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Thread: James Opelton Bradley Sentenced to LWOP in 2014 NC Slaying of Elisha Tucker

  1. #11
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    MURDER TRIAL OF TWICE-CONVICTED PENDER COUNTY KILLER UNDERWAY

    By Matt Bennett
    WWAY News

    WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — The trial of twice convicted killer James Bradley continued in Wilmington Tuesday.

    Bradley is now accused of killing Elisha Tucker, whose body was found in Hampstead in 2014. The DA’s office is seeking the death penalty.

    Witnesses on Tuesday included investigators, a Pender County Sheriff’s deputy, and a Wilmington Police Department CSI worker.

    WPD Sgt. Robert “Lee” Odham described how he and two other sergeants found Tucker’s body while searching for Shannon Rippy Van Newkirk, whom Bradley was convicted of killing in 2017.

    Odham said he saw a stump sticking up in the middle of a field, and the ground around it was spongy. He says he “bounced” on it, and water was released along with a smell he says he immediately recognized as human decomposition. Another sergeant, Matthew Fox agreed.

    Odham said they dug and found trash bags, which contained the remains of a body later identified as Tucker.

    The trial is taking place in Wilmington due to hurricane damage at the Pender County Courthouse. It continues tomorrow.

    https://www.wwaytv3.com/2019/03/19/m...ller-underway/

  2. #12
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    James Bradley found guilty in murder of Elisha Tucker

    By Jim Gentry
    WECT

    WILMINGTON, NC (WECT) - James Bradley has been found guilty of first-degree murder in the death of Elisha Tucker.

    The jury deliberated for less than three hours Tuesday morning before returning a verdict.

    The sentencing phase of the case is scheduled to begin at 9:30 a.m. Thursday. District Attorney Ben David announced his office would seek the death penalty soon after a grand jury returned an indictment for first-degree murder in the case.

    “We will be calling additional witnesses on Thursday,” David said. “This jury, after eight weeks in the making, say they can fairly consider life or death for Bradley."

    This marks the third time Bradley has been convicted of murder. He spent nearly 25 years in prison in the 1988 killing of his 8-year-old stepdaughter.

    He is serving a 30-year sentence on a second-degree murder conviction in the presumed death of Shannon Rippy Van Newkirk, his coworker and love interest, who has not been seen or heard from since April 5, 2014.

    Tucker was reported missing by her family on Oct. 21, 2013, though it had been months since they had heard from her. The Wilmington woman had an extensive drug history and convictions for prostitution, according to court documents.

    She remained missing until April 29, 2014, when investigators who were searching for Shannon Rippy Van Newkirk on a plot of land she and Bradley frequented for their landscaping jobs discovered human remains. The remains were initially believed to be Van Newkirk — prompting authorities to charge Bradley with her murder — but were later identified as Tucker.

    Though Bradley immediately was named a suspect in Tucker’s killing, he wasn’t formally charged until late 2016 when investigators obtained physical evidence — principally, the test results of blood found on the floorboard of his SUV being a DNA match to Tucker — linking the pair.

    Closing arguments wrapped up in the capital murder trial Monday.

    David spent several hours Monday presenting what he called the three Bs in the case — body, bindings and blood — that prove Bradley killed Elisha Tucker.

    Tucker’s body was discovered in 2014 bound with duct tape and wrapped in trash bags in a shallow grave in a Hampstead field. David said Tucker’s autopsy showed she had blunt force trauma to the head and broken ribs, and that she was struck with some sort of object at least four times.

    David also said by the time Tucker’s body arrived for an autopsy, there was no blood left in her body.

    “The three Bs in this case are blood, body and bindings," David told the jury. "Elisha was someone’s baby, and this is her day in court. It is time for justice for her.”

    The state says Tucker’s DNA and blood were found in Bradley’s truck, although the defense disagrees. David also said duct tape found on Tucker’s body matched duct tape found in Bradley’s apartment on Flint Drive.

    “Bradley is an expert cleaner and body concealer," David said. "He cleaned his car three times in one week after the disappearance of Tucker.”

    Geoffrey Hosford, Bradley’s defense attorney, stressed during closing arguments that Bradley and Tucker were in a relationship and living together, that Bradley would have no motive to kill Tucker, and there was no previous altercation between the two. Hosford asked for a mistrial multiple times Monday, saying David improperly instructed the jury and made improper references to Rippy Van Newkirk’s murder.

    In addition, Hosford stated Bradley was not living in the apartment where the duct tape was found but rather on Dawson Street with Tucker.

