A Dallas cold case that sat unsolved for 32 years has ended in an arrest, after detectives say DNA pulled from blood on a wall inside the victim's home matched a man who had been living under a false name for decades. Gary Len Ross, 56, is now charged with capital murder in the May 1993 killing of 55-year-old Tommie Davis, who was found beaten and slashed inside her residence in the 1500 block of Haskell Avenue.
According to DPD Beat, Davis was attacked with a 2×4 and a knife inside her own home, and investigators at the time found minor damage to her front door along with items missing from the residence — signs that pointed to a break-in. The case went cold for decades until Detective Isom began reinvestigating it in 2025 and submitted several pieces of evidence for forensic testing, per the same outlet.
That retesting turned up blood on a wall inside Davis's home that did not belong to her. Investigators entered the resulting DNA profile into the Combined DNA Index System, where it matched a man known as Tommy Lynn Jones — an alias, police say, used by Ross. As reported by CBS News Texas, that alias is what ultimately connected Ross to the decades-old crime scene evidence.
How the DNA Hit Came Together
The match was made possible by Texas's statewide DNA database, which the state's Department of Public Safety Crime Laboratory in Austin has maintained since the State CODIS Program was created under Texas Government Code § 411.142 in 1995. Once a profile is submitted, state law under House Bill 4628, enacted in 2023, requires DPS to notify investigating agencies of a CODIS match within seven days of comparison.
Texas has also widened who ends up in that database in the first place. House Bill 3956, effective September 1, 2023, requires booking facilities statewide to collect DNA samples from anyone arrested on a felony charge at intake, a policy that has steadily expanded the pool of profiles available for exactly this kind of cold-case comparison.
Arrest and Capital Murder Charge
With the DNA match in hand, Detective Isom obtained an arrest warrant for Ross, who was located and arrested in connection with the cold-case murder on Friday. He is now being held at the Lew Sterrett Justice Center, the downtown Dallas facility operated by the Dallas County Sheriff's Department that holds a total inmate capacity exceeding 7,000 across three primary towers.
Ross is charged with capital murder, which under Texas Penal Code § 19.03(a)(2) applies when a killing happens during the commission or attempted commission of a felony such as burglary or robbery — consistent with the signs of forced entry and missing property investigators documented at Davis's home in 1993. Capital murder in Texas is a capital felony punishable solely by either the death penalty or life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for adult defendants. Texas law places no statute of limitations on capital murder, which is why prosecutors are able to pursue charges more than three decades after Davis's death.
Police Credit Cold Case Persistence
Per DPD Beat, the Dallas Police Department commended Detective Isom and the homicide unit for the arrest, with Major Bobbie Epperson saying the department is committed to pursuing justice in every case, no matter how much time has passed. The department has framed Isom's work as emblematic of the dedication within DPD's Crimes Against Persons (CAPERS) Division, which houses the Homicide, Robbery, Assault and Cold Case units operating out of DPD headquarters.
The case is being documented under case #19930383386, and the Dallas Police Department says the facts and circumstances surrounding the incident remain under investigation. Anyone with information is asked to contact Detective Isom at 214-671-3701 or [email protected].
Dallas police have leaned on cold-case outreach before, including Hoodline's own reporting on a 1994 Jaylene Blount case and a 2003 Orlando Garcia-Clemente case, both part of the department's broader push to keep decades-old homicides in public view. Ross's arrest adds to a string of recent North Texas breakthroughs built on forensic retesting, including a similar case out of Arlington involving a 2012 stabbing. As the case against Ross moves through the Dallas County court system, he is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.
