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Final Justice: The True Story of the Richest Man Ever Tried for Murder
On August 2, 1976, gunshots ripped through an exclusive Fort Worth mansion. Two people were killed - including a twelve year old girl. Two others were gravely wounded. Survivors and witnesses told the police the same story: Cullen Davis had invaded the mansion, bent on murdering everyone inside. But from the moment Davis' name was mentioned, an open-and-shut case became legal quagmire. For Davis was heir to a legendary Texas dynasty of oil and money, and worth over a hundred million dollars. Now this shocking and compelling book exposes the behind-the-scenes true story of how this multimillionaire used his power and wealth to protect himself from charges of murder.
Filled with pulsating courtroom drama, it reveals how Davis' lawyers turned the trial upside down with Davis' ex-wife and her circle of lovers and playmates forced to defend themselves against intimate questioning about their lurid sexcapades. An eye-opening testament to Davis' callous credo that money can buy anything, Final Justice will change the way you think about the American justice system forever.
Filled with pulsating courtroom drama, it reveals how Davis' lawyers turned the trial upside down with Davis' ex-wife and her circle of lovers and playmates forced to defend themselves against intimate questioning about their lurid sexcapades. An eye-opening testament to Davis' callous credo that money can buy anything, Final Justice will change the way you think about the American justice system forever.
528 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1993
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
January 11, 2020
When I first picked up this book I wasn't sure I'd like it. I don't usually enjoy reading about rich people putting one over on the justice system. In fact, it makes me want to retch. But, amazingly enough, I did enjoy this book.
It's about Cullen Davis, a multimillionaire, who according to witnesses, killed two people - one of them a 12 year old girl. As you can imagine, as soon as he was implicated, the 'fun' begins. The author deftly takes you through Cullen's life, his marriage, and all that led up to his 'alleged' murder spree.
3 Stars = I liked the book. I'm glad I read it.
Victims
It's about Cullen Davis, a multimillionaire, who according to witnesses, killed two people - one of them a 12 year old girl. As you can imagine, as soon as he was implicated, the 'fun' begins. The author deftly takes you through Cullen's life, his marriage, and all that led up to his 'alleged' murder spree.
3 Stars = I liked the book. I'm glad I read it.
Victims
August 20, 2019
Vivid and very well written
This is a fascinating and disturbing tale that illustrates just how hard it is to convict somebody who has a lot of money and power. Cullen Davis, warped little rich boy dominated by his incredibly wealthy and megalomanic father, grows up to inherit most of the fortune and position. What does he do with it? He chases sex kitten type women, showers them with lavish gifts, and abuses them.
Naifeh and Smith raise the true crime genre to something close to literature here. We have the usual litany of sickies and psychopaths, the usual police incompetence, prosecutors who can't prosecute, etc. The "final justice" in the title is somewhat ironic since multimillionaire Cullen Davis is never found guilty of any of his crimes, the worst of which was the cold-blooded murder of his wife's 12-year-old daughter; the least of which, perhaps the killing of her kitten. The juries in Texas just would not convict him (although they have put a number of poor people on death row). Instead they admired him for his money, stupidly since he just inherited it. And before the book is over, he blows most of it.
We get a terrible sense here that people with riches in positions of power really can get away with murder. People look up to them regardless of their crimes. It helps us to understand how murderers like Sadaam Hussein and what's his name in Yugoslavia continue in power. It's not just that people are afraid of them, they look up to them and find ways to excuse their crimes. This is the human tribal mind at work: better our corrupt and evil leader than theirs, and better a corrupt and evil leader than no leader at all. The women in this one come off as particularly subject to manipulation by power and money, although that was not necessarily the authors' intent. They wanted to show just what a sick, sick man Cullen Davis is, and they succeed in that. But incidentally they revealed the women around him, especially his gold-digging wives, as sad, sad creatures who would be abused and wallow in it for the sake of being close to all that money and power and maybe getting a little of it. One has the sense that they couldn't help themselves.
This is a good read that will rouse your sense of indignation.
--Dennis Littrell, author of the mystery novel, “Teddy and Teri”
This is a fascinating and disturbing tale that illustrates just how hard it is to convict somebody who has a lot of money and power. Cullen Davis, warped little rich boy dominated by his incredibly wealthy and megalomanic father, grows up to inherit most of the fortune and position. What does he do with it? He chases sex kitten type women, showers them with lavish gifts, and abuses them.
