Davis Enterprise

Joel Davis is an award-winning Sacramento-based journalist and college journalism instructor. A native of Davis, Calif., and a former reporter for the Davis Enterprise  (with a '80s Enterprise press pass and skinny '80s tie to prove it),

he holds a bachelor of arts in journalism from Fresno State University. In 1988, he earned a masters with honors from (click link, anniversary attendees!!) the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in New York. In addition to the Enterprise, his work has appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, the Sacramento Business Journal, the Sacramento News & Review, Sacramento Magazine, Comstocks Magazine, and  Editor & Publisher. He has taught journalism and mass communications courses at Sacramento State University and American River College. This is his first book.

Why I wrote this book:

(from the Preface of "Justice Waits")

I did not know John Riggins well. I knew him more by osmosis, through common friends with an interest in sports. At best we might have shared a nod at the grocery store, a "hey" on the sports fields of Davis.

But I did know John Riggins well enough to be among the shocked and bewildered when he and Sabrina Gonsalves were kidnapped in my hometown and brutally murdered the weekend of my 18th birthday.

I left Davis but this case never left me.

I knew this would be an unusual case. I just didn't realize how unusual: Every answer seemed to come with at least two more questions.

Journalists are meant to observe, not participate. Although I would eventually participate in this case more than I ever thought I would when I launched this project during the summer of 2000, I've always looked as my role here as a conduit of sorts: investigate and report what happened since Dec. 20, 1980.

A lot happened.

Sacramento Bee/Kevin German

Dan Ariola, right, in January 2006 shows onetime high school basketball teammate/bench warmer Joel Davis the Davis High School Baseball field on which he and John Riggins once played. Ariola, one of John Riggins' best friends, was the first person Joel Davis contacted when he got the idea to do "Justice Waits."  Ariola is now a successful coach of the Davis High baseball team, which plays on a sparkling field with a fence that was paid for from charity funds donated in John and Sabrina's memory.