Appeals court upholds former Mart football player’s capital crime conviction

WACO, Texas (KWTX) – The Waco Court of Appeals has upheld the capital conviction of Zamar Kirven, the former star football player who shot and killed two of his best friends while high on LSD.

In a nine-page opinion from the three-judge 10th Circuit Court of Appeals, the judges rejected three points raised by Kirven on appeal and affirmed his conviction in connection with the April 2021 shooting deaths of 20-year-old Jacob Ybarra and 23-year-old Sabion Kubitza in a Mart home.

Kirven, a star linebacker who played on a Mart state championship team and played two seasons at the University of Houston, was convicted in June 2023 in Waco's 54th State District Court for the deaths of his friends. Prosecutors did not seek the death penalty in the case, so Kirven was automatically sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

On appeal, Kirven claimed that Judge Susan Kelly erred by allowing the state to question a defense witness about irrelevant crimes, by admitting into evidence photographs that Kirven claimed were prejudicial, and by “acting as counsel for the state.”

The appeals judges ruled that Kelly did not abuse her discretion when she allowed prosecutors to question Kirven's cousin, Kevin Kirven, a lifelong criminal and gang member who had testified that he, not his cousin, shot the two men.

Kevin Kirven testified that Zamar Kirven told him he had a “problem” with someone in the house and that he would “take care of it.”

Kevin Kirven admitted under cross-examination that he had eight counts of assault with a deadly weapon on an officer and two counts of murder pending against him in another county. He said he told Zamar Kirven not to hurt the man and told him he would “go to the NFL” if he could “get his life in order.”

The justices also rejected Kirven's claim that the judge erred in allowing the jury to be shown still images from the bodycam video of police officers walking through the brutal crime scene.

On the final point of the appeal, the justices rejected Kirven's claim that Kelly had “coached the state” and thereby abused her discretion by “becoming opposing counsel against it.”

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