BILLINGS — A third suspect has been charged and pleaded not guilty in the killing of a man inside a southern Montana motel room during an alleged robbery tied to a drug debt.
China Rose Dawn Davis, 30, appeared Wednesday in state District Court in Yellowstone County to face a count of deliberate homicide with a weapons enhancement. Bail was set at $500,000, the Billings Gazette reported.
The defendant told detectives that the victim, Carl Archer, Jr., 53, owed her an ounce of meth and didn’t want to pay, according to charging documents. Davis allegedly persuaded co-defendant James Reese Eder to help her rob Archer inside the Tiger Town Motel in Ballantine, where the victim was shot in the head on Nov. 2, 2019, the charges state.
Davis is charged under the felony murder rule, which says people who participate in a felony crime that leads to someone’s death share responsibility even if they didn’t commit the killing.
Eder has pleaded not guilty to deliberate homicide and his trial is set for February.
Twenty-nine-year-old Charlie Reimers, who was accused of driving Eder to and from the scene of Archer’s killing, has pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of robbery.