Local Crime

48 Hours revisits one of Fort Worth's most notorious murders

Peter Strauss and Heather Locklear as Cullen Davis and Priscilla Davis in the TV movie Texas Justice.

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UPDATE: The "Murder in the Mansion" episode of 48 Hours will air again locally at 8 pm Saturday, January 20 on CBS.

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Those who love unsolved crimes, especially with a local angle, will want to rope off an hour on Saturday, May 13, at 10 pm when CBS' 48 Hours examines one of the most notorious cases in Texas history.

In "Murder in the Mansion," 48 Hours will investigate the 1976 ambush of former college basketball star Stan Farr and his date, Priscilla Davis, who was going through a divorce from her Fort Worth oil millionaire husband Cullen Davis.

Also killed was Andrea Wilborn, Priscilla’s 12-year-old daughter from a previous marriage, who was believed to have been shot before the adults returned home.

After the shootings, Priscilla was one of two eyewitnesses who identified Cullen Davis as the shooter. At the time, he was the richest man in America to be tried for murder. Farr's son won a $1.8 million judgment in the case. But in the 48 Hours episode, Davis, now 83 and a born-again Christian, denies he was involved.

The case has been covered many times over the years, in books, a TV miniseries, and an A&E special. It was also the subject of a 1995 TV movie called Texas Justice, starring Heather Locklear. But "Murder in the Mansion" features former CultureMap staffer Claire St. Amant as a development producer, and is therefore must-see TV.

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Death Penalty

Tarrant County man gets death for murder of convenience store owner

Tarrant County Sheriff's Office

Christopher Turner

A man received the death penalty for his 2020 cold-blooded execution of a convenience store owner.

According to a release from the office of Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney Phil Sorrells, a Tarrant County jury sentenced Christopher Karon Turner, 48, to death on November 20 for executing convenience store owner Anwar Ali during a robbery. Tarrant County Assistant District Attorneys Charles Boulware and Allenna Bangs represented the state.

On March 27, 2020, at around 6:15 am, Turner, a convicted felon, wore a surgical mask and a glove and entered the Super Big Country Mart in an unincorporated area of Tarrant County south of Fort Worth. There, he held a gun to the back of Anwar Ali, the 62-year-old store owner, and walked him through the store.

Ali did everything Turner demanded, including opening the cash register to give him money. And yet Turner forced Ali into the bathroom and onto his knees, and shot him in the neck. Ali was discovered, dead in the bathroom, about an hour later.

Turner fled the store in Ali's Toyota minivan with the money from the register and Ali's wallet. In the van, he found more than $50,000 cash in a black bag. Over the next few days, Turner went on a shopping spree, buying cars, jewelry, drugs, clothes, and more. He and others used cash and a credit card that belonged to Ali.

Turner fled to Colorado where U.S. Marshals arrested him. On his body they found a firearm which was determined to be the murder weapon.

"This was a premeditated, cold-blooded murder," Boulware told the jury. "From the moment he was charged with this crime, he has tried to escape responsibility."

Bangs noted that before this trial began, Turner obtained the names of jurors and their telephone numbers, and gave them to an inmate charged with murder. At the trial on November 20, as Bangs addressed the jury, Turner tried to hold up a sign to the jury but was handcuffed by Sheriff's deputies who removed him from the courtroom, while he yelled out "she lied."

Ali came to the United States from Pakistan decades ago to pursue the American dream. Ali's son, Hussein, spoke in the courtroom after the death penalty was announced. "Thank you for giving us justice," Ali said. "I hope there are no more devils like this person."