March 17, 2016
Hayden Mitman /for PhillyVoice
Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams announces murder charges against Quadir Jeffries. Police believe Jeffries was one of two killers in a violent triple homicide that occurred in Northeast Philadelphia in February of 2014.
On Feb. 13, 2014, three men were killed execution-style – all shot in the head, two of them were bound with electrical cords and duct tape – during a home invasion in the city's Lawncrest neighborhood.
A year later, in October 2015, Cori Thompson, 23, of the 1400 block of Magee Ave. in Castor Gardens, was arrested and charged.
He is still awaiting trial.
But law enforcement officials always believed another person was involved in the slayings of Keurlin Charles, 35; Brian Williams, 25; and Vagner Freemont, 34, according to Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams.
Now, more than two years later, prosecutors say they believe they have found that other suspect.
Quadir Jeffries, 24, of the 2200 block of Disston St. in Mayfair, was charged Thursday with murder, robbery, burglary, firearms offenses and related charges after a grand jury investigation, Williams said. The grand jury was necessary to obtain information in the case after several individuals refused to provide information to authorities in what Williams said was likely the result of witness intimidation.
"Quadir Jeffries committed a horrible triple murder," Williams said Thursday morning, announcing the charges. "And, I chose to submit his case to the investigating grand jury because certain witnesses were reluctant to give simple answers to simple questions. I'm thankful for the good work of the grand jury and investigators and hopeful that the families of Keurlin Charles, Brian Williams and Vagner Freemont will begin to receive the justice they deserve."
The evidence that tied Jeffries to the crime, Williams said, was a spent shell casing that police found at the scene.
Quadir Jeffries, 24, has been charged with murder and related offenses in a triple slaying from February of 2014.
According to court documents, Charles had lived in a home with his parents in the 6300 block of Martins Mill Road. Freemont, a friend, rented a room in the basement.
At about 2:41 p.m. on Feb. 13, 2014, Brian Williams visited the home, and shortly afterward, witnesses claim, two other men – who police believe were Jeffries and Thompson – were spotted walking in and out of the house.
Less than a half hour later, a witness contacted police when the men in the house didn't answer cellphone calls, according to court documents.
On Thursday, the district attorney said that Charles had been selling marijuana out of the home.
Police responding to the incident found the home "ransacked," court documents said, and in the living room, they found Williams dead on the floor.
He had been shot several times, including in his head, neck and thigh, and court documents said he was the only victim who had not been bound.
Nearby, on a living room couch, police found Charles' body. He had been bound by the wrists and shot once in the right side of his head, court documents said.
In an upstairs bedroom, Freemont was found, his hands and ankles bound, after having been shot in the right side of his head, court documents say.
"This was a horrific, horrific homicide," said the district attorney.
Court documents said the suspects took cash and marijuana, as well as Williams' bank card, which was used after the killings.
An investigation found that a gun that police allege was used by Thompson, could be traced to bullets found in Brian Williams' head and leg and was used to kill Freemont.
Court documents noted that investigators found that Jeffries' gun, a 9 mm, was used to shoot Williams in the neck and was used to kill Charles.
The district attorney alleges that Jeffries was involved in a home invasion in Hunting Park about a month prior to the slayings, when a 54-year-old man was shot with the same weapon that prosecutors believe was used in the triple homicide.
Jeffries and two others were convicted in that home invasion, and Jeffries is in prison serving a 20- to 40-year sentence.
Ballistic evidence from that home invasion linked the gun used in that crime to a shell casing found at the scene of the killings, he said.
"There was nothing simple about this investigation," said Assistant District Attorney Andrew Notaristefano. "All of the roads kept leading back to Quadir Jeffries."
A date has not yet been set for Jeffries' preliminary hearing on the charges.
