Jury finds Bethea not guilty in double homicide

A Delaware Superior Court jury deliberated for about six and a half hours before finding Damon Bethea not guilty in the January 2014 double homicide and robbery at a home on Harmons Hill Road in Millsboro.

Bethea, 32, of Camden, N.J., faced 21 felony charges including two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of first-degree robbery and 15 charges of possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony.

Prosecutor Chris Hutchison said he respected the jury’s decision. Judge Jane Brady said in her view, Bethea was a lucky man. She encouraged him not to come to Delaware again.  

On the last day of testimony in the trial, Bethea took the stand in his own defense. He was asked point-blank by attorney Tom Donovan, “Did you kill Cletis Nelson?”

“No,” Bethea replied.

“Did you kill William Hopkins?” Donovan asked.

Again Bethea replied, “No.”

Bethea’s account of the weekend of Jan. 13, 2014, differs from that of defendants Shamir Stratton and Richard Robinson. According to Bethea, he was an unwitting member of a group that traveled from New Jersey and Pennsylvania for what he thought would be a Friday night party but that eventually led to robbery and murder.

Bethea, a bookish-looking, thin man clad in an ill-fitting dress shirt and khakis, and wearing dark-rimmed eyeglasses, said he was first approached to come to Delaware by Stratton, his cousin. Bethea said his family and Stratton’s were close, and that he and Stratton would frequently hang out. He said the only other time they had gone to Delaware for a night out had been a trip to Newark; Bethea said he had never been to Sussex County until the weekend of the murders.

At first, Bethea said, he was hesitant to go with Stratton; he said he had finished a 15-hour shift at his job at a box-manufacturing plant and was tired. Bethea relented, he said, because Stratton assured him they would only be down for one night and then come back. Bethea said he traveled with no extra clothes, no phone charger and no contact lens solution; he testified that he is blind in his right eye and cannot see out of his left eye without a corrective lens.

Along the way, Bethea said Stratton stopped in Philadelphia to pick up Stratton’s cousins, Robinson and Rhamir Waples, two brothers who Stratton referred to as his “little cousins.” Bethea said he fell asleep on the way to Delaware, thinking the group was going to New Castle County, and he was surprised to wake up to the sight of cornfields.

The group intended to go to a party at the Millsboro VFW, but when they found it was Oldies Night, Bethea testified, Stratton did not want to go. They then went to a residence on Pine Ridge Road occupied by John Snead and his brother, Steven Kellam, known to everyone as Silk. Bethea said the group asked Kellam if they could crash at the house, and Kellam agreed. Bethea said Kellam had guns all around the house, which made him nervous. Bethea said he constantly nagged Stratton to go home, but Stratton talked him out of it.

Tensions soon arose between Robinson and Bethea, after Bethea said he caught Robinson and Waples trying to break into a nearby home. Bethea said he overheard Robinson yelling at Stratton, “Why did you bring him here?” That night, Stratton, Bethea, Robinson, Waples and Kellam went back to the VFW, where a fight broke out. Bethea said he stayed out of the fracas, which angered Stratton, who got hit over the head with a bottle. After seeing Stratton’s head wound, Bethea pressured Stratton into going to the hospital. He said Robinson and Waples demanded to come to Beebe Healthcare with them, fearful that Bethea and Stratton would leave them in Sussex County. Bethea said he thought Stratton was showing off during the weekend for his younger cousins, trying to play the role of a street guy.

The following day, Jan. 13, Bethea said Snead took Stratton to view two men sitting in a car, with Snead asking Stratton if one of the men, who had dreadlocks and fits the description of Hopkins, was the one who hit him with the bottle. Later, Bethea said, they heard Snead was down the road trying to start a fight. He said he stayed behind while Stratton, Kellam, Robinson and Waples went to check out the situation. Previous witnesses, including Stratton, have testified that Kellam and Waples were armed at the confrontation between Snead and the other man, who turned out to be Hopkins.  The confrontation ended with a one-on-one fight in which Hopkins got the better of Snead.

Bethea said he again pressured Stratton to take him home, which led to Stratton becoming annoyed with him. The group - Bethea, Kellam, Waples, Robinson and Stratton - then went out, first stopping at a Wawa in Milford where Bethea said he talked to a car full of girls, trying to persuade them to give him a lift up north. Their next stop was a hotel in Long Neck, where they encountered Rachel Rentoul, Jackie Heverin and Carlton Gibbs. Bethea said he hit on Heverin until Heverin asked if he had drugs. He said he and Heverin were away from the rest of the group, who went in and out of the bathroom, Bethea presumed, to smoke marijuana. Bethea said the group did not talk about a robbery of Nelson and Hopkins around him.

The group then left in separate cars, Rentoul and Heverin together, Gibbs driving Kellam, and Stratton driving Bethea, Waples and Robinson. Bethea said they met at the home of one of Kellam’s relatives. He said Kellam handed Stratton a bundled sweatshirt that contained three guns. Bethea said Stratton passed guns to Waples and Robinson and tried to pass one to Bethea, who demurred.

When asked by Donovan what he thought at that point, Bethea said, “A bad situation.”

Bethea tesified Robinson, Waples and Stratton talked about a mission and pulled out the guns in preparation. When the subject of what to do came up, Bethea said Kellam was called and when the order was given to kill whoever was inside the house, Stratton protested. Bethea said Robinson and Waples were eager to commit a robbery. The group then went to Nelson’s home on Harmons Hill Road where Robinson, Waples and Bethea got out of the car.

