Home Page Table of Contents Update Page George L. Wallace February 7, 2006

- Arrests Made in Murder of George L. Wallace -

- His Fingerprints were found at Murder Scene ! -

 

Stephen M. Sterling - Age 21

3435 3rd Avenue, North

St. Petersburg, Florida

 

 

- Two charged with First Degree Murder in the killing of 85-year-old Man in home invasion  -
 


St. Petersburg, Florida – Two Black males have been arrested in connection with a home invasion that left George L. Wallace dead; Wallace lived in the 6600 block of Pasadena Avenue, North; in St. Petersburg.

Police arrested 21-year-old Stephen M. Sterling, of 3435 3rd. Ave., North, and 17-year-old Eugene Wesley, of 520 28th Ave., South, in the beating death of 85-year-old George Wallace.

Investigators say Wallace, who was disabled, was inside his home on Pasadena Avenue on January 13, 2005 when the two men broke into his house to burglarize it. Police say when they saw that someone was home, they beat Wallace to death with a pipe. Eugene Wesley threw a comforter over Mr. Wallace's head and Stephen Sterling beat him mercilessly with a pipe. Mr. Wallace died from his injuries at Bayfront Medical Center Hospital in St. Petersburg a few hours later.

Wallace's roommate says he was awakened by his screaming, but he thought he was having a nightmare and went back to sleep. He was awakened later by Mr. Wallace's moaning, at which time he got up and called police.

Sterling and Wesley are both charged with first degree murder.

Police say Sterling was identified from fingerprints found inside the residence. He was taken to the Pinellas County jail and held on no bond, pending a court appearance on Tuesday.

Eugene Wesley, who police say admitted to the crime, was placed into the custody of juvenile authorities. A hearing will be scheduled to determine whether he will be tried as a juvenile or an adult.

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Police say the plan was to burglarize the home, but Wallace evidently surprised the pair.

Investigators say fingerprints found inside the home implicated Sterling, and Wesley confessed to the crime.

Sterling's fingerprints were on record from a June grand theft arrest. Gulfport police arrested Sterling the next day on unrelated charges of trespassing and violation of probation. Gulfport police released Sterling early Feb. 2, jail records show. Information about the arrest was not available Monday night.

Department of Corrections records show he was placed on probation in October for a year and a half for a grand theft conviction.


Meanwhile, some neighbors told Action News they had been on edge since the attacks, and were relieved by the arrests.
 

See original articles:

 http://www.tampabays10.com/news/news.aspx?storyid=25030

http://www.abcactionnews.com/stories/2006/02/060207arrests.shtml

http://news.tbo.com/news/metro/MGB4J22ODJE.html

 

Comment:

Right after the murder I wrote the following:

<And, although the police do not have any suspects, you don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to deduce that two or three Black males (probably 2), ages 17 to 19, who live in the Mid-Town area of St. Petersburg, committed this Home Invasion and murder. I would estimate that at least one of them lives within a 1/2 mile radius of where the car was abandoned. This narrows things down considerably! How many 17 to 19-year-olds can there be in that area?

 

Furthermore, it is likely that the police have either fingerprints or DNA evidence from either Mr. Wallace's home or from his car. It would be a simple matter if the police could collect DNA samples from - and/or fingerprint - all of the 17 to 19 years olds within that half-mile radius, but the police cannot legally do that. They have to have reasonable suspicion that someone committed the crime. Of course, if the perpetrators have a record, which is likely, they have been fingerprinted, and all the police would have to do is match up the prints.>

 

My deductions have proven to be mostly correct: the perpetrators were two Black males; I put them both between 17 and 19 years of age - one is 17 and the other is 21 years old; I suggested that they could be apprehended from fingerprints at the scene and that the perpetrators likely already had a police record - this proved to be true; Stephen Sterling was arrested in June of 2005 for "grand theft." Stephen Sterling's address was 3435 3rd Ave., N., which is two miles from where Mr. Wallace's car was abandoned at Melrose Ave. and 19th Street. Eugene Wesley's address is 520 28th Ave., South, which is two miles in the opposite direction from where the auto was abandoned. The two killers abandoned the car halfway between their two addresses. My supposition was somewhat off on this point.

