Dwayne Davis often wonders what would have happened if he hadn’t fled the country just as his February 2019 trial began. Could he have convinced Vance County jurors that the heroin police found in his grandmother’s house wasn’t his, and that his confession that it was had been coerced? 

Other what-ifs haunt the 40-year-old: What if he hadn’t entrusted his fortunes to a celebrity lawyer whose brash style irritated the judge? And what if he hadn’t blown up a plea deal that would have secured his release in as little as two years—a promising, if unusual, offer that would have required him to buy the Henderson police a luxury car?  […]

Jeffrey Billman is a politics and law reporter for The Assembly. The former editor-in-chief of INDY in Durham, he holds a master's degree in public policy analysis from the University of Central Florida.

Michael Hewlett is a courts and law reporter for The Assembly. He was previously a legal affairs reporter at the Winston-Salem Journal and has won two Henry Lee Weathers Freedom of Information Awards.