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Curtis Lavelle Vance on Trial for Beating Anchorwoman Anne Pressly to Death

Monday, November 2, 2009 at 12:10 pm
Anne-Pressly.jpg
The Little Rock TV anchor was murdered in her bed last October
​In October of last year, Little Rock morning TV anchor Anne Pressly awoke to find a man "committing a sex act" beside her bed, according to police. Startled, the man began hammering her with a garden tool. Anne fought back, as her shattered left arm would indicate. But the man hit her as many as five times.

Anne was taken to the hospital in a coma, and she never regained consciousness before dying five days later. But even without her statement, police still believe they have their man: Curtis Lavelle Vance.

He goes on trial today for the murder of the 26-year-old TV woman, who was killed in her home near the Little Rock Country Club. As police tell it, they not only have the DNA from semen found in Anne's bedroom, but a taped confession from Vance himself...

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Curtis Vance's semen was found on Anne's bedsheets and body
​Yet Vance's lawyers are saying much of that evidence is coerced. Using "police trickery," as one lawyer politely calls it, they say detectives confused Vance into providing DNA samples and improperly duped him into confessing. Vance even claims that a cop stuck a gun in his face.

This is especially crucial because a shrink hired by the defense says Vance is retarded. He has a low IQ, couldn't hold a job, doesn't have a driver's license and wasn't able to live independently -- all signs of retardation, says the shrink. Then again, these things tend to be on the resume of every bad guy.

And the evidence against Vance is compelling. Detective J.C. White says he went willingly to the Marianna, Arkansas police station last November as investigators looked for links between the Pressly murder and an unsolved rape in Marianna, Vance's home town.

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Evidence suggests Anne tried to defend herself; her left arm was shattered
​A hair sample Vance provided matched DNA from both the rape and semen found in Pressly's bedroom. And in one taped interview, Vance is seen talking casually to detectives, even saying "Y'all showed me the utmost respect" at its conclusion.

Moreover, Vance kept changing his stories as the interviews progressed -- and each one put him in Pressly's neighborhood looking for computers to steal.

He eventually confessed to beating Anne with a garden tool, then throwing it in the Arkansas River as he drove away.

A month later, while in jail, he changed his story yet again. This time he said he was with two other men who committed the murder while he was out moving his car. But he still couldn't explain how his sperm was left on Anne's sheets and body.

The 28-year-old man has pleaded not guilty to murder, rape, burglary and theft.


Tags: Arkansas

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