Post Mortem | A Fatality in the Stairwell

Welcome to Postmortem, I'm your host Ann Marie Green, and today we are discussing the case of Kevin Davis. Now in the early morning hours of August 12, 2023, Kevin's wife, Allison, called 911 and said that she woke up to a loud noise and she found Kevin at the bottom of the stairs. One later died in the hospital and autopsy later revealed that he had a crushed in skull and a murder investigation was launched. With Allison becoming the primary suspect, she was charged with murder, arrested, and put on trial where she would fight to clear her name. Joining me now is 48 hours correspondent Peter Van Sant. Thanks for chatting with me today, Peter. Hey Ann Marie, great to be here. The usual reminder before we get into it, if you have not listened to this episode of 48 hours, head on over to your podcast feed to get the full audio. You're going to find the full episode in your podcast feed right underneath this one. Go take a listen and then come on back. All right, here we go Peter, because this one's a little different. It's a dozer. Yeah. So, of course, at the center of this entire episode, right, the big question was Kevin's death and accident, or was it murder? And we see sort of very early on, people interacting with Allison are interpreting her behavior differently. She's speaking to first responders and they have very different assessments of what they're seeing. And you guys actually played somebody came footage of that. That's right. And these two first responders that are a particular interest here, they are trained to observe anything suspicious at a crime scene as well as trying to save a life. And so they focus on how things are said. And at the Davis House, the first two responders were standing by an ambulance and one officer said, she doesn't have a normal reaction for me telling her her husband's critical, right? And the EMT said, I think she's still in shock. That shows you the range of interpretations you look at these people. But having watched all of that video, there were some very odd moments. Allison apologized for wearing pajamas. Now, the normal reaction would be quick. He's in here. Quick as fast. Follow me. But she apologizes about what she's wearing. She laughed, talked with people at the scene. That struck some is very, very odd. But a lot of the people who defend Allison's behavior say she was raised to be extremely polite. And this is how she speaks. She will always say thank you to people and what not. And watching the hour, the only time that it sort of struck me as odd was that little laugh talk that we saw. But as I listen to you kind of put it all in line for me, like list it all. What comes across to me is someone who's a people pleaser almost that you sort of mimic the reaction that you're getting from other people. And you say thank you and you apologize for being inappropriate. That's how it actually comes across to me. Well, you know, the laugh talk that she did, I've covered so many hurricanes. And you'll walk up to someone in their house has been destroyed. Is this your house? And they'll go, yeah, yeah, this is it. There's not much here. Is there the laugh talk? I think that's a stress reaction in some people that it is an involuntary emotion and that laugh talk occurs. That's what I was thinking about when I watched that. And also keep in mind, her friends said that later she was incredibly emotional. She was crying at the hospital and her dad said that Alison, she compartmentalizes because she knew she had to be calm to help Kevin. And Alison's defense said that, well, if she committed a crime and had rehearsed a story, why would she have forgotten to act sad on the police body cam video? Right. So there were some questions about the 911 call and I want to play that. 9-1-1. What's the outer fear of urgency? It might happen to some of us. There's one everywhere. I can't look all over. I don't know what people have ever done. Okay. I can't understand what you're saying. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. What's your outer fear? I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. He fell down the stairs just now. I was sleeping downstairs. Oh, I heard all of a sudden. I heard a loud noise. I'm trying to get longer, deeper breath. I went to the bottom of the stairs. There was blood everywhere. I can't put them over. I can't wake them up. I don't know if you agree, but you're not. Okay. He's not responding to you at all. He's not responding. I'm not responding. I'm not responding. Okay. Okay. I'm going to have help on the way to. They'll be there in just a few minutes. Okay. Okay. Thank you so much. You're welcome. So what was the problem with that 911 call? Because I mean, it seems normal to me. I've heard, you know, hundreds of these 911 calls from local news all through my network life. Usually, if my wife finds me at the foot of the stairs with blood, I'm not going to tell the 911 operator a story. I woke up and I heard a noise there. No, you'd say, he's my, my husband is unconscious. He said, the bottom gets someone here as fast as you can. That tends to be the normal call. So the sudden call. Detective Krueger in this thought that this was a performance. And she also thanked the operator at the end of the 911 call, which was rather unusual because it was a very friendly thank you. I mean, often when we've done these stories, Peter, one of the things that sort of stands out when people are suspicious is that they give you more details than you are asking for. Absolutely. When they're calm, it can be interpreted that the person telling this story has rehearsed this story. If they are overly dramatic, then it must be a performance. You can't win on these 911 calls and it is also important to remember people do react differently in crises. Yeah. By the way, during the course of this, there was a really surprisingly emotional moment for us. Allison's father had not heard the 911 call and I turned that on. He just, his head just went right down into