IL - Michael Cooney, 62, Dorothy Bone, 82, & Doris Fischer, 79, slain, 2 Mar 2005 *suspect died*

WasBlind said:

Prayers for their families, and that they have justice, Lanie

Click to expand...

Authorities have identified a bloody thumbprint inside a sport utility vehicle that was taken from the West Main Street salon where a hairdresser and two customers were fatally stabbed a year ago, police sources said Thursday.

The thumbprint belongs to a teenage boy from St. Louis whom authorities questioned for several hours after the hairdresser, Michael J. Cooney, 62, and sisters Dorothy E. Bone, 82, and Doris J. Fischer, 79, were fatally stabbed on March 2 last year, the sources said.

Click to expand...

Police Chief Dave Ruebhausen denied news reports Friday that police have identified a bloody thumbprint found inside a sport utility vehicle belonging to a hairdresser who was murdered with two clients last year. Ruebhausen wouldn't comment directly about evidence in the murders of Michael Cooney, 62, and sisters Dorothy Bone, 82 and Doris Fischer, 79.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported Friday that a thumbprint in blood from the crime scene was found inside Cooney's Nissan Pathfinder and belonged to a 16-year-old St. Louis boy who police questioned for hours the day after the murders.

"It was information from an anonymous source, and it wasn't accurate," Ruebhausen said. "That information hurts what we are trying to do."

Click to expand...

A grand jury on Friday issued murder charges against a man believed at one time to be a prime suspect in the grisly stabbing murders of three people in a west Belleville beauty salon in 2005.

Samuel L. Johnson, 50, was charged Friday with first-degree murder in connection with the slayings of Doris Fischer, 79, and her sister, Dorothy Bone, 82, and their hairdresser, Michael Cooney, 62, at Cooney’s home-based beauty salon in West Belleville on March 2, 2005.

Belleville Police Department reinitiated the investigation in 2014. The indictment was unsealed Monday.

“New evidence collected during the course of that investigation has been presented by my office to a St. Clair County Grand Jury,” said State’s Attorney Brendan Kelly. “The grand jury has returned an indictment charging (Johnson), of St. Louis, Mo., with three counts of first-degree murder of Michael Cooney, Doris Fischer and Dorothy Bone at 7813 Main Street in Belleville.”

Click to expand...

Johnson is serving a seven-year term in the Missouri Department of Corrections in Charleston for receiving stolen property, possession of a firearm, possession of a controlled substance and possession of a controlled substance within a jail.

Missouri Department of Corrections lists 22 aliases for Johnson, including Felton Belson. He is eligible for release from Missouri Department of Corrections on Oct. 30. He can then waive extradition to face the Illinois charges or have a hearing so a judge can decide whether he should be brought to St. Clair County on the murder charges.

His bail on the Illinois murder charges is set at $3 million.

Click to expand...

Jurors have found Darrell Lane not guilty on all counts in a triple homicide case.

Lane was accused of three counts of first-degree murder in the 2005 stabbing deaths of Belleville hair stylist Michael Cooney and two clients, sisters Dorothy Bone and Doris Fischer. The jury began deliberating the case shortly after 10:45 this morning, and the verdict was returned just before 4 p.m.

Click to expand...

In closing arguments this morning, prosecutors said Lane was "caught red handed" when his finger left a bloody print inside Michael Cooney's stolen SUV. Crime scene analysts said Lane's fingerprint was made with Cooney's blood.

"There is no more powerful evidence of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt than a bloody fingerprint," said Jim Piper, an assistant St. Clair County state's attorney.

Lane's defense lawyer said his client made the print after several others had stolen the vehicle and wiped the car down. A fingerprint expert has said that the print could have been made by a damp finger that touched dried blood found on the upholstery.

"That's all he's guilty of ... being inside a stolen motor vehicle," said Andrew Liefer, Lane's defense attorney.

Click to expand...

The man accused of three stabbing murders at a Belleville hair salon in 2005 will be heading back to Illinois to face first-degree murder charges.

Samuel L. Johnson, 51, waived extradition from Missouri to Illinois at a court hearing Tuesday.

“We are making plans to go and get him right now,” St. Clair County Sheriff Rick Watson said.

Click to expand...

In an interview with News-Democrat reporters in 2005, Anna Nicole Hobbs, who was then the girlfriend of Demico Evans, Johnson’s cousin and roommate, said Johnson had taken a hook-bladed knife from her nightstand the day before the killings. Hobbs told reporters how a nervous Johnson returned the next day with a wad of cash, telling them he had “messed up.”

For more than a year after the murders, no charges were issued in the case. In 2006, the investigation was revived, and the Major Case Squad was activated. That investigation centered on Cooney’s Nissan Pathfinder, which was stolen from outside the salon the morning of the murder. The Pathfinder was found the next day behind an apartment in north St. Louis.

The Pathfinder was found abandoned, running with the keys in the ignition, behind a liquor store, four blocks from the home of Darrell “Rell” Lane. A teen from the neighborhood took the car for a joyride, according to police, then sold it for $20 later that night.

There were 30 fingerprints in the car, but a single one in blood left on the driver’s seat.

That fingerprint belonged to Lane, a developmentally delayed 16-year-old.

Based on that fingerprint, Haida charged Lane with murder. But the teen was acquitted.

Click to expand...

Johnson was arrested six days after the killings by the St. Louis Police Department. He remained in Missouri for six weeks fighting his extradition. Once paperwork to extradite Johnson was complete, three Belleville police officers went to pick him up April 22, 2005. Johnson previously declined to talk to police without a lawyer. But during that car ride, Detective Doug Jones wrote a report noting that Johnson changed his mind.

There was no recording of the conversation that occurred in the car.

“As the court knows, whenever any interaction occurs off-camera between officers and any interview subject — much less the prime suspect in a triple murder — the first thing they do once they get back on camera is to confirm the substance of what did and did not occur,” Keefe argues in a motion asking that the statements not be allowed as evidence.

Click to expand...

The man accused of a triple murder in a Belleville hair salon in 2005 said in a jailhouse interview last week that he’s innocent, and that the prosecution knows it because they already charged someone else who was acquitted.

“I am innocent,” Johnson said. “If you get a conviction, you will be convicting an innocent man.”

St. Clair County State’s Attorney Brendan Kelly charged Johnson last year. Johnson had been scheduled to go to trial last week, but the trial was continued at the request of the defense.

Johnson’s trial is scheduled to begin Jan. 18.

Click to expand...

It was one of the bloodiest and most gruesome killings in Belleville history — the stabbing deaths of hairdresser Michael Cooney and two of his clients, 79-year-old Doris Fischer and 82-year-old Dorothy Bone.

For years, Belleville Police Chief Terry Delaney, now retired, insisted Samuel L. Johnson did it. On Monday, St. Clair County prosecutors will set about the job of convincing 12 people that Delaney was right. Jury selection for Johnson's murder trial is set to begin Monday at the St. Clair County Courthouse.

Click to expand...

JusticeWillBeServed said:

Jury selection begins Monday in Belleville hair salon triple-murder case

Click to expand...

JerseyGirl said:

Salon triple-stabbing trial delay frustrating, but likely a smart move

Click to expand...