THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, August 29, 1995 TAG: 9508290288
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JUNE ARNEY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Medium: 70 lines
A Circuit Court judge on Monday refused to grant bond to Billy Joe Brown Jr., one of two Navy SEAL trainees charged in the killing of Jennifer L. Evans.
Brown, 23, had been refused bond in a lower court and appealed.
Judge Thomas S. Shadrick on Monday said Brown had linked himself to the crime through statements to police and had no ties to the community - two factors making a release on bond inappropriate.
Brown is being held in the Virginia Beach jail.
Detectives on Monday provided new details of Brown's statements. In two versions, Brown says his roommate, Dustin A. Turner, 20, killed Evans after meeting her in a resort nightspot in June.
In one statement, Brown told Detective Al Byrum that he and Turner decided to have sex with Evans, who had passed out. Turner drove to a side street near the Oceanfront. The two got on opposite sides of Evans and started undressing her, but she woke up, screaming and kicking. Turner then put his hand over her mouth and Brown held her down.
Evans went limp but woke up soon afterward, and Turner choked her, Brown said.
Brown said he then went to sleep and woke up in a wooded area when Turner asked him to help move her body.
In a second account, Brown said he walked up just as Turner was getting out of the car. Evans was inside and appeared to be dead.
He said Turner told him: ``I think I killed her.'' Turner then suggested taking her to the beach, raping her and dumping her body in the water to make it look like she had drowned.
Once in the car, Brown said, he fondled her even though he believed she was dead. ``I realize this is pretty sick,'' he told Byrum.
The two then dumped her body in a wooded area of Newport News Park. Brown ate a sandwich and they returned to their barracks at Little Creek Naval Amphibious Base. The next day they went apartment hunting. In a conversation later that day, Brown said Turner told him about the killing.
Turner told him that Evans had agreed to have sex with him, but then told him to stop when he ripped the buttons from her shorts while they were in his car. He pushed her down with his arm.
Brown claimed he agreed to lie to FBI agents and the Virginia Beach police to protect Turner, initially telling them that he and Turner left the nightclub together while Evans remained inside.
Evans, 21, vanished from The Bayou nightclub June 19. The body of the honors pre-medical student at Emory University in Atlanta was found June 27 in the Newport News park.
Turner's version of events was that he left the bar with Evans, then went back to suggest that Brown find another ride home.
Evans and Turner then walked back to Turner's car to listen to music. Shortly afterward, Brown walked up and got in the back seat. That's when the killing occurred. Turner claims that Brown was the killer.
Shortly after Turner's arrest, police confiscated 4 1/2 pounds of plastic explosive from Turner's apartment in his hometown, Bloomington, Ind.
In 1990, when Brown was 17, he assaulted his 14-year-old wife in front of Huber Heights police, and then fought three officers when they tried to arrest him, according to an Ohio police report. He was charged with domestic violence and three related offenses. ILLUSTRATION: FILE PHOTO
SEAL trainee Billy Joe Brown Jr., left, was taken into custody June
28 by Virginia Beach Detective Al Byrum.
KEYWORDS: MURDER by CNB