his hands. The all but collapse. He started crying. I would call it even sobbing. And for him, this was his daughter. This was completely genuine. This was heartbreaking. This was real. He did hear the change to the calmness. Okay. Okay. I've got my breath now and and her telling the story. But he said, that's my daughter. That's the way she talks. Just as an aside, I was so impressed by him. I just, I thought he was sort of the almost the MVP of that whole hour. You know, often you see moms. And so it was good to see a dad defending his daughter. And I wondered how he was remaining so unemotional. And then we saw the emotion bubble over, you know. Absolutely. And he's someone you trust implicitly when you hear him speak. Yeah. And he didn't show an instant of doubt about his daughter's innocence. Okay. So after first responders arrive and police decide not to enter the upstairs bedroom. And they do that because Allison says that their pet pit bull is up there. And the pit bulls a guard dog. I still didn't understand. I understand why maybe they wouldn't want to go up there without her. But they could have gone up there. Yeah, that's an obvious mistake. Because there could be important evidence inside that room. She had warned him that you know there's a pit bull on the other side. That's obviously a deterrent. But Allison had signed permission for them to enter the room. And she did offer to move the dog and detective Kruger. Because he initially much too quickly believe that Kevin's death was an accident. He now believes that who knows the murder weapon might have been in that bedroom with the dog. And of course, he regrets not going in. Yeah, I can imagine a detective Kruger also clear the crime scene. So even if he might have suspected that there was no foul play. Why not at least wait till the autopsy. Especially since officers at the scene seem to really question Allison's behavior. And certainly the amount of blood at the scene. This was an enormous blunder. There is a reason why police have crime scene tape to seal off that crime scene. There is no hurry to give it back to a family. You have to do your CSI work there and take the time. I'm working on another case right now where it was months before the death scene was cleared by police. And detective Kruger said the new Haven Indiana police department. You know there is a small town outfit. They have limited resources and expertise. And Kruger said he just didn't see the need to tie up all of their resources and hold the house for what he thought was an accident scene. They eventually called the Indiana state police because they have many more resources right. But by the time they got through the house had already been cleared. That scene has now been contaminated and whatever they found would have been challenged in court. So then. What evidence did investigators actually have against Allison? Well, Allison told first responders, and this is important that she and Kevin had gotten into a fight that night. That was the word that she used. And that played into the investigators' belief that she hit Kevin in the back of the head with an object, because they think, well, if there was a fight, there was emotion. And she may have lashed out at him. No murder weapon was ever found, and Detective Kruger pointed to a text that Kevin had sent his friend early in the morning, about 2.34 a.m., he wrote, "Got to go to bed, the wife." Now you hear that, the audience hears that. I heard that. I didn't think it was any big deal. But investigators thought, wow, the wife, that suggests tension inside that house. I thought that was a bit of a stretch. Other texts that we didn't get to in the hour, Allison texted Kevin. I love you, and he didn't text back. And the prosecution brought this up in court that there may have been some tension, some problem inside, some anger inside that house. But Allison and Kevin lived together. He knew he was going to see her later. So you know, you get busy, and you sometimes don't answer those, I'm guilty of that. And you've got to be careful about confirmation bias when you're an investigator, and once you start interpreting everything as evidence of a crime, you can really get in trouble, which I think happened in this case. Welcome back. On October 17th, 2023, this is two months of an investigation going on, police finally declared Kevin's death, the homicide. And about two months later, a warrant is issued for Allison's arrest. She turned herself into the Allen County jail with her parents. So I want to ask you about that local bar that Allison and Kevin frequented, it's called the East Haven tavern, seems like a place with a lot of regulars. When you spoke to some of those, I'm curious about how Allison's arrest affected the patrons there. I'm also curious about, you know, what they said about the couple. Anybody that's ever been in a pub, I used to live in England. This East Haven tavern was like a pub. Everybody knows everybody, it's like the old TV show cheers, everybody knows your name. And Kevin were regulars, Kevin, big personality guy, really entertained people. He liked to argue, debate and things, but they, they really loved him. So the people there were really shocked at what happened. And the East Haven tavern is in New Haven, Indiana, it's a town of roughly 15,000 people. And it's a real microcosm. But after Allison was arrested and charged in jail, well, people were thought, well, they must have something on her, they wouldn't just arrest her unless they really have a solid case. So some of the people there started to drift toward that. Others, you know, we're saying, there's just, there's just no way. There's just no way she could do this. So this is the intrigue of this case as, as our investigation went forward. Allison pleaded not guilty, but since Indiana rarely allows bail on a murder charge, she had to remain in jail for 17 months waiting for the trial. I am curious, I mean, how did she spend her time behind bars? This was, this was really terrible. She