In June of 2018, the family of Christopher ‘Devan’ Cobb grew worried when they could no longer get in touch with him. The 23-year-old White male from Florence, Alabama, was reported as a missing person, a move that would soon lead to a grim discovery. On June 22, 2018, police officers, conducting a welfare check at the request of the Muscle Shoals Police Department who were handling the missing person case, entered his apartment at the Four Seasons Apartments on Helton Drive.
Inside, they found Devan deceased, having been shot multiple times. As investigators processed the scene for evidence over the next day and a half, they realized his vehicle was also missing and issued a nationwide alert for it.
The investigation quickly gained momentum. Within a few days, detectives identified two individuals from Tennessee as persons of interest in Devan’s death. Following leads, investigators tracked 18-year-old Hannah B. Burrows, a white female, and 31-year-old Jesse James Parker, a Black male, to a hotel in Memphis, Tennessee. Investigators from Florence traveled to Memphis and, with the assistance of local law enforcement and the FBI Safe Streets Task Force, took both Burrows and Parker into custody without incident. A search of their hotel room yielded additional evidence related to the case.
With the two suspects in custody in Tennessee, the legal process began. Warrants were issued for both Burrows and Parker, charging them with the murder of Devan Cobb. They were held without bond in the Shelby County Jail as they awaited extradition back to Alabama to face the charges against them. The relationship between the Tennessee pair and Devan was not immediately clear to investigators. Eventually, both would be held accountable for their roles in the killing. Jesse James Parker pleaded guilty to murder and received a 35-year prison sentence. Hannah Burrows also pleaded guilty to murder and was sentenced to serve 20 years in prison.
