Man killed in fake robbery staged by ex-girlfriend, WI cops say. She’s sentenced

A Wisconsin woman accused of orchestrating a fake robbery to kill her ex-boyfriend is heading to prison, officials say.

Ashanti Davis, a 26-year-old Milwaukee resident, was sentenced Wednesday, June 25, to seven and a half years in prison in connection to her ex’s killing, court records show.

McClatchy News reached out to an attorney for Davis on June 26 but didn’t immediately hear back.

Prosecutors say her ex-boyfriend, Bernell Hall, was shot in the head three times during a staged robbery on Nov. 1, 2024, WITI reported.

“He was ambushed, betrayed and murdered by someone he trusted,” Hall’s mother, Latrice Hall, told the station. “I just want justice.”

Two masked men approached Davis and Hall as they got out of a car on Milwaukee’s northwest side at about 1:20 a.m., prosecutors said, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.

Davis told investigators that the men forced her and Hall to get on the ground and demanded they hand over everything in their pockets — and then she heard a gunshot and the men ran away, the outlet reported, citing court documents.

However, months after the killing, prosecutors say Davis made phone calls to her new boyfriend — who is a prison inmate — and talked about the plan she executed, saying she “got a cat to kill the rat,” and “baby daddy, boom, pop, boom,” the outlet reported. Those calls were recorded and ended up in the hands of investigators, according to officials.

Davis’ attorney, Quron Payne, said Davis was long abused by Hall, and is “a woman who’s been crying out for years,” Payne told WITI. Regarding Hall’s death, Payne said her client “maybe or may not have … got what she wanted.”

Davis’ sentencing comes after she pleaded no contest in April to a charge of solicitation of first-degree intentional homicide, records show.

Police are working to find others involved in the plot, but even as Davis heads to prison, it’s still unclear who actually killed Hall, investigators told WITI.