was not allowed any in person visits, except for her attorneys, her family not only wasn't allowed to visit in person, but virtually, like on a, a FaceTime call. She wrote letters and she could make phone calls to family and friends. She was not allowed to see family members. Her attorneys say that in jail, Allison, you know, tried to make the best of her life. There she was leading workout classes and she was trying to influence people in a positive way, but that isolation. The trial is May 6, 2025. I want to play a clip in the episode from Detective Krueger, as he's heading into court that day. I'm anxious. What's at stake today is either Kevin Davis gets justice for what was done to him or we let a murderer walk free. So he's, you know, clearly convinced that Allison is guilty? Yeah, she is innocent until proven guilty. They didn't have a CSI moment, they didn't have an eyewitness, they didn't have a motive for certain, they didn't have so much in this case. And to say that if she is found not guilty, she still is, that's just wrong. That's just wrong. Keep in mind, Detective Krueger is now police chief Krueger. He is highly respected in the community and his profession and he owns the mistakes that he made in this, releasing that crime scene so early. So the trial was really a battle of experts. The jury heard from Dr. Smok, who testified for the prosecution and Dr. Dragavitch, who testified for the defense. When a jury is faced with two experts, with two totally opposing views, how do they determine who or what they believe or I wonder if at times they just cancel each other out? The prosecutors actually had three different doctors testify and both Dr. Smok and Dr. Dragavitch, they were convincing. This was a face off. It's always dramatic when this happens because a life is hanging in the balance. In this case, Alison's life, we also interviewed them and they had a lot of additional material for us about this case. Dr. Smok, the prosecution's expert said that Kevin's CT scan showed multiple fractures to multiple areas of his head and he believes that Alison wielded some sort of a weapon, a blunt object to beat Kevin that was never found, that he didn't fall down the stairs, but he was attacked. Dr. Dragavitch, who testified for the defense, said that the injuries and that fall and all of it was the result of one impact to Kevin's head that led to multiple fractures. He believes that Kevin fell and his head hit the banister, which caused Kevin's brain to ricochet inside his skull. He made a compelling case that one single impact would not necessarily cause any open external wounds or blood marks on the banister. There weren't any cuts on his head. The 48 hours people were a bit overwhelmed, trying to figure all of this out. We really laughed out loud when the juror that we interviewed after this case in our interview said that they found the expert testimony to be easy to follow and clear. Really? And they were getting it more than we were. But Dr. Dragavitch explained it in ways that people could follow and he prevailed. It's a four day trial. The jury deliberates. They deliver verdicts. Alison Davis is not guilty. We don't cover a lot of not guiltys. I mean, in your years of doing 48 hours, how many not guilty verdicts have you covered? I've had two. This is one of them. Two. That's it. There have been other cases, too, where I thought there would be a not guilty verdict, but there's only been two. And one of the jurors said the prosecution's case had holes in it. But Kruger took the loss very hard. And the democratic thing to do would be to accept the jury's verdict. And the lead prosecutor said, well, the jury has spoken and that her next best theory would be that there was another attacker in the house. But Kruger said 100% that Alison got away with murder. And it's very rare to go on the record to say something like that. And it's unfair. This puts a little scarlet letter on her as she goes back into society, back into life. A jury of her peers said she's not guilty. And as her dad said, I can't believe they did this to her. It's unbelievable, such injustice, he can't believe that they ever charged her with homicide, kept her in isolation. And then a jury takes just six hours after all of that to find her not guilty. You got to go with that verdict. And in this case, I think the jury got it right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I felt everything that dad was saying. And another thing that people don't kind of think about is the money that it takes to defend yourself. Just being accused can be ruinous to your life, you know? So then that brings me because the one person that we're all, as if you were waiting to hear from him in that hour is Alison, I know you guys reached out to her. And clearly she didn't want to be involved. Now, she's left New Haven and is living with her parents. We did reach out. She declined. We understand that. It wasn't long after she had been acquitted that we put in this request to her. She not only lost to husband, she was accused of murder, spent 17 months in jail that Alison, if you're listening out there in my mind and I believe in the public's mind now, you are an innocent person. And I wish you all the best in life. And the fact that her father participated, I assume that she gave her blessing and he represented her very, very well. Absolutely. Well, Peter, thank you for participating in this podcast. This was an unexpected ending because 48 hours doesn't always end like this. And you know, I'm really happy that Allison is rebuilding her life because there's a lot more life to live for her. All the best to you, Allison. And if you like this episode, of course, please rate and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Plus, documentaries, we're about to go kill some of them. It did look like a one-way ticket. Experience life on the front lines of infamous US Special Ops Forces missions. We are expecting 80 percent casualties. 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