Brothers say murder confessions were lies

The teens now say they lied early in the case to protect a co-defendant.

©Associated Press
August 28, 2002

PENSACOLA -- Two juvenile brothers charged with murdering their father testified Tuesday that their confessions were a lie to protect an adult co-defendant.

Alex King, 13, said Ricky Chavis, 40, told him and his 14-year-old brother, Derek, to confess because they could argue that they killed their father with an aluminum baseball bat in self-defense, and all three would get off.

"He said that we had to take the blame for him because he promised his mom right before she died that he would never get locked up again," Derek told the jury.

Chavis served time for violating probation after pleading no contest to molesting two teenage boys in the mid 1980s.

Chavis' attorney, Michael Rollo, said in his opening statement earlier Tuesday that the King brothers told the truth when they confessed a day after the Nov. 26 killing but had now come up with a "new, improved story."

The brothers testified that Chavis told them he killed their father, Terry King, 40, a single parent, inside their home in nearby Cantonment while the boys were hiding in the trunk of Chavis' car.

Chavis is on trial for first-degree murder, the same charge the King brothers are facing. The boys will go on trial next week.

Alex, dressed in a green prison jumpsuit with his hands cuffed in front of him, also testified that he had been in love with Chavis and that they were having sex for some time before the murder.

Throughout his testimony, Alex kept his head down, rarely looking at Chavis, the lawyers or the jury. Most of his answers were "Yes, sir" and "No, sir."

Derek, dressed in a similar jumpsuit but without handcuffs, was a contrast in style, looking directly at the lawyers when answering their questions, usually in a confident voice.

In their confessions, the boys told Escambia County sheriff's investigators they killed their father because they were afraid he would punish them for running away from home the week before.

Chavis initially was charged only with being an accessory after the fact and evidence tampering. He remains set for trial on those counts Nov. 4.

More than four months after the killing he also was indicted on the murder charge and committing a lewd and lascivious act on a child -- Alex -- after the boys changed their story in testimony before a grand jury. He is facing another trial Oct. 21 on the sex charge.

All three defendants are facing automatic sentences of life in prison without parole if convicted of first-degree murder.

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