A 21-year-old Shady Side man convicted yesterday in Anne Arundel Circuit Court of the rape and murder of an Annapolis woman now faces a possible life without parole sentence.
Alvin Winslow Gross of the 4800 block of Atwell Road was convicted of first-degree murder, first-degree rape, kidnapping and handgun charges in the Dec. 19, 1993, death of Margaret Courson, 26, who lived in an Annapolis rooming house.
The jury of eight men and four women convicted Gross after deliberating a little more than five hours.
He will be sentenced by Judge Bruce C. Williams on Jan. 23.
Gross, captain of the Southern High School basketball team four year ago, showed no emotion when the verdict was announced.
As he was led out of the courtroom, he told the dozen supporters that he could "do no more than tell the truth."
The courtroom remained quiet for a few minutes after his departure. Then, Shirleen Gross, the defendant's mother, began wailing "Oh my God" as her husband held her.
"You can't do any more than tell the truth," said her husband, Beville Gross, echoing his son.
Assistant State's Attorney Cynthia Ferris said Gross and an acquaintance, Sidney Scott, picked up Ms. Courson in Gross' 1991 Isuzu Amigo sport utility truck about 3:30 a.m. Dec. 19, 1993.
Gross then raped her and shot her twice in the chest and twice in the neck, Ms. Ferris ssaid.
Her body was dumped in the 300 block of Leitch Road in Tracys Landing. About 6:30 a.m., a passer-by found the corpse, naked from the waist up.
Mr. Scott did not testify in the trial and has not been charged in the killing.
Detective Keith Williams, who worked the case, would say only that the investigation is continuing.
During the five-day trial, jurors learned that Gross had told a friend about the killing and told two friends that his revolver had "a life on it." Ms. Courson's pubic hair and fingerprints were found in his truck.
Carpet fibers from Gross' truck also were found on Ms. Courson's underwear.
Termayme Gross, the defendant's 17-year-old brother, testified that Gross was home in bed the night of the murder.
Gross, a former Anne Arundel Community College student who worked for his father's pier construction business, admitted in testimony that he and Ms. Courson were acquainted and that they had had sex in his truck the night before she was killed.
He also said she initiated the sex after climbing into his truck and going for a drive.
"When I got in the back she was pretty much taking off all her clothes," he told jurors.
He said that he let her off, unharmed, near the Annapolis City Dock a short time later.
Under cross-examination, Gross failed to explain why his longtime friend, Troy King, testified that he had confessed to the murder in a telephone conversation a few weeks after Ms. Courson was killed.
"It could be that he was confused, or misunderstood something that he heard me say," Gross said.
The defense also did not offer any witnesses to confirm that Gross was acquainted with the victim. His attorneys did emphasize Gross' strong family background, attack the credibility of the state's witnesses and criticize the police investigation as being superficial.
"This was a case where they didn't want to check out the stories they were hearing," said Timothy D. Murnane, one of Gross' three attorneys. "This was a case that was closed by arrest."