Murder trial for 2023 Saint Marys Avenue homicide up this week

ALLEN COUNTY, Ind. ---They came to the home on Saint Marys Avenue three deep, chasing after Travis Gilbert, who allegedly sold them “salt” instead of methamphetamine.

At 1:20 a.m. on Sept. 15, 2023, two people - Royal Davis, Jr. , 38, and Jessica Fuentes, 31 - burst into the back door of the home at the corner of Saint Marys and Margaret Street, disrupting a familiar family scene.

Royal Davis, Jr.

Travis was sitting on a recliner; his father, Steve Gilbert, and his father’s girlfriend, Melinda Hooper, asleep on the couch, when Davis and Fuentes loudly came in demanding $500 from Travis, court documents said.

Earlier, Travis Gilbert, 28, had been involved in a drug transaction at a gas station downtown, Deputy Prosecutor Jamie Groves told the jury. His customer Robert Ward, sat outside while the bungling, yet violent scene, went down inside 2022 Saint Marys.

“Dude you just told me $300,” Travis said to Davis, Jr.  in court this week for felony murder, attempted robbery while acting in concert and battery causing serious bodily injury.

Davis is accused of striking Gilbert so hard that night with his .45 caliber pistol that Gilbert fell to the floor, briefly unconscious. At the same time, Davis’s motorcycle helmet fell off and his gun skittered across the floor, into the hands of Steve Gilbert. Steve Gilbert then had to fight off bullets coming from Fuentes and took a bullet to his leg, according to court testimony. 

Fuentes and Davis, at that time living as a couple at The Travelodge off Lima Road, one of those hotels that’s seen its share of police activity and accusations, backed away shooting at the group from the kitchen, before fleeing outside, as revealed in court docs and testimony.

Fuentes still had her pink 9mm gun used to shoot Travis Gilbert as he ran to the back door once he was back on his feet, but Groves said Tuesday that it was “safe to say" it was Davis who likely shot at Travis and killed him with a bullet to the chest.

Jessica Fuentes

Travis was able to stumble back into the kitchen where his father cradled him as he died. Hooper called 911. When responding Officer Isaac Valencia testified Tuesday, his body camera showed Steve Gilbert, the frantic father, trying to make sense of it all.

Just after the homicide, it was Fuentes who was first charged with Travis’s murder, Groves said.

Ward, sitting outside in an SUV, was one of the first suspects because he was found in Travis’ s Facebook Messenger texts as "Ro Ward." Travis Gilbert was unable to afford a regular phone and used Facebook messaging to communicate with others, his sister, Teresa Gilbert, said.

Interviewed by homicide detectives Brian Martin and Mark Bieker, Ward at first said he didn’t know a thing about the shooting, but then admitted that he did, according to homicide detective Darrin Strayer who took the stand Tuesday to testify and is the lead detective on the case.

Although Fuentes was first blamed for the killing shot, as the investigation continued, the homicide unit believed Davis was the one to blame. 

But, between the harrowing events at 1:20 a.m. and the drug deal at the downtown Shell station around 10:30 p.m.,a couple of hours earlier, there was one more person defense attorneys brought up. An unidentified man and Gilbert visited a Shangri-La strip club after the drug deal.

“We’d love to find the guy who went to the Shangri-La with him,” Strayer told defense attorney Tim Stuckey. But no strip club video apparently exists.

Earlier, defense attorney Skip Campbell said the differing stories from the three involved in the Saint Marys Avenue chaos made it impossible to convict Davis beyond a reasonable doubt, the state’s unequivocal line in the sand in court.

After the shooting, “people were milling around the house,” Campbell said, including a security guard from the apartment complex across the street. 

Who knows who left the pink 9mm gun on the picnic table. The shooters left the .45 caliber handgun at the home where it was taken into custody by Valencia and kept in the police car.

The jury will be treated to fingerprints and DNA on the helmet and a glove found in the grass. Medical records belonging to Davis were found under the seat of his yellow Moped he drove to the homicide scene.

Travis Gilbert’s sister, Teresa Gilbert, stressed that her brother was a father and probably needed money when the drug deal went down. He was the kind who always wanted to make sure not only his daughter but his nieces and nephews got presents on their birthdays and he cared for everyone in his family.

Deputy prosecutor James Posey represents the state as well as Groves. Allen Superior Court Judge Fran Gull is presiding.