Man sentenced to life in prison nearly 30 years after KCK stabbing death
Nearly 30 years after investigators found a woman dead in a Kansas City, Kansas, home, a man has been sentenced to life in prison for his role in her death.
A Wyandotte County jury found Gary Dion Davis Sr., 54, guilty of second-degree murder in January in the 1996 stabbing of Pearl Barnes.
On Friday, a judge sentenced Davis to life in prison, Jonathan Carter, a spokesperson for the Wyandotte County District Attorney’s Office, said in a news release. He will be eligible to apply for parole in 10 years.
Davis, who was a long-haul trucker at the time, fatally stabbed Barnes, also known as Sammemah Mussawir or Pearl Davis, on Nov. 22, 1996, according to an information document filed in Wyandotte County on Sept. 15, 2023.
Barnes was found dead in the living room of her childhood home in the 700 block of Lafayette Avenue in northeast Kansas City, Kansas, according to a court document filed by the state.
He was also charged in the fatal beating of Christina King on Christmas Day 1998, but the Wyandotte County jury found him not guilty, despite 2003 DNA evidence found at the crime scene allegedly connecting Davis to the crime. King was found behind an abandoned building at 27th Street and Sewell Avenue in Kansas City, Kansas.
Davis was arrested in September 2023, around 26 years after Barnes’ death. His arrest came on the heels of the creation of KCKPD’s cold case unit. At the time of his arrest, detectives suspected Davis of killing more people.
Before his arrest, Davis lived near I-635 in Kansas City, Kansas’ Turner neighborhood, according to court records. He worked in logistics in Lee’s Summit at the time.
The Star’s Luke Nozicka and Bill Lukitsch contributed reporting.
