The Murder of Sheilah Doyle

 

I know, I know, you hear me often say “this murder is more senseless than others,” and I truly mean it when I say it. I feel like every time I hear of a murder that just seems to be for nothing I think I have “heard it all.” Then I come across another case that makes all the ones before seem like nothing compared to this one. This is just such a case.

Sheilah Doyle was a nurse in Evergreen Park Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. She lived in Palos Hills, another middle class suburb of Chicago, about thirty minutes away. She worked the three to eleven shift at the hospital there.

At around 12:30 am on July 4, 1993 Bill Doyle had woken up in bed and noticed that his wife, Sheilah, was not there. He looked at the clock and thought it was odd so he got up and looked around. Everything looked exactly as it did when he went to bed. He went out into the garage and saw that Sheilah's new black Toyota Camry was parked in the driveway. Inside he saw her purse and her nurses bag.

I want to stop here for a second and mention a few things. A television show I watched said that Bill noticed that the Camry had been pulled far up in the drive and had actually hit some toys in the garage. He claimed he grabbed the spare key and pulled the car back just a bit. My research indicated that the garage door was still open but there were other things that stated that the door had been closed. I do not recall this being discussed on the television show. I note this here because I think it is interesting. Knowing later what had occurred there it would seem odd that the door would have been closed, but it seems just as odd that it was not mentioned in the television show when telling the story, because it would be the first clue that either Sheilah had left, or something had happened.

Bill went inside the house and the oldest of the couple's three children, Kelly, woke up. Bill told Kelly how he could not find Sheilah and she offered to get in her car and drive around and look for him. In the meantime Bill called the Cook County Sheriff's Department. Two officers arrived on the scene and Bill told them his story. The officers looked around the garage and then asked Bill for the spare key to the car so they could look in the trunk. Kelly had just returned home also and the officers asked father and daughter to go back inside the house while they continued their search.

Apparently as soon as Bill and Kelly went back inside the house the officers opened the trunk of the car. They were stunned at what they found. Inside the trunk was the body of a woman and it was clear that she was not breathing. The officers went inside and notified the family and they called for more officers to the home. It was quickly discovered that the body belonged to Sheilah and she had been shot in the back (some research said it was the top and not back) of the head.

Officers immediately began questioning Bill. They asked him if he owned a gun and he told investigators he did not. Of course they did not take him for his word and they asked to search the home. Strangely, while the investigators told Bill and Kelly not to allow anyone over to the home while they searched, they did not wake the couple's other two children, seventeen year old Kevin and eight year old Kristin. The two younger children would not know about their mother's death until the following morning.

Investigators searched the Doyle home until about five that morning and then took Bill down to the police station to question him some more. Things did not seem to add up. Investigators could not figure out if Bill was not involved in Sheilah's murder how he had not heard a gunshot going off in his garage. Bodies just are not found in homes where no one else is injured unless it is someone close to the victim. Nothing seemed to match up. The only explanation that could be given was that it was Fourth of July weekend and there were fireworks going off in the neighborhood and even if Bill had heard the gunshot he likely would have dismissed it. Investigators did not really think that Bill was involved but they just simply could not explain it.

A few days later seventeen year old Kevin was talking to his friend down the street and was telling him about his mother being murdered. The friend's dad spoke little English but he understood enough to know that he was convinced he had seen what had happened. The man told his son, who told Kevin and they contacted investigators. According to the neighbor late in the night of July 3^rd he had heard a woman scream. He had looked outside his window in the direction of the scream and soon after heard the gunshot, although he believed it was probably fireworks. But, just after the noise the neighbor had seen two men run from the Doyle garage and get into a car that immediately took off. It is unclear whether the neighbor was able to describe the men or the car they got into.

Sheilah drove a black 1993 Toyota Camry and Bill had made sure to take extra care with the new vehicle. The car was cleaned and waxed often. While at first investigators found this to be a bit odd because the car was “so clean” but later they realized this worked to their advantage. Finger and palm prints were found on the jam of the drivers door and on the trunk of the car. Prints belonging to two unknown people were found on the trunk and one of those unknown people had apparently touched the door also.

Investigators were eventually able to connect print that was on the trunk and the door jam to twenty-two year old Antwon Tyler. It was said that initially there were no hits on the other palm print on the trunk but they would discover that it belonged to sixteen year old Marcos Gray. Along with Tyler and Gray, eventually twenty-one year old Gregory Jackson was also arrested. What happened next seems a bit confusing, but the motive for the crime was like one I have never heard before.