 

Incidentally, it took the St. Petersburg police 3 1/2 weeks to make the arrests; one wonders what took them so long. In the interim, the killers could have struck again. Now, however, after some of the facts have been revealed, we know why it took the St. Petersburg police 3 1/2 weeks to arrest Stephen Sterling. The day after the murder, the City of Gulfport police (a small town to the west and south of St. Petersburg) arrested Sterling on charges unrelated to the murder - he was arrested for trespassing and violation of probation and he was put in jail. By this time, the St. Petersburg police had discovered some fingerprints at Mr. Wallace's home, and they probably also established on January 14, the same day that Sterling was arrested in Gulfport, that the fingerprints were those of one Stephen M. Sterling, who resided at 3435 3rd. Ave., North, but who had mysteriously vanished. No one in his apartment building had seen him since January 14th. From what we know, one can deduce that 24 hours after the murder took place the St. Petersburg police knew that Stephen Sterling was one of the killers. But they couldn't find him. They couldn't find him, because he was sitting in the Gulfport jail.

 

But the St. Petersburg police did not publicly announce that they knew who one of the killers was. And one has to conclude that they had no idea that Sterling was sitting in the Gulfport jail; otherwise they never would have allowed the Gulfport police to release Sterling on February 2nd - as shown by the Gulfport police jail records. Neither the Gulfport police, nor the St. Petersburg police, nor the news media, have addressed this curious situation - and one can understand why. Somebody would be very embarrassed. There was obviously lacking communication between the two police forces of the two communities. This situation could have ended much more seriously than it did. Sterling had the time to flee the area, and possibly could have eluded police for years. Worse yet: He could have committed another serious crime and could possibly even have murdered again - he had nothing to lose. He knew that he was facing a possible death sentence for first degree murder. Additionally, the police might never have found out who Sterling's accomplice was, since it was presumably from Sterling that the police learned the name of Eugene Wesley.

 

Why hasn't the news media asked the police departments these questions? This lack of communication between police departments could have been very costly in terms of additional crimes being committed. As it stands, there were additional costs, namely the money spent trying to locate Sterling while he was sitting in the Gulfport jail. The taxpayers will have to pay for this oversight.

 

Another obvious question is, if Stephen Sterling was arrested in June of 2005 for grand theft, why wasn't he put in jail instead of being put on probation? The reason that he wasn't put in jail is probably because the prisons and jails are full. Sterling was given 18 months probation in October for the grand theft charge.

 

Additionally, there still remain unanswered questions concerning prior arrests of both Stephen Sterling and Eugene Wesley. And I think that the reason the news media does not ask these questions is because they don't want to know. I think that the news media is afraid of being too inquisitive lest they be challenged by so-called civil-rights organizations for discriminating against Blacks. And further, I also believe that the news media is afraid of the Black community. The people who work for the news media are constantly living in fear of losing their jobs if they say the wrong thing about Blacks or if they pry too deeply into Blacks' criminal records.

 

One question that the news media should be asking now is why someone who is convicted of grand theft only gets 18 months probation instead of jail time, and this, when it is a good bet that Sterling already had a police record of prior convictions. If the judge gave Sterling 18 months probation because there isn't enough space in the jails and prisons, then the news media should be asking why there isn't enough space. If the State of Florida has a surplus of cash, as Governor Jeb Bush is claiming, then why don't they build another prison? Are the news media afraid to ask the difficult questions because they are afraid of the Blacks and the so-called civil-rights organizations?

 

The citizens of Florida have to demand that the Governor and the legislature approve funds for the building of more prisons. Since the Governor and the legislature are very much aware of the fact that Florida's prisons are overcrowded, they have to be taken to task over this matter. The way things now stand, both the Governor and the state legislature can be accused of having blood on their hands from the murder of George L. Wallace and other murders which have taken place under similar circumstances.

 

And the cowards who work for the news media are also partially responsible for the high-level of violence in our society, because they are not reporting all of the facts and they are not asking the difficult questions. The news media spends most of its time reporting so-called human-interest stories, which are just a lot of fluff to entertain their audiences. The average citizens of America have got to demand that the governors and legislatures of our individual states appropriate the necessary funds to build the number of prisons that we need to house the criminals. Anything short of this is malfeasance of office.

 

And we must also demand more of the news media - or we should establish our own alternative news media, such as this and other websites, that are not afraid to speak the truth. I would like to ask that the reader inform others about this website, and if you have any information about serious crimes committed in your area, please let us know and we will publish it. Our email address is on the Table-of-Contents' page.

 

Yours Faithfully, Liberty

Home Page Table of Contents Update Page George L. Wallace February 7, 2006