NICOLE WILLIS - 16 yo (1989)/ Accused: Carlos P. Garrett - Centreville IL

'Justice for Nicole': Man charged with 1989 murder of Centreville teen

Published: February 13, 2013 Updated 13 hours ago
By BETH HUNDSDORFER — News-Democrat

A simple high school yearbook inscription from one honor student to another became a promise for justice that stretched across decades.

Tandi Stephens Schroeder's Cahokia High School yearbook was signed by her friend and schoolmate, Nicole Willis: "FF (Friends Forever). RMA (Remember Me Always). 2 cute + 2 be = 4 gotten. Nicole."

Just a few months later, Willis, 16, was walking home from a bus stop at the intersection of 68th and State streets in Centreville. The next morning, Oct. 4, 1989, Willis' grandfather found her partially nude body in an empty lot at 215 N. 69th St. -- about a block from her home. She had been beaten and sexually assaulted.

That day at school, Willis' cousin was called to the principal's office. Schroeder remembers hearing the screams, then hearing about what happened to Nicole.

"It didn't seem real," Schroeder said. "I didn't know anyone who had been murdered."

For a time, the prime suspect in Willis' murder was Lorenzo Fayne, a serial killer who targeted children in East St. Louis. Schroeder was initially comforted by the fact that the man who so many thought killed her friend was in prison for five murders committed in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

But Fayne consistently denied he murdered Willis. And police said there was no physical evidence connecting Fayne to Willis.

In 2001, police said they didn't have a good suspect for Willis' murder.

Marva Willis didn't know who left her daughter's body in the vacant lot. She turned to God to handle Nicole's murder and not knowing who did it.

"I am a strong Christian. I rely on my faith," Willis said. "I trusted in God to get me through this and a lot of things that will come."

As years passed without an arrest, Schroeder wanted answers. She couldn't forget Nicole, couldn't forget that no one had been caught and made to pay for the murder of her friend, couldn't forget that inscription.

"I became obsessed," she said. "My goal was to get justice for Nicole."

Around 2009, Schroeder was a financial adviser in Arkansas and called the Illinois State Police to ask for a detective who worked cold cases. She got connected with Illinois State Police Special Agent Dave Wasmuth. She kept calling.

"He was a godsend. He never got impatient with me calling all the time," Schroeder said. "He would say, 'I've got her file right here.'"

Wasmuth could not be reached for comment.

At Wasmuth's request, Schroeder said then Centreville Assistant Police Chief James Mister found the evidence in Willis' case and it was sent to the lab to check for DNA.

A DNA profile was recovered and loaded into the FBI's Combined DNA Index System, or CODIS, in June 2010, Schroeder said. There wasn't immediately a match.

On June 30, 2010, Carlos P. Garrett, 51, began serving a six-year prison sentence on a drug distribution charge out of Montgomery County. As part of his sentence, Garrett was required to submit his DNA for testing. It was then entered into CODIS where the DNA profile from the Willis murder was already waiting.

After the match, police went to work building a case against Garrett.

On Monday, Garrett was scheduled for release from state prison. He discovered that day he faced first-degree murder charges for Willis' death in St. Clair County. He was picked up and transferred to the St. Clair County Jail, where he was being held in lieu of $1 million bail on Wednesday.

Garrett, who would have been 28 on Oct. 3, 1989, wasn't on the radar for Willis' murder, Schroeder said.

"I didn't know who it was going to be. If they knew her, they would know what a great person he took from us. And that bothered me," Schroeder said. "If they didn't know her, he should hear what he took away and hopefully he will feel remorse for it."

In the 1980s, Garrett was a boxer who trained at Pop Miles Athletic Club in East St. Louis. Garrett has no previous felony convictions in St. Clair County, but around the time of Willis' death, he was charged with public indecency and patronizing prostitutes. Two months before Willis was killed, Garrett was convicted in St. Clair County of contributing to the delinquency of a child.

"Our focus on cold cases is showing results and there will be more to come," said St. Clair County State's Attorney Brendan Kelly. "Going above and beyond is important for unsolved murders because the lack of closure hurts family and undermines public trust in the justice system."

Garrett's arrest means closure for Marva Willis, who said she intends to attend the trial.

"I'm prepared for what may come," Willis said.

