DEL.ICIO.USMove toward trial slow 19 months after woman was beaten, raped and strangled.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 04/29/08
It is a scene Linda Jacobs can't shake.
Police found her daughter's College Park apartment door standing open and tracked her by following a trail of torn cloths and pulled hair. They found Kimberly Jacobs, 26 — once a petite bundle of smiles — face down in her filled bathtub.
 Family photo | ||
| Kimberly Jacobs admires flowers sent by her boyfriend, Odaine Hudson. | ||
 Elissa Eubanks/Staff | ||
| Linda Jacobs shows a photo of her daughter Kimberly Jacobs and a shirt that she smells and holds to remind her of Kimberly, who was killed in September 2006. | ||
 Clayton County district attorney's office | ||
| Leroy Mitchell Knox, 23, suspected in the slaying of Kimberly Jacobs, is undergoing mental evaluation to determine if he is competent to stand trial. | ||
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Partially nude.
Beaten, raped and strangled.
"When I read the report, all I could do was imagine what happened to her," Jacobs said. "When I opened the casket to see her body, she had purple bruises and scratches on her forehead. Her eye was so swollen I almost didn't recognize her profile. That is a vision I will never forget."
Kimberly Jacobs was supposed to pick up her younger sister at the airport on Sept. 30, 2006.
Instead, she was buried.
It has been 19 months since Linda Jacobs' world caved in. The time seems longer when she considers that the man police say killed her daughter, Leroy Mitchell Knox, now 23, has yet to stand trial for murder, rape, kidnapping and necrophilia.
Already, the wait is more than four months longer than the usual time it takes from the date of a killing until sentencing. Since 2000, the statewide median time for that was slightly more than 14 months. And the Knox case isn't going to trial anytime soon.
Such facts and figures may mean something to researchers and legal analysts, but they're of little concern to Jacobs, who has seen the case languish for a variety of reasons.
The overriding delay has been completing a mental evaluation of the suspect, a process that generally takes three to six months. However, this one has been complicated by the suicide of the original psychiatrist, said John Turner, Clayton County's executive assistant district attorney.
And between January of this year and the next January, his court-appointed attorney, Robert Mack, has requested 10 leaves of absence for vacation and training.
Lawyers have to give notice for any known absences or face contempt of court charges, and judges don't generally question requests.
Jacobs comforts herself by knowing Knox is being held in the Clayton County Jail, unable to make a $275,000 bail. The latest court date has been set for Monday, but it can't take place until Knox's mental evaluation is finished. And that's unlikely.
"Typically, families get frustrated. We can never move fast enough to get families over the trauma," Clayton County District Attorney Jewel Scott said. "But we try to be as sensitive as possible to move the case along."
Jacobs is less optimistic. She has written letters to the GBI, Gov. Sonny Perdue, U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson and Attorney General Thurbert Baker asking for intervention.
"At this point, I don't believe that this is going to go to trial this year," Jacobs said, tossing aside a stack of monthly letters from Clayton's Victim Witness Assistance Program informing her of new court dates that never happened.
Jacobs is exasperated about the concern over Knox's mental health, particularly because authorities didn't seem as concerned with his mental state when they released him from jail just two hours before her daughter was killed.
That collected anger at the legal system is fueling her mission, which is also driven by her own guilt.
'She trusted me'
In her purse, she carries a small, red sweater that belonged to her daughter.
"My baby was 5-feet-zero, 103 pounds soaking wet," Jacobs said, holding the sweater up against her chest. "I just felt like I let her down. She trusted me to find a safe place for her, and I didn't do it.
"When she needed me the most," Jacobs said, "I wasn't there to protect her."
A single mother who retired after 25 years in the U.S. Army, Jacobs, 52, raised her two daughters to be independent.
The younger, Janese, 24, followed her mother's example and joined the military. The last time the three of them were together was June 2006, when Janese graduated from basic training in San Antonio.
Kimberly, after graduating from the University of Georgia in 2003, embarked on a career in social work. She initially worked for Head Start in Columbus but longed to return to Athens or to find a job in Atlanta closer to her friends and boyfriend.
