Ex-con arrested for 8 murders

Ex-con arrested for 8 murders


Nicholas Sheley, 28, was arrested without incident. There was a two state manhunt for the ex-convict. He was arrested quietly outside a bar known as a police hangout.



According to authorities “he was desperate and gave up without a fight.” Police felt like it would only be a matter of time before he was arrested because of the intense publicity surrounding the case.

Sheley was taken into custody at 1840 hrs on Tuesday while outside smoking a cigarette.

Apparently a bartender recognized him as he ordered a glass of water and then going to the bathroom. The bartender went outside and told the police officer that was parked in the bars parking lot.

The officer radioed for help and shortly there after the bar was surrounded.

Authorities have to decide whether he stays in Illinois or goes to Missouri to face possible charges.

The FBI on Tuesday launched a manhunt for Sheley, who they warned was considered armed and dangerous. He is suspected of killing, among others, a 93-year-old man, a child and a couple whose blood-soaked dogs were found roaming a motel parking lot.
Sheley has only been charged in the death of one of the eight. He faces charges of first-degree murder, aggravated battery and vehicular hijacking in the death of Ronald Randall, whose body was found Monday behind a grocery store in Galesburg, in northwestern Illinois, police said. An autopsy showed the 65-year-old died from blunt force trauma to the head, likely on Saturday.

Investigators said the other victims all appeared to have died in the same manner and that evidence linked to Sheley was recovered at each scene. The FBI and Illinois State Police declined to elaborate.

Authorities said the killings began with the beating death of 93-year-old Russell Reed, a Sterling man whose body was found stuffed in the trunk of a car Thursday. Sheley also is from Sterling, a town of 15,000 about 100 miles west of Chicago.
On Monday, police discovered the bodies of two men, a woman and a child in an apartment in nearby Rock Falls. Investigators believe they likely died late Saturday or early Sunday.

Sheley was acquainted with the male victims, Brock Branson and Kenneth Ulvey, both in their 20s, said Illinois State Police. Police did not identify the woman or child.
More than 250 miles away, the bodies of Tom and Jill Estes of Sherwood, Ark., were found Monday behind a gas station in Festus.

The couple had checked into a Comfort Inn in Festus on Friday and was last seen late Sunday. Their dogs were found in the hotel parking lot, unharmed but covered with blood.

Public records show Sheley has multiple convictions for robbery, drugs and weapons charges and has spent three years in prison.

Sheley's uncle, Joe Sheley, 47, of Sterling, said before his nephew's capture that Nicholas Sheley recently struggled with drugs and his rap sheet includes 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 served nearly three years for aggravated robbery between 2000 and 2003 and another 17 months on parole, which ended in April 2005, IDOC spokesman said.

Federal prosecutors in northern Illinois charged Sheley on Tuesday with fleeing the state to avoid prosecution for a June 14 felony home invasion in Sterling.

At one point Sheley was in Iowa, and stopped to call his wife Saturday from a rest area between Davenport and Bettendorf, Iowa, an FBI agent said in an affidavit.

Update 07/03/2008

Sheley suspected in a killing spree that left eight people in two states dead is being transferred to a county where he's charged in one of the slayings.

Sheley faces Knox County charges of first-degree murder, aggravated battery, vehicle hijacking and theft in last month's beating death of 65-year-old Ronald Randall.