Suspect In Concord Park Murder Confesses In Court
MARTINEZ (BCN) -- A 19-year-old man accused of raping and murdering a woman in a park in Concord in July confessed to the murder during his arraignment in Contra Costa County Superior Court in Martinez Wednesday afternoon.
Tirrell Dudley, a Concord resident, was charged earlier today with the murder, rape, sodomy and robbery of Javaughna Lynch, 31, who was found dead in Baldwin Park on July 13.
"Sir, I confess to the robbery and the murder, but I didn't rape that lady," Dudley told the judge.
Dudley, who was wearing a safety jacket put on inmates in county jail who are believed to be suicidal, could also be eligible for the special-circumstance charges of committing a murder during the course of a rape and during the course of a robbery. But prosecutors have not yet made a decision on whether to file the additional charges, prosecutor John Cope said.
Lynch, who attended a local adult education school, died from a blunt force head injury, according to the Contra Costa County coroner's office. According to Lynch's MySpace page, she had an infant son and was living with her mother and brother in Concord.
Lynch and Dudley were part of a group of people who often hung out together in downtown Concord, Cope said.
Police had detained and questioned Dudley the day Lynch's body was found, but he denied involvement in the murder and was released because police didn't have enough evidence to charge him at that time.
Since then, however, DNA and other physical evidence found at the scene have linked Dudley to the murder, police said.
Dudley, a student at the Alliance Program, a continuation high school in the Mount Diablo Unified School District, was arrested Friday morning as he was leaving his home in Concord, police said.
He is being held without bail in county jail in Martinez and is scheduled to return to court Oct. 25 to be assigned an attorney and enter a plea.
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