THE DARK SIDE OF IOWA
Jason Tate
#6259995
photo courtesy Quad City Times
Full Name: Jason Dwaine Tate
DOB: December 12, 1978
Charge: 1st degree murder
County: Clinton
City: Clinton
Current Status: Iowa State Penitentiary
Date of Crime: December 19, 2010
Tentative Discharge Date: Life
Victim: Kelsey Stahl
DOB: December 12, 1978
Charge: 1st degree murder
County: Clinton
City: Clinton
Current Status: Iowa State Penitentiary
Date of Crime: December 19, 2010
Tentative Discharge Date: Life
Victim: Kelsey Stahl
Jason Dwaine Tate and Kelsey Stahl knew each other well. In the spring of 2010, Kelsey moved into a one bedroom apartment at Miller Ridge Apartments in Clinton. Jason moved into her apartment approximately 45 days later. However, between November and December 2010, Kelsey’s friends reported seeing a change in her behavior and her relationship with Jason.
On December 19, 2010, Jason fired a single shot from a .38-caliber revolver that pierced Kelsey’s neck just below her jaw line on the right side of her body. The bullet severed Kelsey’s spinal cord and lodged into her third cervical vertebra. The shot caused Kelsey to collapse on her bedroom floor. The gunshot likely caused instant paralysis and Kelsey remained conscious, if at all, for a matter of minutes or seconds.
Immediately after the shooting, Jason grasped Kelsey’s body and attempted to drag her out of the apartment. He pulled her out of the bedroom, down a short hallway, and into the entrance of the kitchen. At some point, he stopped trying to move her and left Kelsey’s body lying on the linoleum floor. Jason then grabbed the gun, ran down the apartment stairs and threw the gun away from the apartment into the snow. He rushed back into the apartment, stepped over Kelsey’s body, and changed his blood-stained jeans in the bedroom. After changing, Jason again stepped over Kelsey’s body, took her car keys off the top of the refrigerator, and locked the door on his way out of the apartment.
On December 19, 2010, Jason fired a single shot from a .38-caliber revolver that pierced Kelsey’s neck just below her jaw line on the right side of her body. The bullet severed Kelsey’s spinal cord and lodged into her third cervical vertebra. The shot caused Kelsey to collapse on her bedroom floor. The gunshot likely caused instant paralysis and Kelsey remained conscious, if at all, for a matter of minutes or seconds.
Immediately after the shooting, Jason grasped Kelsey’s body and attempted to drag her out of the apartment. He pulled her out of the bedroom, down a short hallway, and into the entrance of the kitchen. At some point, he stopped trying to move her and left Kelsey’s body lying on the linoleum floor. Jason then grabbed the gun, ran down the apartment stairs and threw the gun away from the apartment into the snow. He rushed back into the apartment, stepped over Kelsey’s body, and changed his blood-stained jeans in the bedroom. After changing, Jason again stepped over Kelsey’s body, took her car keys off the top of the refrigerator, and locked the door on his way out of the apartment.
Kelsey Stahl, courtesy WCF Courier
After leaving Kelsey’s apartment, Jason drove her car to a nearby gas station. He purchased gas, cigarettes, and a lighter – in three separate successive transactions. He then drove across the Mississippi River and into Illinois. While in the car, he placed several phone calls. He called his mother, Jerri Ross (his ex-girlfriend’s mother and grandmother to one of his three children), and Neelie Wallace. Neelie is another one of Jason’s ex-girlfriends with whom he had a child.
Beginning at or around 9:45 on December 19, 2010, Jason placed between nine and eleven phone calls to Neelie. Neelie later testified that Jason left a frantic message saying he wanted to see his son “one last time” because “he was gonna be gone for a while, so he just wanted to be with people that he loved.” Neelie eventually returned Jason’s calls and allowed him to come to her home in Rockford, Illinois.
At approximately 11:30 PM on December 19, Jason arrived at Neelie’s home. Upon his arrive, he told Neelie he was “on the run for murder.” When she asked what he meant, he laughed while he said “from a long time ago.” Neelie then noticed blood on Jason’s shirt and shoes. She asked him what happened and he told her that he was at a “trap house” with Kelsey when someone robbed them. He said someone came into the room and started shooting. In the midst of everything, he looked over at Kelsey and noticed that she had been shot but didn’t know what to do.
Later that night, Jason told Neelie that “he had a gun and that he thought maybe he had shot her, but he wasn’t sure.” He explained that after Kelsey had been shot, he tried to life her arms over her head and then just grabbed her keys and left. After explaining the blood on his clothes, he took what appeared to be a shell casing out of his pocket and told Neelie she “needed to get rid of it.” Neelie allowed him to shower and stay the night. Jason and Neelie then engaged in sexual intercourse.
The next day, Jason changed his story to Neelie. He began to cry and said, “I swear it was an accident.” He confided in Neelie that he had accidentally shot Kelsey. While explaining what happened, he said he was in Kelsey’s bedroom and she asked to see his new “banger.” He thought the gun was unloaded and he gave it to Kelsey. He then said she accidentally shot herself. Neelie asked Jason what he would have done if she had been shot instead of Kelsey. Jason said he would have taken her to the hospital immediately.
On December 21, 2010, Jason asked Neelie to move Kelsey’s car. Jason had parked Kelsey’s car away from Neelie’s apartment in a different apartment complex. Once they reached Kelsey’s car, they decided to park it alongside of an abandoned house. After parking the car alongside the abandoned house, Jason asked Neelie if she would drive him to Chicago. As Neelie later explained, she did not want to get in trouble for helping him so she declined. However, she agreed to take him to the gas station, give him money, and pay for gas in Kelsey’s car. After Jason left, Neelie called the Crime Stoppers hotline, told law enforcement she had heard Kelsey had been killed, and requested law enforcement to check Kelsey’s apartment.
Later on December 21, police arrived at Kelsey’s apartment to investigate the Crime Stoppers tip. Upon arrival, police officers noticed blood on Kelsey’s apartment door. After gaining entry into the apartment, officers discovered Kelsey’s body lying on the floor in the hallway between the bedroom and the kitchen. A blood splatter analysis revealed Kelsey had been shot in her bedroom near the closet. Large transfer stains indicated someone dragged Kelsey’s body from the bedroom to the hallway near the kitchen. Police found two live .38-caliber rounds in the bedroom, and one in the hallway between the bedroom and the kitchen. Authorities later matched Jason’s fingerprints to the bloody prints on the door.
Meanwhile, Jason drove Kelsey’s car to Evanston, Illinois – a northern suburb of Chicago. He then took a train to the south side of Chicago to meet up with a friend. Undercover police officers acted on a tip that Jason was in Chicago and apprehended him on the street. As officers patted Jason down for weapons, Jason told them he had thrown the gun in the Mississippi River.
While in the car with officers, Jason reportedly said he was having difficulty sleeping because he kept seeing Kelsey’s face. Jason said, “She was just too heavy. I couldn’t get her in the garbage.” Jason then said he “was going to jail for a very long time, wasn’t gonna see his kids.”
In the Spring of 2011, a Miller Ridge employee found a .38-caliber revolver with a peral handle near Kelsey’s apartment. One of the chambers still had a casing inside it. The casing was at the 2:00 position, indicating the trigger had been pulled again after the bullet housed in that casing was fired, or that someone opened the gun and rotated the chamber after the shot was fired. A ballistics report later matched the bullet recovered from Kelsey’s body to the .38-caliber revolver found outside the apartment. The ballistics report indicated the gun had been fired one foot to two-and-a-half feet away from the entry wound.
Source: Justia US Law
