Murder on winter’s morn
Who’d want to kill this young couple at Christmas?
‘I just got shot...’ The line fell silent
In the small hours of Christmas Day 2015, children everywhere were tucked up in their beds, dreaming of the excitement to come. Stockings were filled and presents were heaped under trees, awaiting the magic that morning would bring.
Tired mums and dads grabbed some sleep, too, in preparation for the busy, festive day ahead. But, at 3.34am, while it was still dark, an emergency-services operator in Augusta, Maine, took a frantic call. On the other end of the line was a frightened woman, a young mum. ‘I just…i just got shot,’ she managed to say. There were a few more garbled words. It was hard for the operator to make them out. Then the woman fell silent. But the line was still open. Using tracking software, the authorities traced the phone’s location. And, as police officers raced to the scene – the entrance to a gravel pit on a remote lane – they tried in vain to get a response from the caller. Still on the line to the caller, the operator said, ‘If you can hear me but are unable to speak, please press any button on your keypad now.… But it was too late. The police found a maroon people carrier – and, inside it, two dead bodies. Eric Williams, 35, was slumped in the driving seat, his girlfriend and mum-of-one, Bonnie Royer, 26, beside him in the passenger seat. She’d died making the emergency call. Both had been murdered on Christmas morning by an unknown gunman. The grisly scene wasn’t far from the home the couple shared on Easy Street, North Augusta. As Christmas Day dawned and the news spread, shockwaves echoed around the quiet area. Who would have killed this young couple? Thoughts turned to Bonnie’s 6-year-old daughter, who lived with her dad. Bonnie’s grieving family held a candlelit vigil and a spokesperson issued a statement on their behalf. ‘We are beside ourselves during this difficult time. ‘You can never prepare for the death of your child. Bonnie is an amazing soul with such a big heart.’ All the while, the police investigated, interviewing suspects and retracing the couple’s final steps on Christmas Eve. Then, four days after the murders, the police stopped a car and arrested David W Marble Jr, 29, a rapper and keen chess player, who originally came from New York.
Marble made a living dealing drugs, even went by the street name ‘Dee Money’.
Marble was charged with the double murders, as the police revealed to reporters that the couple’s death was drugs related.
In July 2017, after much legal wrangling and delay, David Marble stood trial at County Court.
He pleaded not guilty to double murder.
Prosecutors told the court that Marble had shot Bonnie and Eric execution-style, as he sat behind them in the vehicle early on Christmas morning.
It was said the murders were carried out as vigilante justice, revenge for Eric breaking into Marble’s flat on 24 December and stealing TVS, drugs, a gun and several backpacks.
The burglary, prosecutors claimed, had been the ‘final
straw’ for Marble.
So Marble had arranged for Eric and Bonnie to collect him shortly after 3am on Christmas morning, under the pretext of selling Eric drugs – Eric had bought drugs from him before.
Court papers included a text message from Marble’s phone, minutes before the murders: It had to be Eric. I am with him
now we taking a trip.
The prosecution claimed that Marble had put a gun to the couple’s heads when they’d parked up at the entrance to the gravel pit.
Shots were heard by Marble’s associates, parked nearby, and a witness even claimed to have supplied Marble with the murder weapon. The prosecution told the court that Marble had been seen returning to the people carrier after the first shooting, because he’d left his phone inside the car – and that another shot was heard. Initially, Bonnie had survived, managing to make the desperate call to emergency services. It was said that she was pregnant and therefore, ‘profoundly motivated’, staying alive long enough to call for help. But she and Eric were both dead by the time the police found the car. Mobile-phone data placed Marble at the crime scene that night and the court heard that texts between him and Eric before the shooting indicated that the two men were on a ‘collision course’ to murder. But Marble’s defence argued that there was no forensic evidence tying him to the crime. The murder weapon wasn’t found and neither his fingerprints or DNA were found in the car. There wasn’t any trace of Marble’s shoeprints outside in the sand of the gravel pit, either. ‘You’re not going to have any evidence that puts him there,’ insisted Marble’s lawyer Jon Gale. Gale also highlighted how Marble hadn’t fled the area, even though he’d known that the police were interviewing suspects. ‘He could have been gone within an hour,’ Gale insisted. Instead, Marble had stayed put. Was that really the action of a guilty man? Marble’s defence also claimed the murder could have been committed by any one of a number of other suspects. The defence accused the police of failing to properly investigate all avenues, focusing too quickly on Marble. So was David Marble guilty – or was Eric and Bonnie’s real killer still out there?