After the shootings in Lahore, Davis, 36, contacted his colleagues for help; they raced to the intersection and accidentally killed someone else, then sped away, as a black mask, bullets, and a piece of cloth with an American flag fell out of their Land Cruiser, according to a police report. For all the sketchy details, and the deaths of three men, Davis was on official business in Lahore, apparently helping to collect intelligence on terrorism suspects. “It’s not like he’s someone from the underworld who’s been contracted to perform an assassination,” Aftergood says. “He wasn’t freelancing. He was implementing government policy, for better or worse. The problem may be with the policy.” The secret policy fosters a situation in which criminal behavior can flourish, say Obama administration critics, and contractors end up in jail.
***
Raymond Davis grew up on Strawberry Patch Road five miles outside Big Stone Gap. His father, Charlie Edward Davis Sr., died when he was young, say his high-school friends; his mother, Virginia, was “a lady that had some hardship,” recalls Rev. Roy Smith of Appalachian Pentecostal Church. She had a ninth-grade education when she got married as a teenager in a Baptist ceremony, according to a marriage register, and later worked as a cook to support her children. She died last year at age 59, after a long illness.
When Raymond was growing up, Strawberry Patch Road was a place of lonely roads and double-wide trailers. People here work in mines, and their lives are defined by coal: Pieces are scattered alongside railroad tracks and in other places, glittering when the sun hits them. Several years ago, residents still had to fetch water from a spring when the pipes froze, and today the neighborhood is quiet, smelling of damp earth, with toads trilling in a creek and a rusted truck on the side of the road. The Faith Hope United Church is on a hill, with a crown of thorns hanging on a wall inside the building and a stone angel standing in front.
At 14, Davis was enrolled in a vocational-technical program; he was a “good-hearted kid,” says Chris Bartee, who was on the wrestling squad with him and trained at Powell Valley High School. Davis was disciplined, keeping his weight down and living “on lettuce and Jell-O,” as his friend Spencer Bowman recalls, and rarely losing his temper. “Once, he absolutely destroyed a running back,” says Bowman. “He killed him in the back field—um, I don’t want to say ‘killed.’ He tackled him, then helped him up. Reached out his hand.”
“They call him an American Rambo,” adds Bowman. One person, posting on a blog hosted by the community-news site Topix, said Davis and his brother were so strong “they could climb trees using only their hands, no feet.”
“They could probably tear a tree
down with their hands,” says Bartee, recalling how Davis used to bench-press 400 pounds. “He’s folklore.”
After high school, Davis joined the Army: “He was trying to do something good, you know,” says his cousin Carolyn Kelly. Davis was accepted into Third Special Forces Group at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, but “wasn’t somebody who made a huge mark,” says Master Sgt. Eric Hendrix, who works at Army Special Operations Command in Fort Bragg. “Nobody here remembers the guy.” Davis eventually started his own company, Hyperion Protective Consultants, and became part of the CIA’s Global Response Service. “The pattern is not that unusual,” says Robert Grenier, a former CIA station chief. “A former Special Forces soldier who’s gone out and found work as a security contractor.” Yet in one way he stood out. “Shooting two people,” says Grenier, “that is pretty uncommon.”
The Justice Department has announced a criminal investigation into Davis’ case; the contractors who have gotten in trouble overseas over the past 10 years and were investigated have not been prosecuted, though, with few exceptions. One of them, ex-CIA contractor David Passaro, worked at a military base in Afghanistan in 2003 and was sentenced to eight years for beating a prisoner who later died. Passaro, however, did not have the public support of the president; while Davis was in jail, Obama called him “our diplomat.”
Some people, even in Big Stone Gap, have a more critical view. “He shot them in the back,” says a Huddle House restaurant customer in a Korea Veteran baseball cap and sweat pants, describing what happened in Lahore. “That looks bad.” Others say Davis was no superhero. Phil Robbins, 67, a retired Powell Valley football coach, sat hunched over at a table at a Chinese restaurant. “He was 5-foot-10 and 180 pounds when we first saw him,” says Robbins. “And he left here as a 5-foot-10 190-pounder. He shouldn’t be blown up as an outstanding athlete or outstanding this-or-that. You could put him in a crowd of 50 people and he wouldn’t stand out.” For such an unremarkable guy, Davis created immense problems. Bin Laden is dead, but Americans are still facing an unresolved war. Davis left Lahore in a rush in March, and his future, and that of U.S-Pakistani relations, remains uncertain.
Pakistani security officials escort Raymond Davis to a local court in Lahore, Pakistan, Jan. 2011 (Photo: Hamza Ahmed / AP Photos)
Ray Davis, Powell Valley High School Yearbook, 1993. On March 16, Pakistani authorities let Davis go after $2.3 million in blood money was promised to the victims? families, using a traditional method to settle the legal dispute over the two men?s deaths. ?Our prayers have come true,? says Kristy Miller Mullins, a Big Stone Gap insurance agent. People in Washington were happy, too. ?We averted what was building up to be a major irritant,? says Robert Killebrew, a retired Army colonel. Finally, the raid on bin Laden could proceed without risking Davis? life.
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Ray Davis, Powell Valley High School Yearbook, 1993. 
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