Defendants in Alexis Crawford murder case ask judge to sever their cases

ATLANTA, Ga. (CBS46) - Barron Brantley and Jordyn Jones appeared before a judge in a pre-trial motion hearing in the Alexis Crawford murder case Friday.

Attorneys for the murder defendants asked for the cases to be severed so that the two defendants can have separate murder trials.

Police say both Barron Brantley and Jordyn Jones confessed in detail, pointing the finger at the other who had a larger role in killing Crawford on Halloween weekend in 2019.

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Atlanta Police Detective Michael Young took their confessions and was ready to play them in court Friday, but attorneys asked that it happened at a later date as they now try to keep some of those confessions out of court.

It’s a case that rocked the Atlanta college community, especially the campus of Clark Atlanta University where Crawford and Jones were students. The two were roommates in an off-campus apartment where the killing took place.

It was homecoming weekend at the school, Crawford and Jones and Jones’ then-boyfriend Brantley, an aspiring rapper had been partying and drinking, according to police. The three went back to the apartment and Jones went to sleep in her room.

She woke up to find Brantley in the locked bathroom with Crawford allegedly passed out. Police say Jones told officers that she knocked on the door and Brantley opened the door saying I did not rape Crawford, although he wasn’t asked about rape.

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Crawford said she was blacked out and that Brantley sexually assaulted her in the bathroom. She left the home and went to Grady Hospital the next day to obtain a rape kit, which traced back to Brantley, police said. Meanwhile, Jones snuck Brantley back into her room where he stayed for several days.

Four days after Crawford’s rape allegation, she and Jones got into a fight in their apartment. Police say Brantley emerged from the room and began to strangle Crawford.

“While she was engaged in a fight with her, Mr. Brantley came out of the bedroom and choked her. While he was choking her, Jordyn Jones put a plastic bag over her head,” Detective Young testified in 2019.

The two told police that they stuffed Crawford’s body in a storage bin, and put it in Jones’ car before driving out to Exchange Park in DeKalb County and dumping the bin with Alexis’s body inside.

Today, the defense attorney tried to get some of the confessions dismissed. No trial date has been set in the case. Attorneys will come back for another hearing to listen to witness testimony.