All my research indicates that prosecutors were able to piece the story together by the written confessions of the three men. However, it appears that they all may have recanted because they all took their cases to trial. By most accounts there were three separate trials but I cannot be certain of this or exactly when they all took place. What I can say is that for whatever reason Gregory Jackson would be acquitted on all charges. My only explanation for this is I have the feeling that his written confession was not entered and it appears that Illinois is one of the states in which a person cannot be convicted solely on the word of an alleged co-conspirator. There was nothing that put Gregory in that garage on that night aside from his own confession or the story told by Tyler and Gray.

Oddly, of the three perpetrators, it was sixteen year old Gray who had the longest criminal list. Seeing as he was a juvenile much of it was not brought to light right away, but it also helped investigators in deciding to charge his as an adult. In fact, at the time of Sheilah's murder Gray was awaiting trial for murder in what investigators called a gang related crime. He also had pending charges relating to aggravated battery, the unauthorized use of a firearm and other things. Tyler was also on probation at the time from a drug possession charge but it appears that none of his criminal record included violence. Jackson actually had no criminal record and was in college majoring in education.

The story that prosecutors were able to gather was this... A few days before Sheilah's murder Jackson and Tyler had been messing around with a gun. Tyler was handling it when it went off and put a bullet hole in the hood of Jackson's mothers 1992 black Toyota Camry. Allegedly Tyler told Jackson that he would either pay for it to be repaired, or he would steal a car to get the hood. It would later be said that a new hood at a Toyota dealership would have cost less than $400 and that a reconditioned hood would have been cheaper.

On the night of July 3^rd the three men were apparently driving around when they saw Sheilah and her 1993 black Toyota Camry and Tyler told Jackson to follow her. It was said that they followed her almost from the time she left the hospital until she pulled into the garage of her home. Tyler told Jackson to stop the car and he and Gray jumped out of the car. They ran up the driveway and confronted Sheilah as she was getting out of her car. It would be said that the men obviously wanted Sheilah's car but that she fought with them. They then decided to have her get into the trunk of the car and she continued to fight them and scream. Once inside the trunk Tyler pulled out a gun and shot her in the back of the head. They closed the trunk and ran back down the driveway.

Jackson would later say that he had no idea what was going on or what had happened but that when Tyler got back into the car he told him “she was fighting me. She tried to take the gun. I had to shoot her.” This would be in his written statement but apparently he never stated this out loud again.

All three men were charged with first degree murder and attempted armed robbery. As I stated above Jackson was acquitted. Tyler was convicted on all charges and given a sentence of life without parole. The Illinois Department of Corrections website confirms this as it shows him as having no release date.

Things get a bit confusing when it comes to Marcos Gray. My research all indicated that Gray too, like Tyler, was convicted on all charges and given a sentence of life without parole. I have seen a picture taken from the Illinois Department of Corrections website taken at some point that confirms this. However, currently the site currently states that his projected parole date is September 27, 2022 with complete discharge date of September 27, 2025. This means the DOC expects him to be paroled next year and on parole for three years. I did a little digging and I found a few appeals that I attempted to read through. There was an indication that his conviction and sentence were overturned at some point and a new trial was ordered. But, the appeal (2015) that mentions this also indicates that once again he was given life without parole. I questioned whether his sentence was changed due to the fact that the Supreme Court ruled that it was unlawful to sentence a juvenile to a MANDATORY life without parole sentence. It is not unlawful for a juvenile to receive a sentence of life without parole, it is only unlawful to receive it as a mandatory sentence and a hearing is required. The Supreme Court did not rule this until 2012 and made it retroactive so cases prior to that time had to make their way back into courts.

Sheilah's family created The Sheilah Doyle Foundation in her honor. The foundation supports children that have been impacted by homicide.

I do want to note that Sheilah's tombstone states her date of death as July 4^th. It is unclear, and probably unknown, just how long it took her to die after being shot. It was theorized that Sheilah pulled into her garage at about 11:40 that night.

There seems to have been no other information about Gregory Jackson so I can only assume that he has stayed out of trouble. Tyler, as I stated, will spend the rest of his life in prison. Seeing as Gray is scheduled to be parole in 2022. He will be in his mid-40s by that time. Time will only tell if we will hear about him again.