18 Await Trials In Homicide Cases After A Violent Year

BY JOHN PATTERSON
SALISBURY POST

If 1998 seemed like a busy year for prosecutors at the Rowan County District Attorney's Office, then 1999 is going to feel like rush hour traffic on Interstate 85.

District Attorney Bill Kenerly, who this year secured convictions and life sentences for child murderers Robin Gosnell and Tamanchies Krider, knows there's no time - and no need - to celebrate 1998's accomplishments.

Eighteen other accused murderers are biding for Kenerly's time in court.

"It seems to go in cycles," Kenerly said of the unusually high number of people charged with murder over the last year and a half. "We had unusually violent years in 1992 and 1993 ... and before that 1987 and 1988 was a violent period. I certainly hope that we're at the top of the curve and not in any period of long-term violence."

To show just how busy it's gotten at the district attorney's office, consider that in January of 1997 only three people were awaiting a trial on murder. And then, in a span of about two weeks in early February 1997, five people were charged with murder.

Kenerly said he's rarely been able to "come up for air" since.

"We usually have about six murders a year here in Rowan," Kenerly said. "When we have five murders in less than two weeks, that's a whole year's work right there."

Kenerly said it takes about six to eight months to prepare for a case. On average, he said, there's a murder trial about every two months in Rowan County Superior Court.

"No crime happens in a vacuum," he said. "Every time a crime occurs, there are 500 or 600 older cases already in the system. We normally dispose of anywhere from 1,000 to 1,500 cases in Superior Court each year."

Kenerly said he plans to get through seven of the 18 by June 1, 1999.

Here's a look at the people currently awaiting trial on murder charges. All are being held in the Rowan County Detention Center, unless noted otherwise:

- Lee Edward Cook: Accused of fatally shooting 22-year-old Michael L. Farmer in the parking lot of Colonial Village Apartments on Nov. 14, 1997. The men, who had both dated the same woman, scuffled before Cook allegedly fired the shot. Farmer died the next day at a Winston-Salem hospital.

The state will not seek the death penalty against Cook.

- Gregory D. Fincher, Gary L. Hickson, Mikey Charles Howell and Rodney Tyrone Howell: All four are awaiting trial in the Dec. 16, 1997, murder of Albert Redd, a former football player at Salisbury High School. Fincher, Hickson and the Howell brothers are accused of chasing Redd into a Franklin Street apartment and gunning him down. Investigators have said Redd's death was drug-related.

Fincher is out on bond awaiting trial. Kenerly does not plan to seek the death penalty against the four.

- Gary Wayne Long: Long was arrested and charged with murder Jan. 9, 1998, after he allegedly beat his mother to death and then stayed inside their Kannapolis home for hours, acting as if nothing were wrong when police came to investigate. Long, who "had a history of mental illness and alcohol abuse," according to Kannapolis Police, also allegedly stabbed his mother, 73-year-old Wilma Yates Lowder, five or six times in the chest. Lowder showed signs of having tried to ward off the attack with her arms.

Kenerly said he will pursue the death penalty against Long.

- J.C. Castor and Tia Scercy Brown: In what investigators originally said appeared to be a "contract killing," Castor and Brown were charged with the Jan. 9, 1998, murder of Golden David Billings, 45.

Billings' wife came home to the couple's Kannapolis mobile home that night and found her husband dead on the sofa.

Castor and Brown were picked up the next day in Gaffney, S.C., by a South Carolina state trooper.

Kenerly is also seeking the death penalty in their case.

- George Johnson Jr.: Johnson was arrested Jan. 20, 1998, for the murder of Keisha M. Williams - exactly a year after Williams disappeared from her apartment at Colonial Village. Johnson, Williams' former boyfriend, was the last person to see Williams alive, investigators have said.

Two fishermen found the woman's body in High Rock Lake on Feb. 21, 1997. The discovery came just weeks after Johnson told police he had a "sick and grieving feeling" near the Yadkin River, prompting authorities to search the area.

Kenerly will not seek the death penalty against Johnson, who is out of jail on bond.

- Corine Marie Jackson: In a case that has received little publicity, Jackson was charged with the Feb. 27, 1998, stabbing death of her housemate, 46-year-old Jimmy Wayne Massey. Investigators at the time said: "Evidently they got into an argument and, as a result, one party ended up deceased."

The state will not seek the death penalty against Jackson.

- Kenneth Robert Allen and Jon Michael Dixon: Both were charged with fatally stabbing to death 19-year-old Samuel Rios Marquez. Marquez was stabbed in the back on March 14, 1998, during an altercation in front of a home on North Main Street in Kannapolis.

