27, 2022, when the methamphetamine case was called in court, Curtis Davis was not there because he was in jail on the stolen vehicle charge. An arrest warrant was issued. It was not served on Davis, however, and was returned because of a defect – it listed the wrong charge.
On August 19, 2022, after the stolen vehicle charge was dismissed, Davis was released from the jail.
On December 5, 2022, the arrest warrant on the methamphetamine charge was re-issued, but for reasons never explained, it was not activated in AIS.
On April 6, 2023, Curtis Davis was arrested for trespassing and taken to the Dallas County Jail. Because the methamphetamine warrant was not active, Davis was only booked on the trespassing charge. After his court-appointed attorney, Randall Scott, met with Davis, Scott requested a competency evaluation. On May 1, 2023, Davis was evaluated by a forensic psychologist, who found him to be incompetent to face the charge.
Prosecutors in the Dallas County District Attorney’s Mental Health Unit were then assigned to the case, and discovered the outstanding warrant on the methamphetamine charge. On May 3, 2023, attorney Clayton Smith was appointed to represent Davis on the methamphetamine charge and the case was transferred to Dallas County Criminal District Court to resolve the competency question.
On June 15, 2023, Davis was re-examined and again found to be incompetent. Based on a recommendation from the examining psychologist, Davis was released to a homeless shelter, the Bridge, to receive treatment. But Davis walked away. An arrest warrant was issued.
On July 27, 2023, Dallas police responded to a 911 call regarding a homeless man in a restaurant parking lot. They detained Davis and discovered the outstanding warrant. The officers found suspected methamphetamine in Davis’s left hand. He was arrested and charged with an additional count of possession of methamphetamine.
On August 3, 2023, Davis was sent to inpatient treatment to attempt to restore competency. Two months later, on October 7, 2023, Davis was re-examined and deemed competent to stand trial.
On October 18, 2023, Davis pled guilty to both methamphetamine charges. He was sentenced to three years of probation with in-prison community residential treatment at the Texas Substance Abuse Felony Punishment Facility. When officials there began putting information into their system, records suggested that Davis’s brother, William, had wrongly posed as Curtis more than three years earlier in the shopping center.
The Dallas County Sheriff’s Office then compared fingerprints and concluded that William was the person arrested at the shopping center. The Department of Public Safety was asked to make a fingerprint comparison as well, and agreed that William Davis was the person arrested at the shopping center.
The case was then assigned to the Dallas County District Attorney’s Conviction Integrity Unit (CIU). The CIU obtained the booking information and the fingerprint card from the arrest in the shopping center, as well as fingerprint cards for both William and Curtis Davis from the sheriff’s office, and the fingerprints collected from Curtis Davis when he pled guilty.
Dallas County District Attorney Investigator Garrick Whaley conducted another examination. He concluded that Curtis Davis was not the source of the fingerprints taken at the Garland police station after the shopping center arrest. Whaley reported that although the prints were consistent with William Davis’s fingerprints, he could not make a definitive association.
The CIU then examined body camera footage from the arrest in the shopping center and the arrest of Curtis Davis on the criminal trespassing charge. The CIU determined that William Davis had indeed been the person arrested in the shopping center.
CIU chief Cynthia Garza arranged for an attorney to be appointed to represent Curtis Davis, and a state law petition for a writ of habeas corpus was filed in March 2024 seeking to vacate the shopping center methamphetamine conviction.
On April 12, 2024, the petition was granted. The shopping center methamphetamine conviction was vacated and the case was dismissed.
– Maurice Possley
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