For Schroeder, Garrett's arrest is the culmination of a schoolgirl's promise she didn't know she made -- to be a friend forever, to remember Nicole, always.

"I will take delayed justice to no justice any day."

Read more here: http://www.bnd.com/2013/02/13/2495112/i-will-take-delayed-justice-to.html#storylink=cpy

Lawyer: Centreville police burned evidence; will 1989 murder case be thrown out?
BY BETH HUNDSDORFER
News-Democrat February 1, 2014

A defense attorney wants the murder charge against his client dismissed because the Centreville Police Department kept its evidence so poorly and once burned evidence that possibly could have affected the case.

Thomas Q. Keefe III said the department failed to take reasonable measures to protect evidence in criminal cases and the murder case against his client, Carlos Garrett, should be dismissed.

Garrett is accused of killing 16-year-old Nicole Willis in 1989.

St. Clair County State's Attorney Brendan Kelly declined to comment specifically on Garrett's case because the case is pending.

In a motion filed in Garrett's case, Keefe alleged that Centreville Police:

* Failed to keep a log that recorded who had access to evidence and when.

* Failed to have a written policy regarding the evidence room.

* Allowed dispatchers, janitors and maintenance personnel to check in evidence.

* Kept a key to evidence hanging next to the temporary storage locker.

* Allowed access to evidence, including officers who were later convicted of federal crimes. Former assistant police chief Corey Allen is serving a two-year prison sentence for lying to a federal agent. Former police detective Michael Baxton was sentenced to serve a year in prison after admitting that he took four Xbox 360 game consoles out of a car during a federal sting operation. Both had a key to the evidence room, Keefe said.

And when the permanent locker needed cleaning out, Keefe said the then-chief threw everything that wasn't marked into a barrel and burned it.

"Respectfully, for decades the Centreville evidence room was a shambles, there were no bins for organization, and no labeling to speak of," Keefe stated in the motion. "There were no records of what was stored where and when and no practice or policy setting forth how evidence (should) be stored together. But, on the plus side ... none of it was willfully destroyed. That changed in 2012."

Keefe alleged then-Centreville detective James Mister removed everything from the evidence room and burned the items that were not labeled with a case.

Mister, now the Washington Park Police Chief, could not be reached for comment.

Willis' body was found in an empty lot at 215 N. 69th St. Willis had been raped and beaten.

The case went unsolved for more than two decades until Garrett was convicted in a Montgomery County drug case. As part of that conviction, Garrett was required to submit his DNA to a database.

DNA had been recovered from under Willis' fingernails and there was a match.

Prosecutors then charged Garrett, 51, with first-degree murder.

But with so many people having access to the temporary evidence locker, the number of keys out for the permanent locker and no log to see who took out what evidence when, contamination of evidence is a real possibility, Keefe said. So, he's asking a judge to toss the DNA evidence, then dismiss the case.

"Since this murder occurred, there have been hundreds of tips, a couple of renewed efforts to solve this," Keefe said. "During this time, Carlos Garrett's name never came up. He has maintained his innocence since police first interviewed him."

Among that items that might have been destroyed in the burn barrel behind the police department was a hat and a hair found under Willis' body, Keefe said. The hat and hair are noted in a police report, but could not be found in the evidence locker.

"That could have been exculpatory evidence," Keefe said.

Keefe will ask St. Clair County Circuit Judge Zina Cruse to suppress the evidence because police and prosecutors can't show that it is improbable that the evidence was compromised.

If Cruse doesn't make that finding, Keefe can ask every person with access to the evidence room to testify and prosecutors must exclude every possibility of tampering or contamination.

Keefe further asked if Cruse suppresses the DNA evidence, that she dismiss the case against Garrett, who has been in jail since he was charged in 2012.

Though the motion was filed in Garrett's case, Keefe said the ruling could have bearing on every case with evidence stored at the Centreville Police Department.

While Kelly declined to comment about a specific case, he did remark about the allegations about the Centreville Police Department and the improvements made by current Chief Steve Brown.

"It's no secret because of decades of mismanagement in some departments, we are often fight for justice with one hand tied behind our back but that doesn't mean we aren't going to fight," Kelly said.

Read more here: http://www.bnd.com/2014/02/01/3035033/attorney-alleges-centreville-police.html#storylink=cpy