Court upholds local murder conviction

By Bernard Baker

Published: October 11, 2008

The Virginia Court of Appeals has upheld what Danville Commonwealth’s Attorney William Fuller calls one of the most difficult murder convictions he’s prosecuted.

The case involved the murder of Latrella Bates, whose remains were found July 22, 2005, in a wooded area near Unity Presbyterian Church on Franklin Turnpike.

Officers had few clues to investigate at the time. Her body was badly decomposed due to the heat and humidity.

Fuller said the case against Jason Ramon Jordan, the man who was eventually convicted for Bates’ death, was primarily circumstantial. He said DNA testing and a hunch from a Danville police detective led to a break in the case.

A group of detectives were on their way to grab some lunch when Detective Jerry Pace asked them to ride around the neighborhood where the crime took place, Fuller said.

Pace saw a Dumpster at Catie Foods about 700 yards from the crime and asked them to stop. He got out of the car and went through the waste container and found denim clothing and a pair of flip-flops, according to the prosecutor.

“Her friends told officers she was wearing denim and flip-flops when they last saw her,” Fuller said.

The detectives checked the immediate area and found a pair of women’s panties. Fuller said he’s glad they did because the Dumpster would have been emptied the next day.

Fuller said the clothing was sent to a forensic lab for analysis. The DNA testing linked the clothing to Bates and showed that some items of clothing had a semen stain.

Jordan became a suspect because he was the last person to see her alive, Fuller said. He met her while they were out with friends, and he offered to walk her home that night.

Fuller said that Jordan killed Bates later that night by strangling her, a claim he said was backed by a missing bone in her neck. 

Fuller said Jordan was able to get out of Danville after the crime by claiming to be a deaf juvenile. Social Services gave him a bus ticket to Mississippi.

Danville police tracked Jordan through a couple of states until they found him in a Georgia jail.

Pace went to Georgia to interview Jordan about Bates. He showed Jordan a photo of Bates and Jordan said he never saw her at least six times during the investigation, authorities said.

Police had to get a warrant to get a sample of Jordan’s DNA. The results came back and showed that “the probability of the semen belonging to anyone but the defendant’s was greater than 1 in 6 billion, which is the population of the world,” Fuller said.

During the trial, Jordan denied knowing Bates, but eventually admitted to having sex with her under cross-examination. He was sentenced to life in prison for first-degree murder.

Fuller said DNA evidence was the main factor in solving the case.

“I doubt very seriously we could have solved this (without it),” he said.

Contact Bernard Baker at or at (434) 791-7986.