"She was fun, carefree and strong spirited," said her college love, Odaine Hudson. The two met at UGA and dated for close to four years until her death.
Kimberly landed a job with the Easter Seals in January 2006. Her mother helped her hunt for an apartment, finally settling on a place in College Park.
Kimberly's biggest gripe about the place turned out to be her upstairs neighbors.
"They would fight all the time," Jacobs said. "She would sleep in the living room because of the noise."
Knox and his girlfriend were the couple upstairs.
Hudson said he met Knox shortly after Kimberly moved into her apartment when he came down and asked to borrow a plunger.
Kimberly didn't have one, so they all headed out to the store together, giving Hudson a chance to chat with Knox.
"He seemed OK. It seemed like he was in a bad position," he said, adding that he often heard the fighting upstairs. "Honestly, it didn't seem like he was violent."
Girlfriend disappeared
Months after she moved in, Jacobs asked her daughter about the noise upstairs.
"She said 'It has been quiet. I think they moved,' " Jacobs said.
But Knox was in jail, accused of beating up his girlfriend and charging at her with a butcher knife. He spent 113 days in jail while investigators searched in vain for the alleged victim, who disappeared after her initial complaint, quit her job, disconnected her phone and moved out of the apartment she shared with Knox, District Attorney Scott said.
He was released Sept. 25, the day Kimberly was killed.
"The girlfriend knew what he was capable of," Jacobs said. "My daughter did not know what he was capable of."
Police say he went home. When he didn't find his girlfriend, he went down to Kimberly's apartment, police believe.
A medical examiner ruled that Jacobs died of strangulation about 5 p.m. Twenty-nine minutes later, according to court records, someone made a 10-minute phone call from Kimberly's apartment phone to the grandmother of Knox's girlfriend.
In describing Kimberly, her boyfriend said, "She was not going to take any crap from anybody."
Indeed, Detective Charles Dan Blissitt Jr. testified during a preliminary hearing that Kimberly fought for her life.
"It looked as though the killer was behind her, pulling her shirt from behind, ripping the buttons off as she ran through her apartment," Blissitt said at the time.
She was beaten and raped before being killed. In charging Knox with necrophilia, police also believe that he had sex with Jacobs after he killed her.
The apartment was smoky and the stove was on. Police say that Knox tried to burn down the apartment.
Jacobs learned of her daughter's death when one of Kimberly's co-workers called: "She said, 'Kim has gone to be with the Lord.' "
In Athens, a friend called Hudson after hearing about his girlfriend's killing.
"I just thought it was a bad rumor. I started calling her and she didn't answer. As I was leaving to go to her place, it came on the news. It was unbelievable," Hudson said. "Everything just stopped moving for me. "
He still places flowers on Kimberly's grave twice a month.
Competent for trial?
Knox was arrested the next week. He maintains his innocence.
"He is not guilty because he didn't do it," said Knox's attorney, Robert Mack, who declined to elaborate.
Mack would not make Knox available for comment.
John Turner, the assistant district attorney, said the psychological evaluation will determine whether Knox is competent to stand trial and how the prosecutor proceeds with the case.
"We have not asked for the death penalty — yet. We will look at that when it is appropriate," Turner said. "But the court can't do anything until we get a report back. We are ready to try the case."
The day of Kimberly's funeral was a blur. Jacobs can't remember how many attended, but she does remember speaking at the funeral.
She talked about how smart and beautiful Kimberly was. How giving she was.
She plans to speak for her once more, at Knox's trial.
"I pray that the Lord gives me good health. If I don't live until the day after that trial, I will be happy," she said. "As long as I have breath in my body, he is going to face me. To do anything less would be to victimize my daughter again."
In her Columbus home, Jacobs has placed all of Kimberly's clothes in a closet.
Sometimes, she walks through it and smells them to remember. She continues to pay Kimberly's cellphone bill so that she can hear her daughter's voice on the outgoing message.
"These are the only words I will ever hear her say," Jacobs said. "The only link I have to her. Twenty-four hours a day, pictures flash through my head.
"The pictures never go away."
— Staff members Megan Clarke and Kevin Keeney contributed to this article.
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