In a case fraught with questions, another mystery emerged over the weekend: How did one of the suspects in the fatal shooting of a Norcross High School student come to possess a handcuff key in the Gwinnett County jail?
Authorities also remained unsure Monday of the motive in the teen's killing earlier this month, and the source of $20,000 found in the minivan of the six suspects.
Gwinnett Sheriff's spokesman Lt. Sean Smith said Monday the jail's intelligence unit was tipped off last week that Reco West, who is being held without bond on murder and burglary charges in the death of 15-year-old Nicholas Jackson II, had obtained a key.
"Sheriff's deputies subsequently searched West's cell and later determined he was hiding the key in his mouth," Smith said. "It is still unclear how the inmate secured the key or how long he has been hiding it."
Most handcuff keys are about an inch long and can be used with almost any set of modern handcuffs. Smith didn't immediately know what kind of key West had in his mouth.
West, 19, was subsequently moved to the "super max" portion of the county jail, into his own cell. "It’s a type of confinement that’s monitored much more closely," Smith said.
Prosecutors were considering whether to add file another charge against West. The charge -- items prohibited for possession by inmates -- carries a penalty of up to five years in prison.
As for investigators' other questions in the case, chief among them is why West and five other men allegedly targeted Jackson's home on the night of Feb. 2.
According to authorities, Jackson was trying to bar the basement door with his hands when six shots were fired from at least two guns. He was shot once through the heart. A short time later, his 17-year-old sister found him unconscious in the basement after hearing noises that turned out to be the gunshots.
Jackson, a freshman football star and honor student, died on the way to the hospital.
Police are now checking cellphone records for Jackson, his family and the suspects to determine if there were any previous relationships and if the men targeted the home.
"We’re working on all kinds of leads and follow-ups," Norcross police Capt. Brian Harr said. "There's still a lot we don't know."
Those unanswered questions -- and the bloody crime scene -- have kept Jackson's family out of the home since the shooting.
In an interview with the AJC on Monday, Jackson's father, Nicholas Jackson Sr., said the family has been staying in a nearby hotel and has no immediate plans to return to the five-bedroom home they've lived in since 2008.
"I don't know if we're going back there or not," Jackson said.
Jackson, his wife and daughter have tried to manage their grief even as friends and neighbors have rallied to their aid with hugs, cash donations and home-cooked meals. The owner of the hotel has a daughter who was his son's classmate, Jackson said, and they've allowed the family to stay there for free until they figure out their next move.
"We still can't believe what happened," Jackson said. "Words really can't describe how or what I'm feeling."
Jackson also said the family found the money initially reported as missing from his son's room. The father pulled about $400 cash out of one of his son's pairs of jeans over the weekend, money the teen earned from household chores and received as a gift for Christmas and his recent birthday.
"He liked money as a gift," Jackson said. "And he was a good saver."
That only leads to more questions about the $20,000 found in the minivan of the six suspects.
The money was stuffed in a black bag and hidden in a compartment of the Dodge Caravan, where authorities also found four semiautomatic handguns, two ski masks, two pairs of latex gloves and a roll of duct tape.
All of these items -- markers of a robbery crew, prosecutors say -- were uncovered when police stopped the minivan about a third of a mile from the scene of the home invasion minutes earlier.
"We don't know where (the money) came from," Gwinnett Assistant District Attorney Mike Morrison said Monday. "But we don't believe it came from the Jackson household."
Also charged with murder and burglary in the home invasion are: Michael Davis, 23, Jason Dozier, 36, Eddie Lewis Green, 46, Timothy Lamar Johnson, 34 and Anthony Bernard Lumpkin, 32.
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