According to reports from witnesses and investigators, a 14-year-old girl said she walked by a large group of Mexican men and someone made a sexual remark. The girl later told Allen and Dixon, who went to the house.

Allen allegedly stabbed Marquez with a 6-inch martial arts knife. It was not clear at the time if Marquez made the remark.

Kenerly has said he will not seek the death penalty in the case.

- Vincent Lonnie Ellis: Salisbury Police charged Ellis with the July 2, 1998, shooting death of Brian Keith Walker at a mobile home park on Bringle Ferry Road. Investigators said Walker, who was shot once in the chest, was the victim of a drug deal gone wrong.

The state does not plan to seek the death penalty.

- Dannette E. Breedlove: Investigators have said Breedlove killed an elderly man and then stole his car and items from his Kannapolis mobile home. Rowan County Sheriff's Department deputies found the body of 78-year-old James Paul Simpson on Aug. 12, 1998, roughly three days after Breedlove apparently shot him to death.

An alert Kannapolis Police officer noticed Simpson's car at an apartment Breedlove was staying at; after questioning, authorities charged her with Simpson's murder.

Kenerly has not yet decided whether to seek the death penalty in this case.

- Vanessa Nadine Gordon: Apparently upset after seeing her husband leaving another woman's apartment in the early morning hours of Oct. 5, 1998, Gordon allegedly backed her car into Christopher Gordon, pinning him against a tree in the parking lot of Weant Street Apartments in East Spencer. Christopher Gordon, who suffered massive trauma to his abdomen, died at a Charlotte hospital about three hours after the incident.

Kenerly has not yet decided whether to pursue the death penalty against Gordon, who is out of jail on bond.

- Christy Albea: Authorities charged Albea with the Oct. 7, 1998, shooting death of John Kautchick, her boyfriend's brother. The trio had been living together at a mobile home outside of Rockwell when the incident occurred.

Albea has denied any involvement in Kautchick's murder. Kenerly has not yet ruled whether Albea's case will be tried capitally.

- Tami Lynn Green: A week after 49-year-old David Clemons collapsed behind the Salisbury Fire Department on East Innes Street, authorities charged Green - homeless and already in jail on another charge - with fatally stabbing Clemons.

Clemons, who had been stabbed a number of times, apparently walked from his house on South Clay Street across Innes Street to the back of the station during the early morning hours of Oct. 8, 1998. He collapsed only a few feet from the station's back door.

There has been no decision whether to seek the death penalty against Green.

- Kathy Wilson Miller: Charged with shooting to death her father, Leon Wilson, on Oct. 21, 1998,

Wilson has garnered publicity from a group of supporters seeking bond for the former North Hills Christian School teacher. However, Miller remains in the detention center.

Miller allegedly shot her father because of a "financial disagreement." Investigators have said Miller allegedly took a check from her father, forged his name and cashed it. Wilson planned to take legal action against Miller; authorities say Miller went to Wilson's house and shot him the same day he went to the Sheriff's Department to file the report against his daughter.

Detention center officials might soon have one more accused murderer to add to the list. Salisbury Police are still looking for Hector Andres Martinez, 32, who is wanted for the Christmas Day stabbing death of Mario Calix.

Other cases

While murder has received a lot of attention in 1998, there are still a number of other cases pending that shared the spotlight. The most notable:

- Derwin "Toby" Holland: Holland's day in court might finally come in January. First accused in October 1997 of shooting his own East Spencer Police cruiser, Holland - investigated by the State Bureau of Investigation and his own department - was later charged with felony obstruction of justice.

Holland said he was assaulted and pepper-sprayed during a late night traffic stop. However, investigators, who have said little about the case, believe Holland shot his own car and then lied about what happened that night.

Holland claims authorities have been tight-lipped about the case because "they don't have a case."

Holland and his attorney said a ballistics test on the bullets recovered from Holland's police cruiser don't match Holland's service revolver.

- Michael Kelly: Former Rowan County magistrate charged with driving while impaired and numerous counts of hit and run property damage. Kelly, apparently on his way to his East Spencer home, allegedly struck a number of parked cars, but didn't stop. He was later charged with DWI.

- Denise Santos: The N.C. Court of Appeals earlier this month overturned Santos' conviction on felony child abuse, forcing a new trial on charges she forcibly submerged a 4 1/2-year-old child in scalding bath water in 1997.

The appeals court ruled that the trial judge in Santos' case should have allowed jurors to consider a verdict of misdemeanor child abuse. The judge allowed jurors to consider only two options: guilty of felony child abuse or not guilty.

Santos could appear in court as early as January for pretrial hearings. Her new trial could happen sometime in the spring.