The Attack at the Silk Plant Forest

By Adam Howell and Cassandra Sherrill

JOURNALNOW PRODUCER & JOURNAL GRAPHIC ARTIST

WINSTON-SALEM

Dec. 9: Jill Marker is assaulted in the Silk Plant Forest, the store where she was assistant manager, sometime between 8:45 and 8:55 p.m. $304 is stolen from the cash register. Marker, who is 3 months pregnant, is hospitalized in critical condition.
Dec. 10: Police receive a tip that a man named Kenneth Lamoureux had been seen talking with Marker.
Dec. 11: Police say they are looking for a black man seen leaving the store, getting in the passenger side of a Ford Mustang, and leaving in a hurry. This is the only CrimeStoppers report mentioning a suspect ever put out on the case.
Dec. 12: A woman calls police and to say she and a friend saw a suspicious white man inside the Silk Plant Forest about an hour before the attack. The next day both women separately identify Kenneth Lamoureux in a photo lineup.

April 19: Jill Marker, still in what is called a persistent vegetative state and critical condition at an Akron, Ohio, hospital, delivers a healthy baby boy, Barron.

May 22: The Granville County Sheriff's Department contacts Williams about a man named Shane Fletcher, who, while staying at Umstead Hospital, told a deputy that he had murdered a woman at the Silk Plant Forest.
May 23: Fletcher is interviewed at length, giving many accurate details about the attack. But, Fletcher's mother tells police that her son was in the psychiatric unit at Forsyth Medical Center from Dec. 3 to Dec. 11, 1995, when the attack on Marker occurred. His stay there partly overlaps with that of Lamoureux.

June 1: An anonymous CrimeStoppers' caller, who is later identified as Andra Wilson, says that Kalvin Smith was responsible for the attack at the Silk Plant Forest. Wilson had been dating Smith before he broke up with her for a woman named Valerie Williams.
June 14: Hospital records indicate that Fletcher had not been allowed to leave Forsyth Medical Center the night of the attack. Fletcher eventually backtracks from his confession, saying he was confused and had learned a lot about the case from television.

July 22: Kalvin Smith is arrested on outstanding warrants. He is interviewed in connection with the earlier CrimeStoppers tip and denies being involved in the attack at the Silk Plant Forest. He takes a polygraph and the police determine that he is truthful in his answers. He is released.

Oct. 31: Williams and another detective travel to Cleveland to interview Marker after her doctor says she can shake her head yes or no, can see with some accuracy and write a bit. She cannot speak. The detectives determine from the interview that Marker's attacker was a black man, about 30 years or older, medium to heavy build, less than 6 feet tall and with some facial hair.

Dec. 9: Police arrest Michael Fuller on a failure-to-appear warrant and take him to police headquarters. He was driving the Mustang that the CrimeStoppers tip mentioned a year earlier. He refuses to speak with police. The police search the Mustang but come up with nothing. The is the last police contact with Fuller.

Jan. 20: Valerie Williams, Smith's girlfriend, calls police to report that Smith was involved in the attack at the Silk Plant Forest.
Jan. 24: Smith and Williams both come to police headquarters. While Williams waits in one room, the police interview Smith. Smith gives a statement saying that he was in the Silk Plant Forest when an acquaintance attacked Marker.

April 23: Williams requests that the police investigation be closed, cleared by the arrest of Smith.
April 25: Jill Marker's husband, Aaron Marker, files a civil lawsuit against the Silas Creek Shopping Center and its owners, saying that they had not provided sufficient security to protect his wife.

Dec. 5: Smith is convicted of assault with intent to kill, and sentenced to a maximum term of 28 years and 11 months in prison.

June 25: Jill Marker wins a $9.25 million settlement in the civil lawsuit against the Silas Creek shopping center.

July 16: Duke Law School Innocence Project agrees to take up Smith's case, an investigation that is continuing.

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