Robinson had earlier testified that Bethea went in the house through the bathroom window and then let Robinson and Waples in the back door, where they robbed and killed Hopkins and Nelson. Bethea testified he walked away from the situation before entering the house. He said he was walking near the woods when he heard shots from in the house and saw Stratton’s car screech away. Bethea said Stratton stopped to look for him, but when Bethea wasn’t visible, Stratton drove away. Stratton had earlier testified that he later learned Bethea was delayed in coming out of the house because he was cleaning up the crime scene, trying to eliminate any fingerprints.

Bethea testified he walked for two hours before Kellam and Gibbs found him and eventually persuaded him to come back with them after assuring Bethea they did not have guns in Gibbs’ truck. He said he did not see any money change hands from the robbery and that no one talked about what they had done. Bethea said Stratton seemed to be spooked by the experience, but Kellam, Gibbs, Robinson and Waples carried on like nothing had happened.

In his cross-examination, prosecutor Martin Cosgrove challenged Bethea’s testimony that he was a reluctant participant. He repeatedly asked Bethea why, if he was so hesitant to be there, particularly after he knew Kellam had guns in the house and when he knew a robbery was going to go down, did he did not try to call someone to pick him up. Bethea said the area they were in had no cellphone service, and the place Snead and Kellam lived did not have a landline. Cosgrove questioned Bethea’s level of discomfort at his situation, with Bethea on one hand insisting he had been uncomfortable but on the other hand admitting to walking in a strange area at night. Cosgrove questioned Bethea’s claimed level of blindness, asking him how he was able to see Stratton’s head wound in the dark. Finally, Cosgrove asked Bethea why he was so adamant about leaving Sussex County, but when the idea of going to a party at the VFW came up, he was all in.

Bethea was the defense’s main witness; they rested their case just before noon April 12.

Prosecution rests

The prosecution rested its case April 11, with its final witness, Detective Fred Chambers of the Delaware State Police.

Chambers detailed how the investigation into the crimes, later known as Operation In The House, evolved after the murders of Nelson and Hopkins. He said from Nelson’s brother, Terrence, police were able to track down Cannon. After interviewing Cannon, police then were led to Rentoul and Heverin. The trail picked up two weeks after the murders, Chambers said, after interviewing Stratton, who slowly revealed information about the murders in the course of a five-hour interview in Camden, N.J. Chambers said initially, Stratton did not give police Bethea’s name as being involved, but when shown pictures of Bethea during Stratton’s visit to Beebe in a follow-up interview, Stratton confirmed Bethea’s being in Sussex County.

After their initial interview with Stratton, Chambers said, police searched Kellam’s car and found a receipt from the Milford Wawa they visited the night of the murders and a discharge paper from Stratton’s trip to Beebe. A year after the murders, police obtained a phone wiretap on Kellam, and they heard Kellam and Snead talk about Chambers’ visit to interview Waples and Robinson. Chambers said during the wiretap, Kellam did not have contact with Bethea.

On cross-examination by defense attorney Adam Windett, Chambers said police evidence technicians conducted fingerprint testing on the window screen prosecutors say Bethea removed to get into Nelson’s house and did not find usable prints. He said there was no physical evidence, such as DNA or fingerprints, tying Bethea to the murders.

Attorneys give closing arguments

In closing arguments, Cosgrove said the motive for the murders of Hopkins and Nelson was twofold: money and retaliation.

Cosgrove said events began with a phone call from Kellam to Stratton about doing a robbery. He said Kellam used his cousins because he figured they could be counted on not to talk. Stratton contacted Bethea, Robinson and Waples, offering them the chance to come to Sussex County to go to a party. Cosgrove said through photos obtained from surveillance at Beebe Healthcare and the Milford Wawa, police were able to put Bethea, Waples, Stratton and Robinson in Sussex County the day of the killings.

The night of the shooting, the gang met up at a Long Neck hotel with Rentoul, Heverin and Gibbs. Nelson was Rentoul’s boyfriend; he was also her drug dealer, Cosgrove said. He said when Rentoul mentioned Hopkins was a friend of Nelson’s and that Nelson had a large amount of cash and drugs at the house, lightbulbs went off in everyone’s head: do a robbery and get revenge on Hopkins for the fight with Snead.

Cosgrove said Bethea went in through the bathroom window and let Robinson and Waples in the back door. He said Bethea, armed with a .40 caliber semi-automatic pistol, pistol-whipped Nelson before he, Robinson and Waples robbed Nelson and Hopkins before shooting them - on orders from Kellam - in the chest and head. Cosgrove said Waples and Robinson fled, driven off by Stratton, while Bethea stayed behind to clean up the crime scene. Bethea was later picked up by Kellam and Gibbs, Cosgrove said. The group met up and divided up the money before going their separate ways.

Donovan said the prosecution was trying to fit square pegs in round holes. He said Bethea didn’t even want to come to Sussex County and complained so incessantly that it created tension with Robinson and led to Stratton punching him in the stomach. Donovan said there is no physical evidence linking Bethea to the crime, and that the stories of Robinson and Stratton differ in a number of aspects, most notably on what they did when they got to Sussex County, who had guns during the fight between Snead and Hopkins, who got which guns, how the robbery was planned and when the kill order was given.

Donovan said the only places their stories match up is on Bethea not having the heart for robberies, Bethea’s complaining all weekend and Robinson not wanting Bethea there. He said the prosecution has resorted to having snitches snitching on snitches in its effort to tie Bethea to the murders. Donovan scoffed at the prosecutor’s theory that Bethea could have climbed through a window with a gun without disturbing anything, taken part in a robbery with Robinson, who he didn’t like, and avoided detection by Nelson and Hopkins, who were awake.  Donovan said Heverin and Nelson’s roommate, Ed Cannon, testified to seeing a figure in the woods with something shiny on his head, which Donovan implied was Bethea’s hat, which still had a bright, New Era sticker on the brim. Donovan asked the jury for a not guilty verdict.