Suspected killer captured in downstate Illinois after 8 deaths

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By Times staff and wire reports | Wednesday, July 2, 2008 12:33 PM CDT | () comments

Nicholas Sheley (Contributed photo)

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Map: Tracking Sheley

A Granite City, Ill., woman who went to pick up dinner on a whim Tuesday brought an end to the hunt for a man suspected of killing eight people in five days.

Police apprehended Nicholas Sheley, 28, of Sterling, Ill., outside Bindy’s bar on Nameoki Road in Granite City after Samantha Butler spotted him sitting at the end of the bar. She faked a reason to leave quickly upon recognizing his face and flagged down one of the dozens of troopers already swarming the area after receiving a tip that Sheley was in a nearby Subway restaurant.

Bindy’s owner, Bill Watson, told the Sterling-based Sauk Valley Newspapers that the arrest was swift and painless.

“It was real quick,” Watson said. “He went out for a cigarette and they just swept him up.”

Police described Sheley in a memo as a methamphetamine addict who recently stated to his ex-wife that he had more killing to do.

In between the killings in Illinois, Sheley went into Iowa and stopped to call his wife Saturday from a rest area between Davenport and Bettendorf, according to an affidavit filed in a June 14 home invasion case in Sterling.

His victims all appear to have been killed by blunt force trauma to the head, according to the FBI. The agency had launched a nationwide manhunt for Sheley.

Trail of homicides

Five counts of first degree murder charges in Whiteside County, Ill., were filed against Sheley late Tuesday. He is also charged with the murder of a Galesburg, Ill., man.

At a news conference Tuesday afternoon in Sterling, investigators said they believe Russell Reed, 93, a farmer from rural Sterling, was the first to be killed last week.

Marc Maton, Region 2 commander for the Illinois State Police, said investigators believe Sheley then killed Ronald Randall, 65, of Galesburg on Saturday afternoon. His body was found Monday behind a Galesburg grocery store, and his pickup truck was missing.

Also on Monday, police in Rock Falls, Ill., discovered the bodies of two men, a woman and a child in a Rock Falls apartment. Police believe they were killed after Randall, likely late Saturday night or early Sunday.

Those victims were identified Tuesday as Brock Branson, 29, and Kenneth Ulve Jr., 25, both of Rock Falls, and a woman and a boy, Kilynna Blake, 20, and Dayan Blake, 2, both of Cedar City, Utah.

Maton said all four victims were acquaintances of Sheley.

Whiteside County Coroner Joe McDonald said Tuesday night that autopsies showed all four died from blunt force trauma to their heads.

Investigators do not have a motive for the killings, Maton said.

Tuesday afternoon, police in Galesburg obtained a warrant for Sheley on charges including first-degree murder, aggravated battery and vehicular hijacking in the death of Randall. Randall’s body was found behind a Galesburg grocery store, and an autopsy shows the 65-year-old died from blunt force trauma to the head.

Police say Randall’s blood-soaked 2007 pickup truck was found in St. Louis, and evidence discovered inside pointed to Sheley’s involvement. Police then focused their search for Sheley in St. Louis.

Randall’s death was starkly similar those of a couple found Monday in Festus, Mo. Jill Estes and her husband, Tom Estes, of Sherwood, Ark., were in town to attend a graduation. Since Friday, they had been staying at the Comfort Inn along Veteran’s Boulevard just west of Interstate 55. Their bodies were found behind a Phillip’s 66 gas station, more than a mile from the hotel.

Late Monday night, witnesses told police, Sheley approached a group as they tailgated outside Busch Stadium in St. Louis and asked to borrow a cell phone. Police would not say to whom the call was placed, but said Sheley asked the group to delete the phone number before disappearing among baseball fans.

Tuesday morning, police in tactical gear searched a Collinsville, Ill., apartment building for Sheley, but did not find him there. Authorities later announced a $25,000 reward in the case.

