Desmond Jennings was a serial killer who was executed by the State of Texas for five murders
According to court documents Desmond Jennings was part of a small gang who would pull off a string of armed robberies that left at least five people dead. Authorities believe that Desmond Jennings may be responsible for twenty murders. The murders he was convicted on are the following:
- Larry Wilson
- Dino Beasley
- Charlotte Dickerson
- Sylvester Walton
- Wonda Matthews
Desmond Jennings would be sentenced to death
Desmond Jennings would be executed by lethal injection on November 17 1999
Desmond Jennings Photos
Desmond Jennings Case
On December 27, 1993, Eric Gardner was standing outside the Ambassador Apartments in the “Stop Six” area of Fort Worth, Texas. Gardner saw Desmond Jennings and John Freeman driving along in Freeman’s white Honda Accord sometime after midnight, and, wanting a ride home, Gardner flagged them down. Freeman and Jennings agreed to drive him home; however, after driving some distance, Freeman said he wanted to get some heroin before taking Gardner home. Freeman mentioned a drug house on Langston Street, and Jennings suggested, “Let’s jack the house.” Freeman was amenable, but Gardner objected, to which Jennings responded, “Well, ain’t nothing but two dope fiends in the house.”
Freeman drove up to the Langston Street house and then traveled further along the street before stopping. Desmond Jennings and Freeman exited the car and approached the house. Jennings pulled his hood over his head and had both his hands inside his jacket pockets. Freeman’s hands were free of objects. Gardner remained in the car, turned on the car’s radio, and watched through the rear window. Jennings and Freeman went inside the house. At one point, when Gardner turned the radio volume down, he heard two shots and then saw Jennings and Freeman walk calmly out of the house. The men had been inside the house for two or three minutes.
Once back inside the car, Desmond Jennings and Freeman sat quietly as they drove away. Jennings eventually pulled out a pouch which he had obtained in the drug house, checked the contents — thirteen cents and empty capsules — and then threw it out the window, saying, “There ain’t nothin’up in here.” Instead of taking Gardner home, they drove him back to the Americana Apartments, situated in close proximity to the Ambassador Apartments where they had picked him up previously.
At the Americana Apartments, Derrick Price and his friend, Victor Walker, joined the group. When Desmond Jennings climbed out of the car in front of Price’s apartment, he called Gardner a derogatory term which translated to a “coward.” Next, Jennings excitedly told Gardner, “I dropped that [person] in the front room.”
He continued by explaining that as they approached the house, a man inside stood up and asked what he wanted. Jennings responded by shooting the man in the face. Jennings related that he advanced into the house and, on seeing a woman raising herself on the bed, he shot her in the head too. Next, he returned to the male victim, shot him again, rifled through his pockets, and stole his pouch. As Jennings and Freeman were leaving the house, Jennings heard the woman moaning so he returned and shot her a second time.
After recounting the killings, Desmond Jennings observed, “I messed my Chucks up. I got blood all over my Chucks and my khakis.” Gardner noticed blood on Jennings’ “Chuck Taylor” All-Star tennis shoes. Jennings did not appear scared, and he showed no remorse. Jennings spent that night with Robert Anderson, who lived at the nearby Ambassador Apartments. When Anderson observed that Jennings had blood on his tennis shoes, Jennings said he had messed them up killing people for nothing. Gardner did not tell the police about the killings because he thought either Jennings or Freeman would have shot him. Price testified that, in that area of town, if a person is labeled a “snitch,” his life is in danger.
Willie Charles Washington, his wife Tosha, Floyd Roberts, and Dietrich Irvin drove to the Langston Street house to obtain heroin on December 27, 1993. Washington and Irvin approached the house and noticed the screen door was closed but the main door was ajar. Washington saw a man lying on the floor gurgling and coughing. The men left the house, drove to a nearby fire department building, and alerted the staff.
Firefighters and medical personnel reported to the scene, followed shortly by Fort Worth police. There they discovered the body of a black male lying on the floor just inside the door of the residence and the body of a black female lying on a bed. The house appeared unkept inside and contained a great deal of drug paraphernalia. Police recovered a spent bullet from inside a pillow on the female victim’s bed and several fired bullet casings from on and around the bed. The male victim’s pants pockets had been turned inside out.
The autopsy of the male victim, Sylvester Walton, revealed that he had sustained a gunshot wound to the head. The bullet entered through his left nostril, traveled through his brain, and lodged in his left occipital scalp. The bullet was recovered from Walton’s body and turned over to police. Tremendous brain swelling due to the wound track caused Walton’s death.
The autopsy of the female victim, Wonda Matthews, indicated that she had been shot three times. One bullet, fired from less than six feet away, entered on the right side of her nose and exited through her jaw in front of her left ear. Although the bullet passed underneath the base of her skull, it did not cause her death. A second bullet entered the left side of her head and traveled down and to the right before lodging in her left nostril. This bullet caused massive brain damage and was the cause of death. A third bullet entered near her left eye, traveled down and to the rear causing damage underneath her brain, and lodged in her left neck muscle. Two bullets were recovered from Matthews’s body and turned over to police.
On January 3, 1994, Fort Worth police officers stopped a white Honda Accord traveling with only one functioning headlight. Earlier the same day, a robbery victim had reported the same vehicle to the officers. Freeman was driving the vehicle, and there were four passengers. Freeman was wearing a Dallas Cowboys Starter jacket that was similar to one stolen during the robbery five hours earlier. The officers arrested Freeman and one of the passengers for possession of a controlled substance. When the car was inventoried, a loaded nickel-plated .32-caliber handgun was discovered in the trunk of the car. Ballistics comparisons subsequently conducted on the handgun revealed that the bullet recovered from the crime scene and the bullets recovered from the victims’ bodies were all fired from this handgun.