Over a cigarette with a detective, Vaughn Garris confessed to stabbing his neighbor to death by crawling through their shared attic. Then he put his feet up on a table at the police station, tipped his head back and fell asleep.
The 38-year-old Woodlawn resident at times appeared relaxed on his videotaped statement played in Baltimore County Circuit Court on Tuesday, despite having just admitted to a crime so brutal that prosecutors are seeking the death penalty against him.
“She jumped out on me,” Garris told Baltimore County homicide Detective David Jacoby, according to the video. “She grabbed me. I don?t know what the hell happened. I never hurt nobody in my life.”
Garris is charged with first-degree murder and first-degree burglary in the March 19, 2007, stabbing death of Chontae Waters, 31.
Garris lived next door to Waters on Heatherton Court, and climbed into the town house?s shared crawl space hoping to burglarize her home to feed his drug habit, police said.
But Waters was home and interrupted the burglary, causing Garris to stab her to death, police said.
Jacoby testified Tuesday during a motions hearing that detectives were led to Garris by a trail of blood.
“The bed was soaked in blood,” he said.
At first, Garris told police he knew nothing of the killing, but when told of the bloody marks throughout the crawl space and his town house, which he shared with his wife and daughter, Garris admitted to the stabbing.
“We was tussling,” he said. “She grabbed me and I fell back. … I was scared, hurt.”
When asked whether the killing was an accident, he said: “Yes.”
Jacoby then asked Garris whether he would apologize to Waters? father.
“I?ll tell him,” he responded.
The motions hearing is expected to continue today.