Naifeh and Smith raise the true crime genre to something close to literature here. We have the usual litany of sickies and psychopaths, the usual police incompetence, prosecutors who can't prosecute, etc. The "final justice" in the title is somewhat ironic since multimillionaire Cullen Davis is never found guilty of any of his crimes, the worst of which was the cold-blooded murder of his wife's 12-year-old daughter; the least of which, perhaps the killing of her kitten. The juries in Texas just would not convict him (although they have put a number of poor people on death row). Instead they admired him for his money, stupidly since he just inherited it. And before the book is over, he blows most of it.
We get a terrible sense here that people with riches in positions of power really can get away with murder. People look up to them regardless of their crimes. It helps us to understand how murderers like Sadaam Hussein and what's his name in Yugoslavia continue in power. It's not just that people are afraid of them, they look up to them and find ways to excuse their crimes. This is the human tribal mind at work: better our corrupt and evil leader than theirs, and better a corrupt and evil leader than no leader at all. The women in this one come off as particularly subject to manipulation by power and money, although that was not necessarily the authors' intent. They wanted to show just what a sick, sick man Cullen Davis is, and they succeed in that. But incidentally they revealed the women around him, especially his gold-digging wives, as sad, sad creatures who would be abused and wallow in it for the sake of being close to all that money and power and maybe getting a little of it. One has the sense that they couldn't help themselves.
This is a good read that will rouse your sense of indignation.
--Dennis Littrell, author of the mystery novel, “Teddy and Teri”
June 20, 2020
This true crime story will attempt to answer the question: Can money buy everything? The accused is Cullen Davis, probably the richest man in Texas at the time the murders happen. He has the money to buy the best lawyers in Texas. Money also buys wives and friendship. I love the way this book was written. As I got to the trial I was thinking I would probably start skimming, but I would say this is one of the few true crime books I have read where even the trial was interesting. It was not repetitive and the author's personal opinions made it even more interesting. As I got to the end of the trial I was wondering what could possibly happen when there were over 100 pages left. I'm not going to give it away but suffice to say there is even more happening after the trial.
As the book was printed in 1993, I decided to do some searching to see if I could find out what happened to the principal players after the book.
Cullen Davis is still alive. He is 86 years old.
Priscilla Davis died in 2001 at the age of 59 from breast cancer.
Priscilla's son Jack died in 2009 from a drug overdose.
Cullen's third wife, Karen Masters, the one he married when the ink wasnt even dry on his divorce decree from Pricilla, died at the age of 67. Cause unknown.
Richard 'Racehorse' Haynes, the defense lawyer for Cullen: 25 years after the trial has been implicated in the alleged bribery of a district attorney's investigator to secretly provide information to the defense during Davis' 1977 capital murder trial.
https://www.chron.com/news/article/Te...
There is a movie based on this case called Texas Justice. Looking at the cast list it doesnt look like W.T. Rufner is mentioned in the movie. What a shame. When reading about his court room appearance I couldnt help but think Sam Elliot would have been perfect for the role.
As the book was printed in 1993, I decided to do some searching to see if I could find out what happened to the principal players after the book.
Cullen Davis is still alive. He is 86 years old.
Priscilla Davis died in 2001 at the age of 59 from breast cancer.
Priscilla's son Jack died in 2009 from a drug overdose.
Cullen's third wife, Karen Masters, the one he married when the ink wasnt even dry on his divorce decree from Pricilla, died at the age of 67. Cause unknown.
Richard 'Racehorse' Haynes, the defense lawyer for Cullen: 25 years after the trial has been implicated in the alleged bribery of a district attorney's investigator to secretly provide information to the defense during Davis' 1977 capital murder trial.
https://www.chron.com/news/article/Te...
There is a movie based on this case called Texas Justice. Looking at the cast list it doesnt look like W.T. Rufner is mentioned in the movie. What a shame. When reading about his court room appearance I couldnt help but think Sam Elliot would have been perfect for the role.
August 26, 2008
The subtitle of this story is "The True Story of the Richest Man Ever Tried for Murder," and what a sad, debauched tale it is.
