Nicole Lebby-Wiley thought she was dreaming when she awoke to a 4 a.m. phone call delivering devastating news: Her sister-in-law had died in a Labor Day fire.
Just hours earlier, around 1 a.m., DeKalb County firefighters had pulled 48-year-old Stephanie Wiley out of her bedroom as heavy flames engulfed her Stonecrest apartment. She’d suffered burns and inhaled smoke.
“My brother-in-law called me and pretty much told me that her apartment caught on fire, and she was rushed to the hospital, and she didn’t make it,” Lebby-Wiley told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Adding to the tragedy, investigators have said they believe the fire was intentionally set, and they suspect Wiley’s ex-boyfriend, Shawn Fails.
The 44-year-old was arrested later Monday, nearly 100 miles away in Alabama, on charges of murder, aggravated assault and arson. Investigators have not disclosed a motive.
Fails has since been extradited and was booked Thursday into the DeKalb County Jail. Online court records do not list an attorney for him.
According to Lebby-Wiley, Fails met Wiley through work, and they dated for about a year. But, she said, the family didn’t know him well.
The two women were very close, as they’d known each other since middle school, when Lebby-Wiley started dating one of Wiley’s brothers.
She said she spoke with her sister-in-law a few days before her death, and she could tell something was weighing on her.
“My sister’s a very happy person, you know, and just by the tone of her voice, it just sounded like she wasn’t 100% herself. I knew something was bothering her,” Lebby-Wiley said. “But when I asked her, I said, ‘Are you OK?’ She’s like, ‘Yeah, I’m good. I’m just tired.’”
She did not anticipate that call would be their last.
On top of having to make funeral arrangements, the family also faces medical expenses for one of Wiley’s adult sons who was inside the apartment at The Hills at Fairington complex. He was seriously injured while jumping from a second-floor window to escape the blaze.
A neighbor’s doorbell camera footage, obtained by Channel 2 Action News and reviewed by the family, shows Wiley’s son hit the ground while pleading for someone to save his mother.
“To hear him cry out for his mom’s safety ... It’s all the more piercing to me,” Wiley’s brother, Rodney Wiley, told the news station upon watching the footage.
The 27-year-old needed surgery to put a plate on his pelvis and repair a laceration on his side, Lebby-Wiley said.
A GoFundMe campaign has been launched to help with funeral and medical costs.
“Anything will help,” they wrote on the donation site. “Please help us to lay our beautiful Stephanie to rest.”
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