Miller's siblings testify Last week, Daniel Shockley Miller's parents testified against their son at his capital

murder trial. On Monday, it was his brother's and sister's turn. "I can overlook a lot of things that Daniel has done, but murder is not one of them," the defendant's younger brother, Danny G. Miller Jr., told jurors when a prosecutor asked why he was testifying. Daniel Shockley Miller is on trial in state District Judge Wayne Salvant's court, charged with the July 21, 1996, kidnapping and fatal shooting of Gina Dykman, 27. Officials have said the defendant and two others believed that Dykman, a young mother, was a police informant who planned to talk about their methamphetamine-dealing business. Her remains were discovered Aug. 22, 1996, in a Johnson County cemetery. Daniel Shockley Miller's girlfriend, Beverly J. Cropp, and friend Kirk Alan Cantrell, have also been charged with capital murder and remain in the Tarrant County Jail awaiting trial. If Daniel Shockley Miller, 33, is convicted of capital murder, prosecutors Camille Sparks and Alan Levy will seek the death penalty. The defendant's brother said he was present at a 1997 meeting when his older brother agreed to relinquish his rights to a house they owned in Dallas in exchange for some quick cash. During that meeting, the defendant told him, his mother and father that he needed the money to flee the country, Danny G. Miller Jr. testified. "He pretty much stood there and told us all he had killed somebody," Danny G. Miller Jr. said, crying. "... It's hard. He is still my brother and I love him, but I know he did something terrible." Miller's sister, Jackie Miller, was not present at that meeting, but she told jurors that her older brother had implicated himself in the slaying on another occasion. Jackie Miller said she lived with her brother for a time, but eventually moved after she grew tired of his drug-dealing business and feared for her safety. She said she began to suspect that her brother was involved in something bad in late 1996 when Daniel Shockley Miller, Cantrell and Cropp began to act paranoid and secretive around each other. Jackie Miller said she began badgering her older brother with questions. "I basically just asked, 'What have you done? What are you all involved in?'" Jackie Miller testified."He said there was a problem and it had been taken care of." Jackie Miller said her instincts told her that her brother had killed someone, and she asked him how he could be so stupid, especially with the advance in forensics and DNA testing. In response, her brother told her that they had been careful and that he had disassembled the murder weapon and thrown it into the Trinity River, Jackie Miller testified. "He said he could trust Beverly, but he couldn't trust Kirk," Jackie Miller said. "He made a comment that you keep your friends close and your enemies closer. "He said he felt if he couldn't trust Kirk, he would get a hotel room and

shoot him up, make him O.D., and no one would ever notice because no one would miss him." After the lunch recess Monday, outside the presence of the jury, defense attorney Wes Ball, who is working with Terry Barlow, stated for the record that prosecutors attempted to settle Miller's and Cropp's case during the break with plea agreements. Miller was offered a capital life sentence -- meaning he would have to serve 40 years before being eligible for parole -- in exchange for pleading guilty to killing Dykman. Cropp was offered 27 years in prison if she would plead guilty to the lesser charge of aggravated kidnapping, Ball said. The judge allowed Cropp and Miller to discuss the offers, alone, in adjoining hold-over cells. Both declined the offers, which means Miller could be sentenced to death if he is convicted. Afterward, the state continued its presentation of evidence, which included testimony by William Bailey, a fingerprint examiner for the Tarrant County Medical Examiner's Office. Bailey testified that, while examining a pocket knife discovered in the cemetery where Dykman was found, he discovered the defendant's middle name, "Shockley," crudely engraved on the knife handle. (source: Fort Worth Star-Telegram)