    One alternative juror was dismissed Monday after she stated she had seen coverage of Bradley’s second murder trial on television over the weekend.

    http://www.wect.com/2019/03/25/closi...-murder-trial/

  3. #13
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    Jury to decide James Bradley’s murder penalty

    After a days-long sentencing hearing, the capital case was back in jurors’ hands

    WILMINGTON -- James Opleton Bradley’s fate is back in the hands of the jury that last week convicted him of first-degree murder.

    On Tuesday, following a days-long sentencing hearing, a Pender County jury began deliberations on Bradley’s sentence for the 2013 murder of Elisha Tucker. Tucker’s body was found bound in duct tape and wrapped in trash bags in a Pender County field in 2014.

    Bradley is eligible for the death penalty, or life in prison.

    Police found Tucker’s body while searching for another missing Wilmington woman: Shannon Rippy Van Newkirk, 53, last seen April 5, 2014, while walking to a downtown Wilmington bar. Van Newkirk’s body has never been found, but Bradley was convicted of second-degree murder in her presumed death in 2017.

    Bradley was also convicted of murder for the 1988 slaying of Ivy Gipson, his 8-year-old stepdaughter, in Cumberland County.

    During the sentencing hearing, the defense and prosection each called two witnesses.

    District Attorney Ben David’s office called Claude Maxwell, the chief investigator into Gipson’s murder, and Detective Carlos Lamberty, investigator on Rippy’s disappearance and presumed murder and Tucker’s murder. Defense attorneys Michael Ramos and Geoffrey Hosford called forensic psychologist Dr. Ginger Calloway, who produced a psychological profile of Bradley, and prison consultant James Aiken, who argued Bradley could be safely incarcerated for life.

    If Bradley receives the death penalty, he would be the first person from the Pender-New Hanover district sent to death row since Paul Dewayne Cummings in 2004.

    Cummings, now 39, was convicted in the 2002 murder of Jane Truelove Head, found stabbed to death on the floor of her 202 Dogwood Road by her adult children. Cummings remains incarcerated at Raleigh’s Central Prison, one of 140 people on North Carolina’s death row.

    North Carolina has not executed anyone since 2006, when Samuel Flippen, 36, was put to death for the beating death of his 2-year-old stepdaughter

    https://www.starnewsonline.com/news/...murder-penalty
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  4. #14
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    JAMES BRADLEY ESCAPES DEATH PENALTY IN THIRD MURDER CONVICTION

    WWAY News

    WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — A New Hanover County jury could not come to a decision as to whether James Bradley should be sentenced to death or spend life in prison for the murder of Elisha Tucker.

    Instead, the judge declared a mistrial, which means Bradley will receive an automatic sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.

    “A serial killer is off the streets of southeastern North Carolina and will never walk among us again,” New Hanover County District Attorney Ben David said.

    “Three strikes and you’re out” were the words of David to three-time convicted killer.

    Bradley has had two murder trials in two years along with his 1988 murder conviction of his eight-year-old stepdaughter.

    “I can tell you that it’s mercifully rare to see pure evil,” David said. “With Bradley, he’s pure evil.”

    Bradley killed Ivy Gibson, Shannon Rippy Van Newkirk and Elisha Tucker.

    “If there’s going to be a death penalty in this state, there are times when it needs to be enforced,” he said. “This was that defendant. This was that case.”

    It’s a sentence the district attorney’s office offered Bradley several times during the years and most recently during closing arguments, if he would tell them where Shannon Rippy Van Newkirk‘s body was located. He denied the offer every time.

    “Right when we found Elisha Tucker and were still looking for Shannon Rippy, that if he would just take us to Shannon’s body, we would give him life without parole,” David said.

    Bradley was convicted in 2017 of killing Van Newkirk, but her body has never been found. Friday will mark five years since she was reported missing.

    While investigators were searching for Van Newkirk, they found Tucker’s body buried in trash bags and wrapped in duct tape in Hampstead in 2014. Bradley was sentenced to between 30-37 years in prison for Van Newkirk’s murder.

    Bradley previously spend two decades in prison for killing his 8-year-old stepdaughter.

    “I believe personally, that this is one of the few things that he can still control and still be cruel about,” he said.

    As David emphasized throughout this trial, it’s not about Bradley, but those whose lives were brutally taken.

    “There’s no joy in this,” he said. “There’s justice. There’s no question that justice has been done by this jury, and we thank them for their verdict.”

    Bradley was immediately taken to Raleigh following the sentencing, where he will spend the rest of his life behind bars.

    https://www.wwaytv3.com/2019/04/04/j...er-conviction/

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