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KNOXVILLE — A Tennessee man convicted of kidnapping, raping and murdering a couple on a date has been sentenced to death.

The defendant, 28-year-old Lemaricus Davidson, showed no reaction Friday as jurors announced the death sentences for the murders of 21-year-old college student Channon Christian and her 23-year-old boyfriend, Christopher Newsom.

Davidson was found guilty of abducting the couple in Knoxville during a 2007 carjacking by several armed men.

Both were raped, Newsom was fatally shot and Christian suffocated after she was choked and stuffed in a garbage bag and trash can.

Davidson’s brother was convicted in the same attack in August and is serving life in prison without parole. Two other defendants from Kentucky are awaiting trial.

The murders were beyond “heinous, atrocious and cruel,” prosecutor Leland Price told the jury. “That doesn't even begin to describe it.”

He said there was no evidence the victims fought back. Instead, they were simply “overwhelmed” by their attackers.

“The only reason these kids were ultimately killed was because they knew too much” and could identify their assailants, Price said.

Those are some of the factors that Price argued should convince the jury to vote for a death sentence — something a Knox County jury hasn't done since 1997.

“You know what justice demands. These crimes cry out for the maximum punishment we have in the state of Tennessee,” he said.

Defense asked jury to spare Davidson's life

Defense attorney Doug Trant recalled testimony about Davidson's poor, neglected, abusive childhood in Memphis, and the promise that a group home manager and foster parents saw in him in his late teens before his arrest and six-year prison sentence for aggravated robbery.

“It's not an excuse, but it is an explanation for why he is here,” Trant said.

He also reminded the jury that a defense psychiatrist testified Davidson has shown that he can function well and know right from wrong when he is off drugs and in a structured environment, such as prison. Trant suggested Davidson could help inmates learn from his example.

“I am going to ask you to spare the life of Lemaricus Davidson,” he said. “Please, I am begging you to do the right thing.”

A jury brought from Nashville to avoid pretrial publicity earlier convicted Davidson's brother, Letalvis Cobbins, 26, of Lebanon, Ky., in the case and sentenced him to life without parole. Cobbins' friend George Thomas, 26, will be tried by a jury from Chattanooga in December. No trial date has been set for a fourth defendant, Cobbins' girlfriend Vanessa Coleman, 21.

A fifth conspirator, Eric Boyd, was convicted in federal court of being an accessory after the fact for hiding Davidson and was sentenced to 18 years.

The case raised racial tensions because the victims were white and the defendants are black, with some Internet bloggers contending the national media downplayed the case because it didn't involve white-on-black crime. Prosecutors, police and the victims families, however, have said race didn't seem to play a role in the attacks and that Christian and Newsom were random victims.