Thursday, December 16, 2010
Jeffrey Easley back in Roanoke to face abduction counts in Brittany Smith case
The suspect in Brittany Smith's abduction is scheduled to appear in court Friday.
Kyle Green The Roanoke Times
Police searched this duplex on Garden City Boulevard, which is the home of Adam McElvy, who police say "could have assisted"Jeffrey Easley. Electronics and DVDs were seized.
ERIC BRADY The Roanoke Times
Roanoke County police Detectives Chris Welch (left) and John McPhail (right) escort Jeffrey Easley, the man accused of abducting 12-year-old Brittany Smith, to the Roanoke County-Salem Jail on Wednesday evening. McPhail and Welch also escorted Easley from San Francisco.
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Authorities have ruled Tina Smith's death a homicide, but have declined to say how she died. She's pictured here with 12-year-old Brittany Smith in Tina Smith's Facebook profile photo.
Ongoing coverage
Updated 12/16/10: Due to the winter weather, Jeffrey Easley's arraignment has been moved from today to 1 p.m. Friday.
Jeffrey Easley, caught with his slain girlfriend's 12-year-old daughter in San Francisco last week, landed in Roanoke on Wednesday night with two detectives to face abduction charges.
Easley, 32, was brought off a passenger jet at Roanoke Regional Airport with cuffs around his wrists and ankles and placed in the back seat of a silver minivan, where two more officers awaited him. Another police vehicle followed them to the Roanoke County-Salem Jail, where a magistrate ordered Easley locked up under medical watch and without bail.
He stepped out of the minivan at the jail with the detectives who picked him up in California, John McPhail and Chris Welch, unshaven and with a blank stare.
He was to appear in Roanoke County General District Court at 1 p.m. Friday to be arraigned on a charge that he abducted Brittany Smith, 12.
Easley and Brittany left Roanoke County Dec. 3 or Dec. 4 in a Dodge Neon owned by his live-in girlfriend Tina Smith, 41, who police said was killed in her Fort Lewis Circle home on Dec. 3. They were spotted panhandling outside a San Francisco supermarket, near a park where they had pitched a Walmart tent, on Dec. 10. Roanoke County detectives brought Brittany home Monday.
The investigation into the killing of Tina Smith, a senior citizens center nurse, gathered speed Wednesday. Police have called Easley a suspect. They won't say the cause of death.
Police also said a Garden City man "could have assisted in the murder," according to a search warrant for his duplex apartment. An inventory filed with the warrant Wednesday showed police seized a flat-screen television, remote control, a DVD player, Wii video games and an assortment of DVDs they believe were taken from Tina Smith's house.
The warrant said police suspect the duplex resident, Adam McElvy, 27, was with Easley the day Smith was killed. A man who looks like McElvy was seen on surveillance video with Easley and Brittany at the Apple Market on West Main Street in Salem on Friday night, the warrant said.
McElvy and Jordan McClure, the woman he lives with, bought Easley's red Chevrolet Blazer just before Easley and Brittany left town, the warrant said. The vehicle was parked in front of the Garden City Boulevard duplex on Wednesday.
Neither McElvy nor McClure has been charged with a crime.
McElvy's criminal record includes a 2002 charge of raping a 14-year-old girl and two counts of sodomy, according to court records. Under a plea agreement, he pleaded guilty to contributing to the delinquency of a minor, and the sodomy charges were dropped. He was sentenced to a year in prison, according to court records.
McElvy's landlord, Charles Chang, said he is seeking to evict McElvy and McClure because they haven't paid December's $550 rent or the water bill.
amanda.codispoti @roanoke.com 981-3334
jorge.valencia@roanoke.com 981-3349