Tim Lewis, the police chief in Festus, Mo., said publicity from news reports paid off after 6 p.m. Tuesday when a number of Granite City residents reported seeing Sheley.

“He looks rough. He’s had a rough two days,” Lewis said, adding that the next step in the case would be for authorities to decide whether Sheley stays in Illinois or goes to Missouri to face possible charges.

More than 70 area law officers worked on the case in the Sterling/Rock Falls area, and more than 40 more in the St. Louis area.

Accomplices charged

Meanwhile, three Whiteside County residents face charges for allegedly helping Sheley in the past week.

Jenna Henson, 20, of Sterling and Eric A. Smith, 21, of Rock Falls, have been charged with obstructing justice for concealing clothes worn by Sheley, according to court records. Henson also lives on the same block of North Griswold Avenue in Sterling where Reed’s body was found Thursday afternoon in the trunk of his car.

Henson also is the girlfriend of Sheley’s brother, Joshua Sheley, who has been charged with obstructing justice and concealing a homicide. According to court records, Joshua Sheley contacted Henson on June 24 and requested permission to park a vehicle containing a body at her house. Joshua accompanied Nicholas to her house with the body inside the vehicle, according to court documents.

Joshua Sheley also accompanied his brother and Henson to Chicago on June 25 and showed them where evidence was discarded in a Dumpster, while telling Nicholas Sheley that he was going to “get him out of trouble,” documents state.

Henson has been released on bond, while Joshua Sheley and Smith remained in custody Tuesday in Whiteside County.

Sheley’s uncle, Joe Sheley, 47, of Sterling, told The Associated Press that Nicholas Sheley had recently struggled with drugs and that his rap sheet include arrests for home invasion.

“He’s been in trouble many times over the years, but something like this, yeah, it’s out of character,” Joe Sheley said. “He’s got a temper like anybody else. Just doesn’t want to be messed with. Won’t back down. But to go looking for a fight, looking for trouble, no.”

Sheley spent nearly three years in the Illinois Department of Corrections for aggravated robbery between 2000 and 2003 and another 17 months on parole, which ended in April 2005, IDOC spokesman Derek Schnapp said.

Sterling schools on lockdown Tuesday

Before Sheley’s capture Tuesday, the fear in Rock Falls and Sterling, sister-cities separated by the Rock River in Whiteside County, was apparent in actions and on the lips of residents.

Sterling schools Superintendent R. Tad Everett said he cancelled summer school classes for about 70 students Tuesday after consulting with local law officers.

Sheley, who attended school in Sterling, has two children who are students in the district. Everett said the district would have a briefing for staff to help them make Sheley’s children more comfortable when they return to school.

“They’re outstanding kids,” Everett said. “We feel bad for them and his family.”

Everett said he first got a feeling about the fear in the community when his son’s Little League baseball game was canceled Monday night after news of the homicides in Rock Falls got out, and decided Tuesday morning that canceling classes and placing the district’s buildings on lockdown was the best thing to do in the interest of safety.

At a restaurant a few blocks from the Sterling home where Sheley used to live, a small group was discussing the case Tuesday afternoon as newspapers on the table blared headlines about the case.

Jeremy Haak, 32, who lives a few blocks from the Rock Falls apartment where four of the victims were found Monday, said the case has been the topic of discussion all over town for days.

Nanette Castillo, 26, a single mother of two, said when she got off work early Monday night from her job at the Wal-Mart Distribution Center near Sterling, she picked up her two children and went to stay with a friend in Milledgeville. She said her 7-year-old daughter is old enough to understand the news reports about the case and that she had been unable to sleep nearly all night.

“When your kids start to feel insecure, what can you do other than take them away from the situation?” she said.

(This story includes reports from Steven Martens and Ann McGlynn of the Quad-City Times, The Associated Press and St. Louis Post-Dispatch.)

Steven Martens can be contacted at (563) 659-2595 or smartens@qctimes.com.