I don't know why the authors stopped writing Pulitzer-winning art books and started writing gossipy true-crime books . . . but I am grateful for it.
I don't know why the authors stopped writing Pulitzer-winning art books and started writing gossipy true-crime books . . . but I am grateful for it.
December 10, 2018
Near the end of "Final Justice: The True Story of the Richest Man Ever Tried for Murder," Charlie Rose interviews multimillionaire Cullen Davis for Rose’s TV show. A Texas jury had just acquitted Davis of killing his wife’s lover and a 12-year-old girl:
“Has your life gotten back to normal,” asked Rose in a husky, intimate whisper. “I mean, can you live a normal life ever again?”
“Normal would be walking down the street without being recognized by anybody,” Cullen replied. “That’ll never happen.”
Davis was right about that. One day in the 1990s, some 15 years after the 1976 murders, my wife and I were crossing a skyway in downtown Ft. Worth. I caught the eye of a man headed in the opposite direction: a slight, dapper-looking fellow with a “cat that ate the canary” glint in his eye. He looked first at my wife and then at me. There was a trace of a smile on his thin lips.
It was, I knew instantly, Cullen Davis.
Rose gingerly turned the questioning to the murders. “Are you afraid, living in the mansion?” he asked.
At about the same time as our Davis sighting in the skyway, we lived near the infamous “murder mansion” on Mockingbird Lane in Ft. Worth. By then, the Davis trials were fading into history and the mansion itself was a long-abandoned wreck. Ghoulish curiosity seekers (including us and our friends) would spend a Saturday or Sunday squeezing through a vandalized plywood barrier to explore the once-lavish, $35 million palace, now dark, musty, and ravaged by souvenir hunters. (I confess that I took a piece of floor-tile from the kitchen – site of one of the murders.)
I mention all this because it’s not often that I read a true-crime book in which the (alleged) killer is someone I’ve seen up-close-and-personal, and whose former home I’ve helped ransack.
But pilfering floor tiles is nothing compared to the hijacking of the judicial system pulled off by Davis and his colorful, apparently conscienceless lawyer, Richard “Racehorse” Haynes, in three trials conducted in the late 1970s.
You think the O.J. Simpson trial was a miscarriage of justice? Check out the Davis trials, in which multiple witnesses — including victims shot point-blank by “a man in black” — identified Davis as the perpetrator, and yet Texas juries could not bring themselves to convict.
Apparently, jurors were awestruck by the strange little man’s wealth and charisma.
I certainly wasn’t awestruck when I locked eyes with Davis in that skyway, nor when I trespassed in the cavernous halls and living rooms of his haunted house. I was creeped out. – grouchyeditor.com
“Has your life gotten back to normal,” asked Rose in a husky, intimate whisper. “I mean, can you live a normal life ever again?”
“Normal would be walking down the street without being recognized by anybody,” Cullen replied. “That’ll never happen.”
Davis was right about that. One day in the 1990s, some 15 years after the 1976 murders, my wife and I were crossing a skyway in downtown Ft. Worth. I caught the eye of a man headed in the opposite direction: a slight, dapper-looking fellow with a “cat that ate the canary” glint in his eye. He looked first at my wife and then at me. There was a trace of a smile on his thin lips.
It was, I knew instantly, Cullen Davis.
Rose gingerly turned the questioning to the murders. “Are you afraid, living in the mansion?” he asked.
At about the same time as our Davis sighting in the skyway, we lived near the infamous “murder mansion” on Mockingbird Lane in Ft. Worth. By then, the Davis trials were fading into history and the mansion itself was a long-abandoned wreck. Ghoulish curiosity seekers (including us and our friends) would spend a Saturday or Sunday squeezing through a vandalized plywood barrier to explore the once-lavish, $35 million palace, now dark, musty, and ravaged by souvenir hunters. (I confess that I took a piece of floor-tile from the kitchen – site of one of the murders.)
I mention all this because it’s not often that I read a true-crime book in which the (alleged) killer is someone I’ve seen up-close-and-personal, and whose former home I’ve helped ransack.
But pilfering floor tiles is nothing compared to the hijacking of the judicial system pulled off by Davis and his colorful, apparently conscienceless lawyer, Richard “Racehorse” Haynes, in three trials conducted in the late 1970s.
