James Cosby is behind bars for murdering his daughter, Britney Cosby, and her girlfriend, Crystal Jackson, whose bodies were found behind a convenience store in Port Bolivar, Texas.
On the morning of March 7, 2014, an employee was delivering beer to Fisherman’s Cove on State Highway 87 near 7th Street on the Bolivar Peninsula when he stumbled upon the bodies of Britney and Jackson, both 24, near a dumpster.
The Galveston County Medical Examiner’s Office ruled their deaths homicides, as an autopsy showed that Britney died from blunt force trauma to the head and Jackson had been shot.
Evidence at the scene suggested that the couple was murdered somewhere else before their bodies were dumped behind the convenience store.
Britney’s great-grandmother, who was 90 years old at the time, stated that she had no idea who would want to kill the couple.
She said she “raised Britney since she was two, and she was a normal girl. All she did was go to school and work.”
The couple, along with Jackson’s daughter, was living with her in the Sunnyside subdivision in Houston.
Britney’s father, who allegedly went by the name “Larry,” had moved in with them in October 2013, after he was released from prison.
He served two years for failing to register as a sex offender.
James started working as a ship channel worker, and he had to catch the bus to work, while his daughter and her girlfriend drove their silver 2006 Kia Sorento to work.
Britney worked as a barista at a coffee shop, and Jackson worked as a security guard.
Investigators stated that after the couple was found dead, their vehicle was missing.
According to CHRON, witnesses told police that on the day of the murders, they saw an African-American male matching James’ description driving a Kia Sorento.
Also, at around 9 p.m. that night, surveillance footage from the Galveston-Bolivar ferry captured a male exiting a silver SUV after a security officer alerted him that one of his headlights was out.
James was initially viewed as the grieving father until detectives found his fingerprints on a piece of paper and a wooden shutter at the crime scene.
On April 2, 2014, investigators went to his home, but he wasn’t there. He was at a candlelight vigil for Britney and her girlfriend.
At the vigil, he pleaded with the public to help solve his daughter’s murder.
He said, “We need to find out what’s happening, you know. The detectives are doing what they do, they [SIC] keeping us informed as much as they can, you know, but there’s nothing yet.”
Meanwhile, detectives had obtained a search warrant and were searching his home, where they found blood, as well as other evidence, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported.
Before leaving the vigil, the police took James to the police station for questioning.
For nearly six hours, James denied having anything to do with the murders, but he was ultimately arrested and charged with two counts of tampering with physical evidence related to a corpse.
James was booked into the Galveston County Jail, where he was held in lieu of a $500,000 bond.
On April 17, 2014, the SUV belonging to Britney and Jackson was found outside a strip club.
In a press release, it was revealed that management at the Ritz Cabaret had contacted DeWitt Wrecker Service and asked them to remove an abandoned vehicle from their parking lot.
After towing the vehicle to their storage lot, employees at DeWitt Wrecker Service contacted the Houston Police Department and put in a request for an officer to check on the vehicle, as it didn’t have a license plate.
Upon doing so, police learned that the vehicle had been reported stolen and that it was registered to Britney.
In June 2015, James was charged with capital murder, KHOU-11 reported.
Prosecutors believe that on the morning of March 6, 2014, Britney and Jackson were getting ready to take Crystal’s daughter to school. She was supposed to go on a field trip to the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo.
At some point, James became angry with Britney, and an argument ensued. That’s when prosecutors surmised that James punched his daughter in the eye and struck her repeatedly on the head with an unknown object, causing her skull to fracture and split, Galv News reported.
As Britney lay bleeding on the floor of his bedroom, James strangled her to death. When Jackson walked into the house and possibly saw what James had done, he choked and shot Crystal in the head at close range.
It was reported that at the time of the murders, Jackson’s daughter was waiting in the car, but when her mother failed to return, she got out of the vehicle and went inside the house.
She told authorities that no one was in the home, and she, therefore, went to her mother and Britney’s bedroom.
After the slaying, prosecutors believe James drove his daughter’s car to Bolivar Peninsula and dumped their bodies near the dumpster behind the convenience store.
He then ditched the vehicle in the parking lot of a strip club.
James’ girlfriend testified that she picked him up from a Whataburger restaurant, which is near the strip club.
An FBI cell phone analyst also testified that he was able to track “James Cosby’s phone from Houston to the Bolivar Peninsula and back to The Ritz, a strip club where the women’s vehicle was found about a month after their deaths.”
On Aug. 10, 2016, a jury in Galveston County State District Court deliberated for three hours before finding James guilty of capital murder.
Bill Reed, the felony prosecutor for the Galveston County District Attorney’s Office, said, “There’s a lot of circumstantial evidence, and ultimately we were able to use what investigators had gathered to build a compelling case.”
Officials are unsure of a motive behind the killings of Britney and Jackson, but the Houston Press reported that he “had problems with women and did not like that his daughter was gay.”
It was also alleged that he might have been jealous of his daughter being able to purchase her own vehicle and having her own bedroom at his mother’s home, while he slept in the garage.
Capt. Barry Cook, an investigator with the Galveston County Sheriff’s Office, said it’s impossible to determine what led to the murder because James has yet to provide any details.
Cook added, “These are the things we know. He had resentment. They had a better life. They were being treated differently at that house.”
“He didn’t agree with their lifestyle, but neither did the Jacksons. Were they killed for being gay? Who knows? He’s the only one who knows, and he’s not talking.”
James was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
In December 2017, James appealed his murder conviction, but it was denied.