A Ramsey County judge sentenced Joseph Davis to 40 years for the killing of Christine Morris.

Monday's 40-year term is the sentence on the second-degree murder plea. KSTP's 480 months are the same length of time, and that station called it the maximum and said five other charges were dismissed. KARE 11 did not print the word maximum or the dismissals. A dismissal is not a finding on those other counts. The child officers found is not named here.

KARE 11 reported Monday, Oct. 26, 2026, at 5:24 p.m. CDT, that Joseph Davis was sentenced to 40 years in prison, with credit for 514 days already served, after he pleaded guilty to second-degree murder. The station did not print the judge's name. KSTP's sentencing story, published Oct. 27, 2026, at 6:11 p.m. CDT, reported that on Monday a Ramsey County judge sentenced Joseph Davis, 36, to 480 months, the maximum allowed, with credit for 514 days, and that he had pleaded guilty to one count of second-degree murder with intent. KSTP reported five other charges were dismissed as part of the plea. It did not name those five charges. Forty years and 480 months are the same term. KARE 11 did not call it the maximum and did not report any dismissals. The five dismissals are KSTP's account. They are not findings of guilt on those counts.

KSTP's story on the guilty plea carries a published time of Sept. 2, 2026, 2:42 a.m. UTC. It said Davis, 35, had pleaded guilty to one count of second-degree murder with intent, that sentencing was set for Oct. 26, and that prosecutors were seeking 480 months. It did not print the calendar day of the plea itself. Thirty-five, in that story, and 36, in the sentencing story, are the ages KSTP printed at those times. The station does not print a birth date. KSTP reported he was later found inside a Minneapolis apartment and taken into custody. KARE 11, citing court documents, reported at least three other convictions relating to domestic assault and protective-order violations in which Morris was named as the victim. Those are earlier cases in KARE 11's account of the documents. They are not Monday's sentence.

KARE 11 reported the charge stems from a welfare check on May 2, 2025, at a home on Edmund Avenue in the Frogtown neighborhood of St. Paul. It reported officers found a toddler unharmed in the living room and, upstairs, a woman with multiple stab wounds who did not have a pulse, identified as Christine Morris, 33. KSTP reported a welfare check at Morris's residence led police to a toddler on a couch in the living room and to Morris, deceased, in a bedroom. Upstairs, in KARE 11, and a bedroom, in KSTP, are the two descriptions of where she was found. The child is not named here. KARE 11 reported the criminal complaint says Davis admitted to stabbing Morris when investigators interviewed him. KSTP reported he allegedly admitted the crime to a family member, and that he told investigators Morris had been cheating on him with a married man and that he had confronted her before the stabbing. That cheating account is what KSTP said he told investigators. It is not a finding about Morris. KSTP reported he told investigators, "I should have never did that to her," and, "I definitely feel bad," with a profanity between those sentences that the station printed and this account does not.

The guilty plea to second-degree murder is the conviction on that count. The 40 years KARE 11 reported, and the 480 months KSTP reported, are the sentence, with 514 days of credit in both accounts. The judge's name is not in either story. The child is not named here. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.