Shania Gray, 16, Murdered Before She Could Testify Against Her Alleged Rapist

Her name was Shania Gray.

Gray, a 16-year-old high school junior, never expected her life would come to a tragic end, but it did, all because she had the courage to speak out.

According to Mesquite, Tx. police, the teen met her demise at the hands of Franklin B. Davis, the 30-year-old man she had accused of raping her. He was scheduled to go to trail on four counts of sexual assault of a child next month, but took matters into his own hands, shooting Gray twice before stepping on her neck until she stopped breathing.

Davis met Gray when she was babysitting his two children. And after she declined several times to watch his children again, Gray confessed to her grandmother that Davis had raped her.

Davis claims he never assaulted the teen, and only wanted to talk to Shania last Thursday when he used social media to lure her away from school and kill her.

The Associated Press reports:

The man insisted in a jailhouse interview Monday that he only wanted to talk to the teen and prove his innocence but said he was overcome by “demons” once they were face-to-face.

Franklin B. Davis, 30, of the Dallas suburb of Irving, was charged with capital murder Sunday in the death of Shania Gray. Gray was last seen alive Thursday afternoon at Hebron High School in nearby Carrollton. Her body was found Saturday in a secluded area near the Trinity River.

Carrollton police say Davis confessed to arranging a meeting with Gray under false pretenses, driving her to a trail near the river and shooting her twice with a .38-caliber pistol. According to an arrest affidavit, Gray fell into the river and called Davis by his nickname: “Why, Wish?” 

Davis told police he then stepped on her neck until she stopped breathing, the affidavit said.

Carrollton police spokesman Jon Stovall said in an email that police believe Davis killed Gray because she was about to testify against him.

Gray confessed to shooting Shania, telling police, he was “fighting demons,” and felt like “a different person was in me.” He has been charged with capital murder and is being held on $2 million bail.

Shania Gray’ tragic murder is heartbreaking for her friends and family who remember Gray as a girl who loved to give hugs and talk about her future.

Shelby Holland, Gray’s junior varsity basketball coach at Horn High School, told a local Dallas news outlet, “We want to spend our time talking about the hugs she was constantly giving out, the wonderful life she held for us while she was here. To see the kind of kid she was and that untapped potential for the kind of woman she would become – it’s just sad to sit here and think, `We’ll never know what kind of great young woman she’d become.’”