Derrick Groves’s Grandma Was Murdered in a Hit Ordered by an NOPD Officer

The murder case of Derrick Groves has been long and complicated, to say the least. And it took an even stranger turn when it was revealed that his grandmother, Kim Groves, was the victim of a high-profile murder in the early '90s at just 32 years old.

For context, Groves was convicted in 2019 for the fatal shootings of Jamar Robinson and Byron Jackson during Mardi Gras Day in 2018, according to the Orleans Parish District Attorney. Two others were also physically injured in the incident.

Although Groves was initially convicted in 2019, a change in the law led to a retrial in January 2023, which ended in a mistrial. A second trial resulted in a deadlocked jury. Finally, in October 2024, he was found guilty on all counts.

But in May 2025, Groves escaped from jail and was on the run for nearly six months before being captured. His escape has since renewed public interest in both him and the tragic story of his grandmother, Kim Groves.

Here’s what we know about her.

You’ve probably heard of Derrick Groves if you live in Louisiana, or maybe because you caught wind of his 2025 escape, which involved him and nine other inmates breaking out of the Orleans Parish Prison.

Groves was serving a life sentence after being found guilty of two counts of second-degree murder and two counts of attempted second-degree murder. He escaped on May 15, 2025, and wasn’t captured until Oct. 8, 2025, in Atlanta, Ga.

What makes his story even more chilling is that Groves is the grandson of Kim Groves, the 32-year-old woman who was shot and killed in front of her home in 1994, a murder orchestrated by then-NOPD officer Len Davis.

Although Davis planned the murder, it was Paul Hardy who actually fired the single bullet that struck Kim Groves in the head as she stood outside her home around 11 p.m. on Oct. 13, 1994, according to the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Louisiana.

The shooting took place on the 400 block of Alabo Street in the Lower Ninth Ward, and Kim Groves was pronounced dead at the scene. She left behind three young kids.

Days before her death, on Oct. 10, 1994, Kim Groves witnessed an NOPD officer “pistol-whipping her nephew,” according to court documents. She decided to file a police brutality complaint with Internal Affairs, and the officer involved happened to be the partner of Len Davis.

Davis, furious over the complaint against his partner, contacted Paul Hardy, a drug dealer at the time, and “asked him to murder Groves.”

Court documents note that Davis and Hardy had exchanged favors in the past, so this wasn’t unusual.

Using his position as a police officer, Davis spotted Groves one night while patrolling in his cruiser and paged Hardy to let him know where she was. Hardy then went to her home and shot her.

Although Davis had promised to help Hardy cover his tracks, he didn’t know the FBI was already wiretapping him as part of an investigation into drug sales and corruption within the NOPD.

Davis was sentenced to death in 1996, but his punishment was later changed to life imprisonment without parole, per The Guardian.