You think the O.J. Simpson trial was a miscarriage of justice? Check out the Davis trials, in which multiple witnesses — including victims shot point-blank by “a man in black” — identified Davis as the perpetrator, and yet Texas juries could not bring themselves to convict.
Apparently, jurors were awestruck by the strange little man’s wealth and charisma.
I certainly wasn’t awestruck when I locked eyes with Davis in that skyway, nor when I trespassed in the cavernous halls and living rooms of his haunted house. I was creeped out. – grouchyeditor.com
January 14, 2021
This book was very well written and researched and, as I am a big fan of true crime, the fact that I gave this book 5 stars is no surprise. What was surprising, however, were the emotions that this book stirred up inside me. SPOILER ALERT: DO NOT READ ANY FURTHER UNLESS YOU HATE SURPRISES AND/OR YOU HAVE ALREADY READ THIS BOOK OR ANOTHER ONE ABOUT THE SAME CASE(S)!!!
I believe that a person is generally innocent until proven guilty. However as a human being, I am vulnerable to the same biases as anyone else. That being said, I am absolutely convinced of this man's guilt. While I am disappointed with my fellow man (and woman) and the way they casually chose to side with a man of means over hard facts and evidence, I am even more distressed and displeased with the amount of leniency and ridiculousness that the defense team was able to get away with. Maybe it's because I've watched too much Law & Order, or maybe it's because I'm a huge fan of both Judge Judy and The People's Court - but I cannot fathom how any court in America would put up with the blatant perjury, not only of the defense witnesses, but of the defense attorney! The only reason Mr. Davis did not receive a guilty verdict was because his lawyers were dishonest, scummy, deplorable representations of what a legal professional is supposed to be, and the lead attorney, Richard "Racehorse" Haynes was the biggest pig of them all. The man should have been disbarred due to his chicanery and mockery of the legal system. I don't know if that's just how it was back in the 1970s, or if it was because Texas has a different style of law, but that sort of injustice is unspeakable!
I believe that a person is generally innocent until proven guilty. However as a human being, I am vulnerable to the same biases as anyone else. That being said, I am absolutely convinced of this man's guilt. While I am disappointed with my fellow man (and woman) and the way they casually chose to side with a man of means over hard facts and evidence, I am even more distressed and displeased with the amount of leniency and ridiculousness that the defense team was able to get away with. Maybe it's because I've watched too much Law & Order, or maybe it's because I'm a huge fan of both Judge Judy and The People's Court - but I cannot fathom how any court in America would put up with the blatant perjury, not only of the defense witnesses, but of the defense attorney! The only reason Mr. Davis did not receive a guilty verdict was because his lawyers were dishonest, scummy, deplorable representations of what a legal professional is supposed to be, and the lead attorney, Richard "Racehorse" Haynes was the biggest pig of them all. The man should have been disbarred due to his chicanery and mockery of the legal system. I don't know if that's just how it was back in the 1970s, or if it was because Texas has a different style of law, but that sort of injustice is unspeakable!
November 7, 2020
This book, a true account of a brutal murder and the trials that ensued, could shake your faith in the justice system--or at least the Texas justice system in the late '70's and early '80's. The authors have compiled a fact-filled yet highly readable account of Cullen Davis from his early, personality-shaping days to his life as an oil millionaire accused of murder.
