I have watched many criminal trials in my life but I have to say the Christian/Newsom murder trial of Letalvis Cobbins is on my top ten lists of most horrific of 'adults killing adults' that I’ve watched. What the jurors and public heard was so tragically horrific that I do not believe I could write in a blog piece of what all took place the night Channon and Chris died. Therefore, I won’t say anything about the horror and terror Channon and Chris endured before Cobbins and his alleged co-killers took their lives.
This young person, Letalvis Cobbins, helped destroy so many lives with his vile, hideous actions. Not only did he help destroy Channon and Chris’s life but that of their parents and siblings and his family too. When his older sister was testifying for his behalf during the sentencing portion of the trial, my heart broke for her. She and her siblings lived a hard life of parental drug abuse, violence and pushed from this family member to the next. That the sisters love their brother is evident, and that they begged for this jury to save him is natural. Yet the cold fact is, Cobbins participated in kidnap, rape, and murder of two wonderful young people. Letalvis’s sisters bettered their life, and he could have also.
Letalvis did not have to follow his alleged co-conspirators in a night of rape and murder; he could have saved Channon. Letalvis, in a cowardly act, decided his personal safety (if what he said about Lemaricus saying he’d shoot him was true) meant more than her life. In fact, Letalvis did not have to follow his alleged conspirators from the car jacking scene to the house; he could’ve driven to the police station and told them what had happened and saved both Channon and Chris from the hideous nightmare they endured.
Cobbins deserved to go to prison for life, in fact he deserved the death penalty.
However, as much as I despise Letalvis Cobbins as a human being and his self-serving vile actions, I am, with mixed emotional hesitance, a little pleased the jury saved his life and decided life-without-parole; he will learn some hard lessons in prison. I say that I’m a little, very little pleased not for his sake, but for his siblings and other family members. They literally destroyed two lives on January 6, 2007, and two families are continually living with the heartache of their loss. The actions of Cobbins and his alleged co-conspirators impacted three families. One family can visit their family member in jail, hear his voice, his laughter and look into his eyes. Channon and Chris’s family will never hear their loved ones again, never hear their laughter or look into their eyes.
Channon’s family is living with guilt they shouldn’t have because they feel they let their daughter down and did not save her. My heart breaks for them; I want to take away that guilt; no way they could’ve known what she would endure when she last left them; no way could they have saved her. I pray the ‘if only’ doesn’t haunt them the rest of their life. I personally know that ‘if only’ vice; I’ve been there, lived it, and it’s emotionally draining and painful. Chris’s mom feels she let her son down because the jury did not give Cobbins a death sentence; she should not feel that emotion; law enforcement did get Cobbins, the justice system worked; they brought him before a jury to answer for his crimes, and due to the guilty verdict will never walk in freedom again. Mrs. Newsom found the strength to endure all the days and nights and meetings with police and prosecutors to fight for her son’s rights; when the battle became emotionally weary and physically draining, as I imagine it was, she looked deep inside and found the strength to keep fighting. She and Mr. Newsom along with the Christian family have battles to fight ahead of them with the three other trials on the docket; I have no doubt they all will find the emotional strength to stand in for their children and continue their battles for justice.
About the older brother, Lemaricus Davidson and his alleged actions the night of Channon and Chris’s death, I can’t say I want him to live; his trial is coming up next so I don’t know what I will feel except what I am now feeling - emotions that resemble hatred just from what I have heard in Letalvis’ trial. I feel total disgust for Letalvis, disgust for what he did and for what he didn’t do; disgust for his choice to take the road of criminal and not the road of a law abiding productive human being, but at this point my feelings for his older brother are on hold.
The trial of Letalvis Cobbins: http://www.wbir.com
Okay so Cobbins gets a new trial. All the horrific acts will be reheard by a new jury. This time around I hope jurors come back with death penalty! The tiny bit of gladness I felt with his LWOP sentencing disappeared a few days after his sentencing. And it has never come back. Channon and Chris need full and final justice. Let Letalvis Cobbins, Lemaricus Davidson, Vanessa Coleman and George Thomas all be sent to prison with a verdict of DP and wait to die.
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