The experienced authors do not hide their well-merited antipathy toward Cullen and his well paid defense lawyers as well as the many citizens blinded to his guilt by his status and wealth. The various trials, thanks to an obsessed defense lawyer who stopped at nothing to win a trial victory for his client, unearthed the seedy side of those who were involved with the accused. Largely overlooked in the trials was the murder of his estranged wife's 12 year old daughter. The violent temper of the defendant and his countless incidents of serious physical abuse of women and children were obscured by the outrageous courtroom antics of the defense team,
It is for the reader to discover the results of the complex web of trials and the surprising end of the story. It is a dive into the underworld of those who will do anything for money, a wide cast of unsavory characters. The legal difficulties of the various prosecution teams and the judges in the various trials reveal the power of an unscrupulous legal team. The many layers of action produced a story that never drags but rather entertains on one level while raising serious questions about the justice system depicted,
The experienced authors do not hide their well-merited antipathy toward Cullen and his well paid defense lawyers as well as the many citizens blinded to his guilt by his status and wealth. The various trials, thanks to an obsessed defense lawyer who stopped at nothing to win a trial victory for his client, unearthed the seedy side of those who were involved with the accused. Largely overlooked in the trials was the murder of his estranged wife's 12 year old daughter. The violent temper of the defendant and his countless incidents of serious physical abuse of women and children were obscured by the outrageous courtroom antics of the defense team,
It is for the reader to discover the results of the complex web of trials and the surprising end of the story. It is a dive into the underworld of those who will do anything for money, a wide cast of unsavory characters. The legal difficulties of the various prosecution teams and the judges in the various trials reveal the power of an unscrupulous legal team. The many layers of action produced a story that never drags but rather entertains on one level while raising serious questions about the justice system depicted,
July 2, 2023
A well-written legal thriller about what I described to my wife as “The O.J Trial before O.J”. This was released just a year before the OJ murders, so he might have read it as a playbook for how to get away with murder LOL.
This book is just a little too long for my taste to give it 5 stars. It is insane what people in Texas will believe, I feel like this book is just as much about Racehorse Haynes and his ability to sway a jury to any decision he wanted as much as it was about Cullen Davis. Really not a lot different today when it comes to social media making bold, innocuous claims to sway citizens. 82% of Ft. Worthans believed Cullen Davis was innocent when the trials were going on, even though there was a giant amount of evidence to convict him, if that goes to tell you something. I believed the juries just wanted to party with him after the trial was over and were entranced by his money and power.
I researched and Davis’s mansion has been torn down in Ft. Worth as of 2021. Probably for the best.
This book is just a little too long for my taste to give it 5 stars. It is insane what people in Texas will believe, I feel like this book is just as much about Racehorse Haynes and his ability to sway a jury to any decision he wanted as much as it was about Cullen Davis. Really not a lot different today when it comes to social media making bold, innocuous claims to sway citizens. 82% of Ft. Worthans believed Cullen Davis was innocent when the trials were going on, even though there was a giant amount of evidence to convict him, if that goes to tell you something. I believed the juries just wanted to party with him after the trial was over and were entranced by his money and power.
I researched and Davis’s mansion has been torn down in Ft. Worth as of 2021. Probably for the best.
July 30, 2010
I think that Cullen Davis was paying some of the jury members to get away with murder. How can someone not convict this guy of murder? who cares about what Priscilla did. A little girl was murdered.
July 12, 2021
Sad but entertaining.
August 13, 2008
Good God Texas if full of the most bizarre goings-on. This was was about people who were well characterized (e.g. women = big hair and gold shoes, men = boots and cowboy hats)
These folks had tons of money and spent it liberally on coke and booze and travel and furs and jewelry and big gigantic American cars. Then the creepy rich guy who beat the CRAP out of all the women in his life shot his ex and murdered her daughter and then all hell broke loose.
A wild ride. Made me glad to be relatively poor and well educated!
Oh and here is the best part: the guy went broke, then became an evangelical Christian, and is now a missionary. The wife, who had huge boobs and yet he wanted her to have even bigger ones so she underwent surgery to please him, died of breast cancer. Weird weird weird.
These folks had tons of money and spent it liberally on coke and booze and travel and furs and jewelry and big gigantic American cars. Then the creepy rich guy who beat the CRAP out of all the women in his life shot his ex and murdered her daughter and then all hell broke loose.
A wild ride. Made me glad to be relatively poor and well educated!
Oh and here is the best part: the guy went broke, then became an evangelical Christian, and is now a missionary. The wife, who had huge boobs and yet he wanted her to have even bigger ones so she underwent surgery to please him, died of breast cancer. Weird weird weird.
August 14, 2014
I must say, in the genre of true crime, this is one of the better books that I have read. I must admit, however, that I can't really explain why. I think it was the story - the fact that Cullen Davis literally thinks that he can get away with anything... and then he does!
October 7, 2010
Very vivid writing. The events that take place in this book are unimaginable.
May 29, 2015
I did not think it was particularly well written, however it is fascinating.It tells the tale of a murder trial in Texas. On reading this one can believe that Texas is another world.
September 26, 2016
Unbelievable outcome! Money talks!
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews